“What I’m doing you don’t understand now, but afterwards you will know.” John 13:7
Happy New Year, friends! I guess from the perspective of dates on a calendar, the new year is a fresh start. If only it were a clean slate of emotional and mental pain. The affliction of loss, grief, injustice and brokenness is what I would love wiped out of my life on New Year’s Day.
How many of us would rewind, rewrite and relive a different story?
Unfortunately, I woke up on January 1st carrying heavy emotional weight again this year. The same deep wounds staring back at me. Maybe you’re like me. Our sorrow didn’t disappear when the calendar flipped. The turn of the year was another first without the life we dreamed we’d have. We opened our eyes with the same nagging ache to the painful reality that our loved one is not here, the diagnosis has not changed, or our child still struggles with the same infirmities. The mounting bills are still due. Meanwhile, a global pandemic is not only continuing, but surging forward powerfully. We cry out, “What in the world are you doing Lord?” (Like, literally…what are you doing in the world?!)
It can feel impossible to begin again (or at the very least far-fetched). Begin again? Start over? How? Why?? I’m sick and tired of the disappointment of hope deferred. Why begin again when I will get the same results? We wrestle with questions about why things are the way they are. The incomprehensible pain on those of us who have lost children, spouses, or those dear to our hearts leaves us wondering, “Why?” If we’re honest, there is likely no explanation or answer that would be acceptable for lives cut short or having to bear the crushing weights we carry. I know I would not want to hear it. The loss is too painful. The grief is too vast. I would MUCH rather change the story than begin again.
In the midst of it all, I still hear God’s Spirit inviting me into a new beginning. Begin what, exactly? For starters, begin believing again. Begin trusting again instead of trying to make sense of what might never make sense in my finite mind. Choose to risk believing what God says in His word about life, death, loss, and grief.
To begin believing again means courageously listening to what He says and accepting His Word as truthful. I must choose to trust that His ways are good and kind, which is even more difficult to comprehend in the midst of daunting circumstances. Especially when questions remain unanswered. After all, His ways are higher than mine (Isaiah 55:8-9). This believing…this trust to which I refer…is the life of walking by faith and not sight. (2 Corinthians 5:7) And what a devastating walk it can be. This is the life Jesus called His followers to in John 14:1 when He said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.” When I cannot yet see it, can I believe it? Yes, we have experienced devastation, but disruption does not snatch us from the divine power of God.
Believing these things doesn’t mean we pretend our difficult realities don’t exist. Yes, we cry about them, scream about them, find healthy ways to process them, and pray about them. By faith, we carry them, believing that one day, the burden will be lifted. Believing without seeing is required, but it’s not easy. In fact it can be quite difficult.
In Chapter 13 of John, the “disciple Jesus loved” gave an eyewitness account of a conversation Jesus had with Peter. The Passover feast was coming and Jesus was sitting with His friends to share the Passover meal. Jesus knew what was ahead. He was fully aware of what His companions would come up against watching Him suffer and die. He knew He would soon be on the cross crying out to the Father who orchestrated it all. He was fully aware of the coming mental and emotional toil. The disciples would come to experience paralyzing fear. What Jesus does and says in the days leading up to His crucifixion fascinates me. I turn to these words and stories when I am in mental and emotional turmoil. They have been a healing balm to my aching soul.
In one of His last acts, Jesus washed the disciples’ feet. Peter, one of His closest companions, was confused and refused to allow it.
Peter asked, “Lord, are You going to wash my feet?” Jesus answered, “What I’m doing, you don’t understand now, but afterwards you will know.” “You will never wash my feet-ever!” Peter said. Jesus replied, “If I don’t wash you, you have no part with Me.” Simon Peter said to Him, “Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.”
I can only imagine how Peter felt as the teacher he loved approached him and moved toward him to perform a less than dignified service reserved for servants at the time.
In his confusion and misunderstanding, Peter refused. I imagine his thoughts. “I do not understand what you are doing. I should be washing your feet. You are the teacher. I am a student. You are Christ. I am your servant. This doesn’t make sense. But, Why?” What strikes me most is that Jesus doesn’t answer Peter’s question directly.
In His mercy, He reminds Peter that he may not understand this outward reversal of “roles”, nor why they had to take place, but after… at some unspecified point in the future, Peter would KNOW. I imagine Peter knowing when The Lord came to him after His resurrection. (John 21)
Much like Peter, we long to know. We tell ourselves, if I knew He was faithful. If I knew it got better. If I knew the details. If I knew… I could begin again.
This is what God teaches me through this encounter:
- There are answers we will not get in this life. Jesus did not always give detailed explanations to His followers when He walked the earth. In fact, He left out details, forcing those involved to make a choice to believe or not. When we ask “how, when, where, or why?” He lovingly responds with WHO…I AM WHO I AM (Exodus 3:14, Job 38:1, John 6:35)
- We will KNOW. God promises that we will fully know and be known. (1 Corinthians 13:12) We must walk by faith until then, believing what He says, even when we don’t see it.
- We often will not understand what God is doing. Some circumstances will just never make perfect sense. When we walk with God, He will reveal His will, often little-by-little, as we continue to follow where He leads. While my finite mind longs for understanding, God tells me to trust. (Proverbs 3:5-6) His ways will never be ours. He is conforming our ways to His. There is so much friction here because we cannot see the whole story. We have to trust in the One who can.
- Jesus cares about our emotional and mental distress. He cares about our losses and our grief. How do I know? He came down from heaven and made a way for us to be eternally free from them. He has gone before us. He is a man of sorrows, very familiar with suffering. In fact, Hebrews 4 says He was even tempted in every way, and yet He never sinned. Isaiah 53 tells us He was unjustly treated and yet never opened His mouth. Lazarus died. Jesus wept. His disciples deserted Him. The Father turned His face from Him on the Cross. Yes, He knows grief, He knows loss, and He knows suffering. He is with us in it and has provided eternal relief from it at the right time.
My dear sister, I wish our pain wasn’t so. I wish the loss could disappear as quickly as it unpredictably came…that we could rewind, rewrite, and relive a different reality. I have no pretty bow to wrap our losses up in. But we have to risk believing the perfectly wise and loving God is writing a better story. The resurrection says it is so. The suffering is producing something we won’t altogether understand until we altogether understand God Himself, unhindered by sin. This is our eternal reality that changes the way we live today. For now, we must walk with our grief compassionately, reminding ourselves of these truths. There is no hope without them.
Jesus overcame death to make a way for us to believe again and again. God doesn’t need a clean slate because He is making something marvelous of our difficult reality. The hope of the gospel is exactly this. Out of the darkest night, the brightest light shines. God Himself, made weak, released the greatest power ever known. What will He write? I wish I could tell you the specifics. What I can tell you is that it’s better than anything you and I could ever write. Trust the God who knows my sweet sister. Be confident in the promise that we will know. With Him we can begin again.
Always Cheering you on,
