Why God Lets Children Get Cancer – Part II

Dear TEAMS,

My last post to you began the discussion of Why Does God Let Bad Things Happen?  In it, I counseled you to really get at the heart of what your hurting friend is really dealing with.  In the end, they need to know you care.

As for the theological/academic answer to that question, I have found it to be brusque and hard but nonetheless Truth.  God does not need to be defended.  I am reminded of the movie A Few Good Men and the dialogue between characters in the courtroom:

Col. Jessep:   You want answers?

Kaffee:   I think I'm entitled to.

Col. Jessep:   You want answers?

Kaffee:   I want the truth!

Col. Jessep:   You can't handle the truth!

The Truth is that God didn’t mess up this world, we did.  He created us with the ability to make powerful choices, and every choice we make in life either creates life or it doesn’t.  Choose to smoke 20 cigarettes a day, and you’ll probably get lung cancer and die from it.  Even if you’re a nice guy, the life of the party, the best friend of everyone you meet.  God, who created magnificent lung tissue that extracts what we cannot see from the air we take in and a body that then distributes those elements all around without our having any control or knowledge of it, entrusted that lung tissue to us for care.  But somehow, the smoker is absolved of all blame when they didn’t hold up their end of the bargain?

God entrusts a person with financial or property wealth and the person thinks of nothing else but to spend it on his own pleasure, so much so that at the end of life, the surplus is gone.  Three generations later, his young, widowed, great-granddaughter who is the sweetest person anyone has ever met would love to be able to buy a house for her children but cannot, and laughs at her situation, wondering what it was like for this unknown ancestor to have enough to get through a day.  And God is blamed that this good woman is in her situation?

Hundreds of years ago, an ancestor wandered into a place of higher naturally occurring radiation, or was incapable of eating a balanced diet, or was a cussed son-of-a-gun and drank himself silly and caused genetic mutation that was carried and built upon throughout time.  Perhaps even more descendants of his made terrible choices as well, adding to the likelihood of DNA damage.  And a young boy born to lovely parents contracts brain cancer at 12 months.  But all of a sudden, there is no anger at stupid choices that there is no proof of, but anger at a God who there is proof of?

Just what exactly ARE we responsible for, if not our choices?  And when we are a victim to one or more person’s bad choices, why aren’t people really focused with their anger at the people who made the bad choices?  And why is it that the people who generally ask these questions don’t entertain the possibility that there have been thousands upon millions of things that they have been spared from because of the very nature of God that they are now calling into question?  

We cannot have it both ways.  We cannot get angry at God for not stopping the drunk driver that killed the newly graduated, responsible high school student but then dismiss away the times we made the bad common sense choices and believe we “got away with it” because we saw nothing bad happen.  Nothing bad happened because of God’s Mercy, not because you are God and made it that way.  Why is it deciding to have unprotected sex that didn’t result in pregnancy or STD (if only that was all there was to it!) is seen as us dodging a bullet, and not an act of God’s mercy?  

Make no mistake; God set up the world to be a place of beauty and compassion and about Him.  Not because He is a self-absorbed, self-centered SOB, but because He has always been, always is, and always will be.  He spoke one word, and life and our world was created, full of mysteries and wonder and beauty that we cannot fathom with our merely human brains.  He set up the laws we live by, both legal and unspoken.  He is the ultimate authority.  But to blame Him, when He is the originator of all we find good in the world?  Is that even logical?  Again, if it’s God’s fault, do you really believe you are walking through this world completely innocent and absolved of blame?

So, how do you reconcile the fact that children get cancer (or insert whatever you wish that is tragic), through no fault of their own?  Well, truly, I think that is the wrong question.  Just think about it logically:

• Will answering this question keep children from getting cancer ever again?
• Will answering this question heal the child of his/her cancer?
• Will you accept the answer if you don’t like it?

Because the answer to the question of why there is evil in the world is that there just is.  We Christians frame it as “we live in a fallen world.”  I defy you to tell me there is not, because I’ve got a whole lotta tangible proof around me.  I have found as I see more of life that the most successful people in life acknowledge the existence of evil, but choose to focus on the abundance of blessings they DO have.  Hence, the Facebook status that realizes the luxury that the worst thing in your life right now is bad traffic, or that people disagree with you politically.

What I finished in my message to my friend on Facebook: 

All I know is that God weeps with us and cares and is walking beside us. He made us strong, and I believe He delights to see us rely on that gift in these hard, character-refining times. He is more there than we know, protecting us from far more than we can see or imagine, and showing new mercies to us every morning.

Love,

Why God Lets Children Get Cancer – Part I

Dear TEAMS,

I was on Facebook yesterday and was posting an observation from one of Daddy’s friends who has a 2-year old son with brain cancer.  They have been battling it over a year, and the child has done the last experimental treatment possible…and the cancer came back.  The child has already had IQ points knocked off because of the brain damage caused by the aggressive chemo treatment that was necessary for the cancer...and now the child has cancer back anyway.  It is heartbreaking.

Anyway, Daddy’s friend said that he wished he had the luxury of being able to make a “normal” Facebook post about the bad traffic or politicians his disagreed with or a passing illness.  That struck me, because most of the people on FB who post those things are unaware that it is a luxury to only have those things to invest their emotional energy into.  So, I posted a status that reflected my observation.

One of the comments I received was from a childhood friend who said, “These are the things I plan to discuss with God someday!”  The comment struck me as odd, because my status was about putting things into perspective.  But upon reflection, I realized her comment reflected the hurt and anger she has at the way things are and seeing people she loves suffer.

I sent her a private message that told her that I cared that she hurt, and that I wondered about how it all worked together.  Here is an excerpt of my message to her:

I have no answers for you about the "whys." I ask them myself sometimes. Theologically, I suppose one could debate about a fallen world and God remaining true and submissive to his own laws, but in the end words and discussions really don't provide the comfort and healing that is needed instead.

There will be a point in your life that you will probably wonder about how, if God is so powerful and can do anything, why he would let young children get (and die of) cancer, or why bad things happen, or why if you prayed you didn’t get the answer you wanted.  If you don’t get to that point in your life, rest assured that people you care about will.  So, I wanted to tell you what I have been led to believe, which has comforted me in times of crisis and hopefully will empower you to comfort yourself and your friends.

Simply, look at the heart of the person (or yourself) as to why the question is being asked.  I have found that the person asking the “why” question usually falls into 2 camps:  the person is angry and hurting, or the person is humbly reflecting on the mystery of the nature of God.  Mostly, people fall into the former category.  I will tell you, though, that it has been my experience that the person will not be helped by the answer to that question.  They (or you) are deluding themselves if they think it will take away the pain.  Sometimes, the person is looking for a reason to hate God and just wants to finally have a reason, because deep down they know the academic answer (which I cover in my next blog).  The actual action that needs to happen is to come alongside the one you love and tend to the hurt, and the question becomes a non-issue because the real need the person has is being tended to. 

Practically, here are some things you can say to your loved one who is really struggling:

• You know, I ask the same thing sometimes!  I don’t have an answer for you right now, but I care and would like to walk through your pain with you.
• I don’t feel as if I can really talk about that with you right now.  But could we spend some time together over coffee?
• I can tell this really bothers you and makes you [sad/upset/angry].  I don’t blame you…it certainly is a good question.  Just know I care that you are [sad/upset/angry]. 

Love, 

How To Write a Letter To The Editor

Dear TEAMS, 

As you know, I am not one to remain silent on things that are important.  As I have gotten older, I have realized that less things are important than I think, but every so often something happens that I feel another viewpoint needs to be heard.

That’s when I feel a well-phrased Letter to the Editor (or anyone who needs to hear) is called for.  But before you open up your laptop and zip one off, I wanted you to submit to you some things for your consideration:

• Pray for God’s wisdom to guide you and put words in your head while you write.  It could be God wishes to use your letter in a life-changing way that you never know, and He will be sure to tell you phrases that will ring true with the reader.
• Do not expect to hear a response, and do not write your letter to get a response.  Write the letter because you want  the person to consider a point of view they do not seem to be aware of.
• Always be courteous, respectful and kind in your letter, and be diplomatic in word choice and phraseology.  The Truth is offensive enough.  Don’t give people an excuse to refrain from dealing with the point you are trying to make because they want to attack your behavior.
• Stick to the facts and use logic.  If you hear back from someone and they take issue with your logic and facts, well, that’s a reflection on them.
• Don’t make threats.  If you really think you cancelling your subscription matters to the editor, you are WAY wrong.  In fact, they are glad to be rid of you because they are just as busy as you are and would rather spend their time elsewhere than with someone who disagrees with them. 
• In fact, a well-placed sentence stating your appreciation for other areas of the publication show that you are an interested reader.
• Show grace.  I use the Three Strikes Rule:  the first time something was in a publication that caused me to get my dander up, it was just an opportunity for me to learn to bless them and re-examine/stretch my viewpoints; the second time something shows up I heartily disagree with is just another opportunity for me to show grace; and the third time is a trend and I probably don’t want to waste my money on renewing.
• By all means, use your spell-check and grammar check.  Your Momma learnt you some good English—USE IT!  Again, it makes the reader (who will be dealing with an opposing viewpoint) stick to the viewpoint and not the intelligence of the writer.  (It is, of course, unfortunate that people are judged by their ability to construct sentences in a correct way, but trust me—it’s just the way it is!)
• If you feel you need to cancel your subscription, then do it, but without fanfare or a nastygram.  I have quietly cancelled 2 magazines and a newspaper subscription so far in my life, and two times I didn’t bother telling the people why, nor did they come asking.  Interestingly enough, the 2 magazines folded within 9 months of me cancelling my subscription, and the newspaper closed up after 18 months.  But at least I knew I had given the publications a fair opportunity to win me (and my hard-earned money) back by sticking to the purpose it was created for and the reason I subscribed to it in the first place.

 

Here is the actual letter I emailed to the editor of Prevention magazine on 3/9/12.  (This was strike one and have since scored another strike with me in a subsequent issue):

Ms. Salvatore:

Thank you for your hard work on Prevention magazine. I have enjoyed my subscription for several years and plan to continue doing so.

On page 10 of the April 2012 issue (“Ask Prevention”), Prevention’s answer to a reader wondering how much porn is too much for a teenaged boy seems underwise and overly politically correct. In the answer, you cite Todd Spaulding of Oxbow Academy who states that “viewing porn provides the same dopamine hit to the brain as drugs or gambling.” That statement implies drugs and gambling are bad physiologically, and porn is to be included with those choices.

If you were to change Spaulding’s last quoted statement to read, “If he prefers doing drugs by himself to hanging out with friends, then you may want to consult with a professional therapist,” you would have hell to pay. No one in their right mind would read that statement and think it is valid, healthy, or a part of true wellness to let a kid do drugs. Add to this that the majority of porn deals with dysfunctional relationship where there is an aggressor and a victim (the highest percentage of which are female), and there is no credence to the advice given to this poor woman. The answer to “How much porn is too much?” is the same as “How much ecstasy/pot/heroin is too much?”: One hit, be it a tab, puff, or website.

Sorry, you got this one completely wrong and we readers deserve better.

Sincerely,
[Me]

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Love, 

Checklist: You Know When You’re an Adult When…

Dear TEAMS,

This morning I woke up to crying.  E was downstairs, stomping around.  A few minutes later, I heard the Camry back up the driveway and she was gone.

Your father came up the stairs and I asked him what was up.  He told me that E was very tired and getting sick and she didn’t know what to do since she had to go to work, and she was mad at your father for (very wisely) not telling her to stay home.

Ah, the joys of adulthood!  When all of a sudden you realize that you are responsible for the big and little decisions of your life, and you are responsible for the consequences of the decisions no matter what.

Somewhere along the way, your father and I, without our knowledge or fanfare or celebration, became adults.  It wasn’t when we turned 18 or 21, it wasn’t when we went to college or got married.  It wasn’t even when we had kids.  These were all moments that contributed to our growing up, but not the actual turning point.  But, it happened nonetheless, and I’m glad of it.

Instead of talking about what the definition of an adult is, I thought it might be better to give you a few litmus tests you can compare yourself to know whether or not you qualify.  

Beeteedubs (as M likes to say):  Just as you can’t know all the thrills and benefits of becoming a member to an exclusive club but you just join in faith it will be enjoyable, you can’t know how fulfilling all the benefits are to being an adult until you become one.  Your choice...but I will tell you it's worth it!

You Know You Are an Adult When:

• (And this one I read once from someone wiser than myself) you do the right things even when no one is looking.
• You are ready to accept consequences for your choices, good or bad.
• You make decisions based more on how other people around you will be affected rather than how you will be impacted.
• Sex, entertainment, or any pleasurable activity is not so you can be gratified but rather relationship-building with your spouse (sex) or friends and family.
• You practice good hygiene and wellness practices for the purposes of taking care of your body to invest in the future and nothing else.
• Having children is about them and not what you’ll get out of it.
• You spend most of your days working and your free time in each day is spent on activities that are “others” centered.
• You get enough sleep.
• You understand that being wrong actually has nothing to do with anything.
• You understand that humility is not the absence of pride, it is understanding who you are in relationship to who God is.
• You have the capacity to earn and save enough money to support yourself and any dependents and that fact is extremely satisfying and desirable to you.
• You value “old people.”
• You realize that all the time giving your opinion is less helpful than saying “I care.”
• How you feel is less relevant to you than what is right.
• You are fairly certain that at any given moment, you “feel” things more purely and acutely than most people around you who are more expressive about their emotions, and yet you still have the capacity to care for what is troubling them and help them.
• The friends you have live their own lives without you, but when you’re together, their life experience blends with your life experience and makes it magical.
• Being loved and accepted by most is not even a regular part of your thought life; loving and accepting the most important people in your life is.

Love,

Note-able

Dear TEAMS,

Was looking around the house today and realized how much communication gets done via notes and posts.  Do you remember:

Added 5/28/12:

Love,

You Won’t Go Blind, But… — MATURE CONTENT

PLEASE NOTE:  This blog post is written for the future audience of my adult children and deals with sexual self-gratification (masturbation).  If this topic offends you, you should stop reading this now.

 Dear TEAMS,

I am laughing to myself as I imagine each one of you, years from now, reading this post.  Betcha never even knew your Momma knew what that word was, eh?!? 

I’d like to talk with you about this concept, though, because I can’t imagine it won’t ever come up with you or your children.  I suppose it should have come up in our home with you as teens, reconciling yourselves to your adult bodies.  But your father and I just never knew what would fan a flame and what would serve as instruction, so like all chicken Christians, we dropped it.  My prayer is that it never became a stumbling block for any of you.

I am looking back on my life and thinking about how I just wanted to be told what I should and should not do when I was in my teen years.  I know I wanted to serve God and have a relationship with Him, and I wanted efficiency in my instruction.  I was pretty sure of the “should nots,” but needed clarity on the maybes.

As I have matured in my relationship with God, I realized I had it backwards.  Sure, sometimes just doing what is understood to be a good discipline even if you don’t understand the “why” can birth greater depth of understanding for issues.  For instance, spending time reading the Bible every day, even when I don’t feel like it or the words seem one-dimensional, has created in me a deeper understanding of the power of God’s Word and what those times that seemed inconsequential really birthed in me over time.  But the “biggie” topics—the ones that had the power to destroy or build up but aren’t mentioned in the Bible—God was trying to show me that it’s about what my base motivation is in my heart, not the action itself.

Individual masturbation has one goal:  to create sexual climax by yourself.  Let me tell you why Sexual self-gratification (SSG) matters, and why it’s a big deal. 

• SSG sets up the expectation that this is the end goal of sexual relationship:  YOU having YOUR climax.
• SSG sets up the idea that you can have what you want when you want it, which isn’t true in any dimension of any fulfilling life.
• SSG does not allow you to develop a healthy coping mechanism to deal with your sexual desires without climax.  There will be times in your marriage that your partner will be unable or unwilling to make love with you, but will need your presence in other ways.  You will need to have the skill of knowing how to “calm down” in order to better meet his/her needs.
• SSG robs your future partner of discovering sex together.  It’s this wonderful, marvelous new world and getting to learn together builds trust in the relationship in a deep way.
• SSG in marriage creates insensitivity to your partner’s sexual needs.  There’s this wonderful subliminal simpatico that lovers get where they discover they are feeling the same feelings at the same time, which they then schedule for or plan for fulfilling and meeting each other’s needs.  If you simply gratify yourself, you deaden that radar and your spouse feels alone.
• SSG creates memories that you bring into your relationship with your spouse which can cause frustration that he/she isn’t scratching your itch the way you do.  That’s not fair to compare, and is akin to being upset that your spouse doesn’t perform as well as your other active lover (you!).
• SSG can be a “gateway” for other non-God intended sexual behavior (such as pornography, etc.), because (once again) it makes sex about how YOU feel and how YOU are relieved and YOUR buzz.  Great sex is completely servant-hearted and not about any of that, even though you feel great and are relieved and buzzed afterwards.
• SSG can cause timing issues when you are making love with your spouse.
• SSG can cause guilt, which in turn can cause you to harden your heart because you get tired of the discomfort guilt brings.
• SSG as a coping mechanism for the stresses in life does not allow God to comfort you and teach you how to cope with the very real, hard things you are dealing with.  Using any sexual activity to cope with stress is pretty much addiction.  God not only wants to help you cope, He wants to deliver you from that stress…a more permanent, mature solution that helps you the next time you encounter stress.

In other words, masturbation makes everything about YOU.  You know from living life in our home that our happiest, most contented days were when everyone was purposing in their hearts to serve other’s needs over their own.  The Bible speaks over and over again about how placing others’ needs over your own are the ultimate act of love.  I want you to live out your excellent destiny.  I hope you will choose God’s best over your own.

Love,

Love Note!

(Written April 12, 2012)

Dear TEAMS,

I am currently sitting in our Camry at Marietta War Memorial field, waiting for S’s first baseball scrimmage of the season to start.  After such a mild March, April has turned cold again—well, really it’s turned normal for us.  I am thrilled to see S’s throwing arm having gotten so accurate.  He has grown 2 inches in the last 4 months, and his legs look long and powerful.  Everyone in the team is kidding around, and they are shoving each other and tossing the ball and warming up.

This year will be S’s last with the Boys’ Club, as he will age out next year.  And unless T takes up a spring sport, it will also be the last year for us to have schedule juggling, since M is a senior and doing track.  It makes for busy weeks, although not even as busy as when we had E doing track as well.

Yesterday it was 3 months until Daddy and I have 3 children over 18 in our home.  I am writing this to you to admit to you that some days I wish I could hurry up and just have the house to myself; that if dirty dishes are in the sink at 1:15 PM, I have no one to blame but myself for not cleaning up after my lunch properly.  Or, that I could really just write (or work on stuff for the business) all day uninterrupted.  Or that fixing a supper involving 10 chicken breasts, 1 loaf of bread plus a bag of stuffing, 3 onions and 3 stalks of celery was not commonplace but rather an adventure.  Or that sitting at a baseball scrimmage in 49 degree weather is only an act of love for my son to support him.

There are a thousand different things in my days and weeks and months that in 10 years will be different.  I am thankful that God reminds me when I’m emptying the sink of the dirty dishes at 1:15 PM that in 10 years I will wish for the people to be back to make them dirty.  

Love you all so much,

Words to a Wife in a Troubled Marriage: Part II

Dear TEAMS,

Here is the second part to the letter I wrote to our dear friend who is having a hard time in her marriage right now. You can see the first part here.

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2)  Being submissive has noting to do with laziness or giving up.  Submission is willfully laying down what you deserve or expect or want in order that the greater good might be accomplished. It is an extremely active response, and it is birthed in your heart. Submission that doesn’t have the heart attitude of “I love this person and because it is important to this person that I do this, I will” backing it will backfire and cause the user a whole lot of pain and damage. If I do not actively do the work to make sure my heart is right, I am merely being legalistic and reinforcing the bars on the prison I feel trapped in. 

I am the one in control when I actively think through and lay down my rights because it is important to [my husband].  One example of this in our marriage has to do with Puffs vs. store brand facial tissue.  [My husband] really, really wanted me to buy Puffs when he had a cold.  I couldn’t justify spending that much money on something that held snot and was thrown away, especially when he would get on me about how much I spent.  When I really started understanding the concept of true submission, I laid down my right to have cheap tissue, even though it was extraordinarily expensive to buy the Puffs brand.  I didn’t just “shut up and buy the tissue and be silent about how much it annoyed me,” nor did I play the nobly wronged person saying, “That’s fine…I’m above all this, so if it’s important then I will do it” martyr act.   I actually realized that by spending my household expenses on Puffs, I was honoring God because I was laying down my selfish desires (which were rooted in trying to controlling money, anyway!).  I would not have had that realization had I not been willing to do it God’s way.  God would provide the finances taken from my spending on the Puffs.  Just writing this, I realize it’s such a silly thing that I ever spent my emotional energy on.

Again, though, I want to really focus on where the heart is with this action.  If your heart isn’t really doing the hard work of “Boy-I’d-really-rather-not-be-[doing x, y or z]-but-I-want-to-honor-God-and-He-sees-this-sucks-and-I-trust-Him-to-take-care-of-me” each and every time you submit to something [husband] wants, it’s just legalism.  If your heart isn’t sincere when you say, “Wow-I-can’t-believe-he-just-[talked to me that way/treated the children that way]-but-God-tell-me-how-I-can-show-him-your-love-right-now” and you give a gentle response in word only without your heart, it will not do the transforming work that will change the situation in the future. 

3) Being a wife and mother is extraordinarily hard work, but “escaping” is no longer possible. I’m not talking about the logistical stuff of actually getting a divorce. I know your heart is to trust God’s word with that. I’m talking about what gets you up in the morning. We live in a world where marriage is seen as an antiquated concept and women staying at home is seen as being equivalent to them being lazy. I didn’t realize how much that seeped into my daily thinking, even though way deep down I knew that was not true. I know things are really hard for you right now, and that your present situation consumes your thoughts. But I got to the point where I wondered at what if instead of feeling I was stuck, I instead put my heart into my work with a renewed passion to be an even more terrific wife and even more wonderful mother than what I was. I realized this was my present lot in life and would be for a while until the Holy Spirit really got ahold of [my husband]. I didn’t surrender; I accepted. I realized I put a lot into my job when I worked outside of the home, but didn’t approach this the same way. So, I started to do that. I actually got up every morning at 6:30 and curled my hair and everything, just as I did years before.  It helped me find more pride in my work, and knowing I was performing for my First Husband (Who loved what I did!) really gave me a boost.

So many women feel this is subjugating themselves, when it is the most empowering position to be in. We actually, with our words and deeds as a fruit from a pure heart, have the capacity to literally change a person’s reactions and position before God. Because make no mistake, that is exactly what happens when sinners such as our husband sin against us and are greeted with pure, loving grace and kindness. Or when our children disrespectfully relate to us, or even rebel against us. My children and husband are better off today because of every time I was wounded because of something they said or did and I asked my First Husband to help, actively laid down my desires from a loving heart, and took my job seriously.

I owe you and apology and a huge THANK YOU. When we first came, you said that you don’t see [my husband] act the way [husband] does, and I said you were wrong. Then I said it was cyclical, but less. However, on real reflection I realized I am really wrong and have misrepresented my husband completely now. What I should have said was, “Yes, he used to be [husband], but now he is changed.” His awful times are few and far between, and I now can speak with him privately and let him have a day to lick his wounds and he turns around. THAT is because of the choice I made to realize the 3 things I talked about above. God did that through me! I thought he had to change, and what I didn’t realize is that I needed to change and that would initiate change in him (the Bible repeatedly talks about this). It has taken years, but I will say that I am very much a different person than the woman who felt so dead and lost and hopeless that stabbing myself with a knife just so I could feel something—anything—seemed enormously appealing to me. So, please forgive me for being so self-pitying that I would completely miss how much my husband has improved, and thank you for presenting me with that opportunity to see that.

I see this is page 4 of 4. Thanks, too, for reading this all the way through. Again, I really care that you are so miserable. I hope this letter will lead you to greater discoveries about yourself that will transform your whole family. Even if it doesn’t, you will find tremendous freedom and coping for your present situation by these things. Never, ever feel like you can’t call or write.

Love,

[Me]


Let me tell you something, Toula. The man is the head, but the woman is the neck. And she can turn the head any way she wants.” ~Maria Portokalos, My Big Fat Greek Wedding


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Love,

Words to a Wife in a Troubled Marriage: Part I

Dear TEAMS,

I recently sent a letter to a dear friend who is enduring some big unpleasantness in her marriage.  While I hope you are never in the situation that she is, I wanted you to have a record of this letter, with changes made to protect everyone involved (and for clarification).  While it is written from a wife to a wife, I know my boys are smart enough to make the conversion, because frankly, it's not really too different for you.  I will continue it in the next blog post.

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Dear [name withheld],

I have been composing this letter for a while now, since our return from visiting you.  It deals with what you shared with me on the way home from church on the Saturday we were together.  I hope I am able to convey the concern and love I have for you in it, and the sadness I have for your present situation as well as hope for your changed future.

I do not know if you remember several years back that I went through a depression.  I chose to seek help because I was chopping vegetables with A and all of a sudden felt an overwhelming urge to take the large Cutco knife I was using and stab myself repeatedly in my arm.  It was like I had to stab myself in my arm, the urge was so great.  The only thing that kept me from doing it was my love and concern for A…I knew it would traumatize her terribly and I loved her so much I couldn’t do that to her.  

Since that time, I have learned a lot about myself and the mechanisms that caused that episode.  I have also learned a lot about what the Bible has to say about the situation I was in.  Looking back, the circumstances surrounding where I was in my life right then involved many of the things you are facing with your husband.  I felt like a prisoner in my own home and in my own life and in my own body because of what I was enduring verbally from [my husband] and the kids and verbally from Satan in my brain, as well as the lies I was telling myself.

I want you to know that I am deeply moved at your situation.  It is a very hard thing to feel trapped and hopeless and being told repeatedly what you are doing wrong that makes someone’s life miserable (even if that’s not true).  I was so pleased to hear that you want to do the right thing and stay married.  Truly, I think half your battle is done when you have resolved to do it God’s way, even though it seems that you will not be able to bear up under the demands of Scripture for your particular situation.

I wish to validate for you that [husband] should not treat you and the children the way he does sometimes.  From our brief stay there, I was struck by how many times you had nothing to do with his misery and he brought you into it.  That is not how God intended life to be for you—or any other woman—as a wife.  Husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the church, and there are no exclusions for personal stress included in Bible.  Christ experienced the same sorts of feeling unappreciated, feeling overwhelmed by responsibility, feeling unimportant, wondering at the meaning of life as husbands do.  However, Father commands them to do as Christ did when He had those feelings, in spite of those feelings.  Christ still gave Himself up and laid down what He was feeling for the greater good.  As I get older, I realize that the reason the stuff that is in the Bible is there not because it is easy to do, but because God knew how hard life is and we would not naturally do the stuff He asks us to that He sees is in our best interest.  

With this validation, though, are some caveats:  1) I watched [husband] in other times when he was acting “normal” and I truly believe his heart is for you and the children.  I did not sense that he does not love you or the children.  He makes some consistent really bad choices to deal with his own misery that doesn’t convey that, but I will tell you that in the end, his heart has not changed for you.  That encourages me that there is hope for you and the marriage and the happily ever after.  [Husband] is going to have to come to terms with his misery someday, and it will be a tough pill to swallow that the answer doesn’t have much to do with you and the kids.  2)  You need to accept that there are some attitudes and behaviors you are doing that are making your own misery.  No one is ever 100% to blame.  I hope you will see my heart in this and that is why I am being frank with you.  I truly believe from my own experience that you will find your way through this and be stronger and better equipped to handle the circumstances you are in.  But some of that starts with accepting that you need to change some things.

I am thrilled you are in counseling, and I thought that was great that she said you needed to get built back up before you work on your marriage.  I really think that will help, because I wasn’t sure why you were taking some of the stuff you were in the way you were.

The biggest thing I wanted to share with you was some things that God led me to in my own study during that really dark time as I tried to work my way out of where I was.  I was so frustrated with my in-network counselor because he was just a “sit and listen and say hmmmm” guy who didn’t believe the Bible.  However, I needed the drugs, so I would go for my appointments!  The upside is that all I had was my Bible.  I realized that God wanted to tell me things that only He can, and every new Truth I learned or relearned I realized was another key to my wellness.  Every person is different and I know some of these things might not be exactly what you are expecting, but I just ask that you ask God if this is Him trying to help you.

1. Your husband is not [name of husband], it is God.  Even the Bible says so in Isaiah 54:5-6, “For your Maker is your husband—
      the LORD Almighty is his name—
   the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer;
      he is called the God of all the earth.
   The LORD will call you back
      as if you were a wife deserted and distressed in spirit—
   
   
   (And you are a wife deserted and distressed in spirit!!)  Think about what that really means and translate that into “husband”…God is your best friend, God is the person that you should be able to run to when you want to tell something funny that just happened to you, God is the father of your children, God is the person that is supposed to hold you when you are upset, God is your provider, God is the one who tells you when you look fantastic in that dress, God is the one who is supposed to be a reliable counsel, and on and on.  
   
   
   I didn’t have a problem understanding that God was my husband when I was single and wanted to be married, but I had forgotten the significance of that concept once I had a human husband.  And I was really convicted about all the stuff I was thinking [my husband] should provide for me, when the Bible right there in Isaiah was saying that God is my first husband.  He wants to be my best friend, my most intimate friend and lover, my “go to” guy.  And I wasn’t letting Him be the very thing He wants to be for me.  And there is not a more faithful, attentive, kind, compassionate, selfless Husband in the world.  I really wasn’t being a very good wife to God, because I wasn’t even giving him any time in my day to talk to Him and let Him talk to me, nor was I finding out what was on His heart for my life and for the world in His Word.
   
   
   When I started treating God as my husband, I realized that I stopped expecting so much from [my husband].  Whether he was fulfilling the Biblical mandate for what husbands should do was no longer an issue for me, because God Himself was fulfilling the needs I thought [my husband] was supposed to fill.  I also started seeing [my husband] for what he is:  just another human being on the planet who feels the same things I do and faces the same fears and frustrations I do.  It gave me compassion for him and for what was driving him to say the things he would say or his short fuse or his unfair treatment or passive-aggressive actions or sarcasm.
   
   
   
   
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   Love,