Comfortably Numb

I remember saying in high school that I loved “deep talks”. Not to slight 15 to 18-year-olds but I sometimes wonder what my teenage definition of a deep talk was. I had far more social interactions in high school and college than I do now, so maybe I did get into subjects with more emotional intensity than I remember.

I often feel like I dodge the deep end of life now. Certainly my mom’s death has something to do with that.

C.S. Lewis lost his wife just four years after getting married late in his life. He said this about his grief:

“No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing.

At other times it feels like being mildly drunk, or concussed. There is a sort of invisible blanket between the world and me. I find it hard to take in what anyone says. Or perhaps, hard to want to take it in. It is so uninteresting.”

I empathize deeply with the second paragraph. Sometimes I still feel as though I am watching other people live from behind that invisible blanket. Last year, I was pregnant while walking through the fog of heavy grief. My lens of life left me wanting to affect very little. I just thought about how all that mattered was the hole in my heart. And the human growing within me which made me miss my mom all the harder.

I recently started watching a Netflix documentary called “Magnetic”. It’s about daredevils — big wave surfers, skiers who find the steepest mountain faces to zag down, and other lunatics. I haven’t finished it, but I was fascinated by how differently I think. One big wave surfer said “We need to do our living now. Because if we wait, it will be too late.” I think it’s fascinating that for thrill seekers, living means almost dying all the time. But it made me wonder if I’m not living as recklessly as God might want me to live. Not taking more relational risks– loving more recklessly.

“For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”   Ephesians 2:10

If I remain comfortably numb and uninvolved, I don’t really know how I’m utilizing God’s handiwork.

I’m reading Donald Miller’s “A Million Miles In A Thousand Years.” It’s about the author editing his life into a script for a movie. In one part, he describes a masters student who was doing his thesis on life stages theorizing that stage one was developing who you are (childhood- age 18), stage two is living your story (20s to 50s) and stage three is reflecting on how your story went (60s+). I see truth in his theory. Though I think and hope many older people would argue that they’re still living out their own life story and not merely reflecting on it.

I find myself reflecting a lot because I didn’t plan on doing so much of my life without my mom. I had a story in mind and now I’m way off the story board in that one of my key characters has been erased. I don’t think of that major alteration in my life every minute, but probably every 10 minutes. I look at my smiling 7-month-old and wonder how it is possible that she’ll never meet her Mimi. But I know my mom wouldn’t want me to be numb and indifferent for long. I love my life and the people in it. It just felt better with Mom in it.

I thought my 2019 was a personal shakeup but 2020 is proving to be a global quagmire. What I see shining this year is our human sense of righteousness. My personality is non-confrontational and go with the flow, so lately I have felt convicted and quite uncomfortable.

I am white and have been privileged, no doubt. I have surely benefited from my skin color and place in society unknowingly my whole life. The police brutality stories appall me. I knew such evil existed but hadn’t seen it so blatantly before.

I listened to a sermon by my pastor here in Tucson a couple weeks ago and he touches on original sin. How one man’s actions incriminated humanity, but one man’s sacrificial love saves humanity. The pastor expands on that saying we’re all in this messy world. We’re all unable to be consistently good. We all have evil in us– ask someone who is raising a toddler 🙂 . That mischief is there from the beginning. I justify my action or inaction all the time with “I’m not that bad…” We constantly compare our own righteousness with others and look for ways to build ourselves up by finding others’ “errors”. What a terribly flawed way of thinking.

Galations 2:21 says, “I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself up for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died needlessly.”

If we could solve man’s awful inclinations through the law, then we wouldn’t need grace. Law enforcement would then be perfectly righteous. If we’re leaning on laws to straighten out our crooked world, we’re not reaching for the right antidote.

Jesus’ life was a proclamation of love. He lived a rich 33 years. I think a cynical Christian view is to think “this world is screwed. Bring on the next one.” We weren’t created to just exist, but to do so lovingly and purposefully; as Christ did.

“But whoever has the world’s goods and see his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?” — 1 John 3:17

We live in a society that is (largely) seeking ways to improve the world. I think that’s reason for optimism. But I don’t think the answers to our problems will be found in new laws or in a vaccine. Those will be major victories, but hardships and discontent will keep coming.

Perfection is what we seek but even when we feel as though we hit every note right, the feeling of triumph fades. What brings lasting joy and significance is belief in a God who loves you despite your inevitable screw ups. A God who says there is no insignificant race, there is no insignificant job, there is no insignificant thread in the tapestry of creation.

¹³ You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. ¹⁴ For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” ¹⁵ If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.

Galations 5:13-15

My stomach churns at some of the social media comments I’ve read. People “biting and devouring” each other. Accomplishing nothing. Jesus set an example of a life lived in humble service. I’d like to strive to infect our screaming world with a love that listens, forgives and seeks to meet the needs of others.

I’m not sure if I can end this with one streamlined thought, but I’ll try to connect my own dots. I’ve felt detached and not motivated to be “involved” for a while now. But this noisy, newsy year has made me realize sitting on our hands (or on our phones) and complaining about the world is not the way to change it. The more righteous we find ourselves, the more eye-rolling we do toward “the other side”/those irredeemable people who don’t think like us.  How haughty does that sound when it’s spelled out?

I’ve met few truly humble people. Those who don’t think less of themselves, but simply think of themselves less. A radical change would be the honest pursuit of caring about people we agree with and those we disagree with. Not just appearing as though we do; but actually aching to humbly serve each other. Oh, what a wonderful world that would be. And oh, what divine heart surgery I need to begin thinking of myself less.