Deep is the Darkness

Deep is the darkness that grinds men’s souls
And turns them into dust;
Angry is the man who can’t control
The things he knows he must

He is aware that The One is there
And is held in His gracious hands;
But it sometimes seems too much to bear,
When he does not know the plans

The weight of life is a heavy thing
When neurons don’t fire right;
And he can often feel the sting
Of things lost to his sight

Sometimes he can see the darts
That puncture his heart and soul;
The steel that makes the dying start;
The dagger takes its toll

True it is, the darts others see
That somehow he cannot
Are those that cause his strength to flee
And perhaps give up all he’s got

He mostly he goes through his days
Unaware of his clown façade;
His heart his mind will often betray
And others think him odd

His days would be fine were he a fool
And he knew none the better
Then ignorance would have its rule
And understanding it would fetter

But when you know, then life is hard
When it’s you that is the reason,
Then you know the cards you hold
May not last you through the season

In dreams peace is not far away
In life not soon enough;
On his soul the burdens stay
He fears they will not slough

He does not know if he can last;
It’s hard, this fitful living
He knows his lot has been cast
It’s the hand he has been given

But he can dream of a peaceful place
Where time will be put to rest
Then he will see Him face to face
And know he’s passed the test

Out of the mouths of children and babes

Kari, at four and a half and one of our twins, is not much of a television watcher. She would much rather be with people than stare at a facsimile. Last night we unwittingly painted a picture of God’s love. She was tired and cold, and I was ensconced on the couch after a trying week. Perhaps because of my own need for touch and closeness, I invited her to join me on the couch to lay on my chest. She immediately took advantage of the offer and snuggled into my chest. Our combined body heat soon brought us both a comfortable warmth. Again, perhaps out of my own need for closeness that runs unabated through me, I began to caress her head and run my fingers through her hair. It is something I know she enjoys, and is brought to a place of peace by the sensation. In that, she takes after her daddy. I love touch, and am blessed by something so simple, to the extent that when I touch or caress, I don’t focus on what I’m doing; rather, I focus on my fingers and the feeling I’m receiving as I’m converging on another’s contentment. She felt the closeness and love, as well. Here, this little four year old, without prodding, without hearing it first, turned her head to the side and said, sweetly, “I love you sooo much.” It was an unadorned statement of fact. It was what resident in her heart, what had been there already. What was in her heart poured out of her mouth and bathed my heart in an innocence and devotion I have rarely felt. That is the love I pray my Father feels from me.

Kari spoke her heart without thought of what it would give her; she gave of her heart, simply because she wanted to, simply because she understood what was true in her inmost self and wanted to express it. That is the relationship I want to have with my Father; I know that He is capable of all things and that, through Him, all things are possible; but that is not what I want my focus to be. I want to focus on my love for Him, and I want to love Him because He loves me and enjoys my company. If He chooses to pour down blessing upon me, then more's the better; but I will not, I cannot, judge His love for me, nor do I want Him to judge my love for Him, but what we give each other. It is the desire to be near, to touch, to share. I want to be known by Him by my love. As He caresses my head as I lay on His chest, I want Him to be blessed by my statement of love, unbidden and without thought of return but for His love.

What is Grace?

Grace has been defined as God’s unmerited favor, established because we do not have the ability to earn that favor through our behavior, or the cessation of behavior that is detrimental to our relationship with our Maker. There is nothing necessarily wrong with that definition, yet it does not connote the fullness of mercy, the extent of love, or the depth of devotion that our Lord showers upon us far beyond our meager understanding, and even farther beyond anything we deserve. To begin to understand grace we must first understand the depth of our sin and how it separates us from our Father. Since we cannot understand the perfection of God, we cannot understand how greatly we offend His holiness without being lead to that knowledge through the Holy Spirit (and we cannot understand that without the Spirit’s willingness to make it known to us– which we cannot understand either!). Then we must come to some understanding of humility and how it must, and without fail, be the wineglass through which we drink in His love and mercy, and through those, have His justice and love run through our veins. If that chalice is not included in our table setting, then we are at the wrong table, in the wrong House, and are in far greater danger than we may realize.

Humility is, in this instance, the understanding of our own wickedness, and the knowledge that we are completely incapable of removing even the lightest of stains from our souls. It is an appreciation of the extent to which we offend God, and a measure of the desire we have to heal that division between Him and us, as well as the recognition that a desire to heal that fracture is vastly insufficient to mend. It is an understanding that we have nothing to offer God that He needs. We are of no intrinsic value to Him. That is the most humbling recognition man can fathom, and it is that humility that draws Him closer to us. Yet, it is more, much more, than that. It is also an appreciation of the extent to which God is willing to go to create a bridge over which we can cross an uncrossable divide – though He has no need to do so.

Grace, then, is not just God’s ability to remove our stain – but also His desire. In this way, grace is not passive; it is continually working in us, renewing us as we call on Him to forgive us our sins. Let this not be misunderstood – Grace is not a tool, however noble and precious the idea. Grace is not something we utilize to cleanse ourselves so that we are presentable to our Creator. Grace is not something we utilize. No, grace has nothing to do with us at all. We cannot call upon it at will; we cannot send it away. It is not affected by our desire, or lack thereof, and it is neither arbitrary nor capricious. We are powerless over it, yet its power to redeem and heal is inestimable.

Grace has one requirement – an acknowledgement on our part that we stand before God powerless, naked, ugly, stained, and filthy, and that nothing we have done has had one iota of effect on relieving us from that state. It is only in standing this way before God that we can finally realize how in need we are of His healing and perfecting touch, His grace.

When we call upon our Father in what can only be understood as desperation (brought on by the whispered love of the Holy Spirit and the finished love of Jesus Christ on the cross), and invite Him into our inmost parts; when we acquiesce to the reality that we are alone and adrift on a river of abomination; and when we cry out to Him because He is (and has only ever been) our only hope, it is then that God sheds His grace upon us. This grace is not a gentle rain, softly pattering and slowly easing away our sin and its accompanying spiritual death. No, this can only be interpreted as a waterfall of unimaginable power and purpose. Grace is a torrential down pouring of cleansing fury – instantaneously crushing and dissolving all the once-insurmountable mountains of sin that stand in the path between us and our Father. There is no sin, no failure, no betrayal that will not instantly be nonextant in the presence of such inconceivable holiness and purity. Grace is not temperate. Once called upon, it will brook no interference with its single mission – to reunite the Creator with His created; and once called upon by the Father’s newly adopted child, that grace is a never ending source of renewal and rebirth, re-creation and resolve -- both to seek after the Father and to allow the Son to reshape us in His image.

Death of the American Experience

What I have come to understand could, at the beginning of the United States, be considered sedition. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, it would have been looked on as union dissension. In the 1940s and 1950s, McCarthy would have denounced it as un-American. In the 1970s, it was fashionable for a time among a sub-culture that had become tired of what was perceived as tyranny and abuse of power. Today, it is considered anti-God, anti-religion, anti-business, and anti-social. It is for me, an understanding that what we call the “American Experiment” has, and was destined to, fail. There is no recrimination in this statement. It is not meant to point to a better political/economic system. I am not touting socialism, communism, or any other –ism for that matter. Just as the American capitalist/democratic system has failed, so also have all other forms of government instituted and administered by humanity. Communism is, in theory, the single most feasible economic/political system out there. The difficulty arises when humanity gets involved and the theory is put into practice. Likewise, socialism, dictatorships (including those of a benevolent nature), and military control have been tried and found wanting.

Democracy and capitalism (not necessarily nor inevitably linked together) have come up just as wanting as all other systems known to man. We in the United States have erred when we equate democracy and capitalism with “good” and other systems with “bad.” Ours is a brand of ethnocentrism that is so innate, so ingrained into the warp and woof of the American psyche, that we cannot contemplate, let alone tolerate, a world where we do not exist and have hegemony over lesser institutions and people. We have come, as had the Soviet people and establishment did, to believe that we are indispensable and favored of the most high gods: money, wealth, and righteousness. We are Americans, and are, therefore, entitled to honor, respect, and acquiescence by the rest of the world that we deserve all that we claim to deserve. We have become (if indeed we were ever different) little more than a clanging drum or banging cymbal, pharisaically demanding obeisance and submission to our will while we use the rest of the world as our playground, toilet, and servant, blind to the pain we inflict or the humility we foist.

It is not that America and Americans are more evil than other nations. It is that we are just as evil, yet ours is accompanied by a military/industrial/economic powerhouse that is second to none in the world. It has been said that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. To think that we are somehow exempt from the foibles and excesses of others is arrogant, narcissistic, and dangerously thin ice for us to tread.

Unlike Republicans, I do not feel that the market will regulate both the economy and right-minded actions. I don’t feel that tax cuts for the wealthy will spill down and infiltrate the lower economic classes. I don’t feel that capitalism will right our capsizing ship. Unlike Democrats, I don’t feel that government can be made to work for the people. I don’t feel that taxing the rich and redistributing the wealth to those in need will end the need. I don’t feel that universal health care is the single answer to create a country where all citizens can be healthy and free from debilitating hardship. Likewise, I have little faith in third parties with their niche ideas for economic and social revival.

Could these views be called un-American? Of course they could; indeed, they are. These views go against all that Americanism stands for. America stands for individualism and self-reliance. To depend on others is to be weak. Social Darwinism has been the mode d’emploi for so long now it is hard to imagine what it would be like without an upper class, made up of five percent of the population, that holds ninety-five percent of the country’s wealth. American-ism and democracy-cum-capitalism are interchangeable ideas that have created the greatest country on earth. We have earned the right to dictate to others how they should live and what they owe us for the privilege to do so. Westward expansion, Manifest Destiny, resettlement, displacement, and acculturation are all terms we have either coined or used to both defend and declare our hegemony over all we have encountered. And yet we are a house of cards, because our foundation is built on sand. This political/economic system is faulty and frail, and cannot meet the needs of the vast majority of those it holds. It is overseen by corrupt and unrepentant politicians whose ideals are subjected to the machine which created them in the first place. Lincoln’s ideal of government of the people, by the people, for the people has ever been just that – an ideal that looks good in print but has no basis in reality.

Sadly, we also equate democracy/capitalism with Christianity. To be Christian in America is to embrace the ideal that all people should live as we do; that democratic ideals and capitalistic markets are viewed as blessed by God. We look at our wealth and world standing as evidence that God has favored our system above all others; indeed our wealth and prosperity are granted by God because our system is as close to godliness as possible in a fallen world. To imagine that a county that refuses to embrace our ideals could ever be loved, let alone blessed, by God is ludicrous.

And yet, here I am with these thoughts, these ideas so contrary to what I have been taught to be true and right. I can no longer block out that still small voice that has been speaking to me for what seems like years. I no longer have faith in our nation, our leaders, our systems, our justice, or our pax Americana. Nor should I. My faith, my trust, my allegiance, and my loyalty must first and foremost belong to Jesus Christ, His kingdom, His systems, and His peace. I am no less of a follower of Jesus if I am communist, nor more a follower if I embrace free enterprise. Jesus cannot, and must not, be equated with any model created by man. He is above all and beholden to none. If my loyalty belongs to Jesus Christ, then it does not matter what political/economic system I am living under. Christianity is no more democratic and capitalist, and democracy and capitalism are no more Christian than any other governmental or economic model.

Capitalism (much more so than democracy), is often antithetical to the teachings of Jesus. Capitalism amounts to little more than institutionalized greed. While some would argue that capitalism finds and fills needs, it also fills those needs by making as much profit as possible. The argument would continue that there is nothing wrong with that. Why shouldn’t someone make a profit, so long as it’s legal? The answer is that there is the law, and then there is mercy and grace. The question then begs to be asked: Which fulfills the teachings of Jesus and acquiesces to His command to love others and obey His teachings? Only mercy and grace meet that objective.

It is not just democracy/capitalism that falls short in this area. There is no human institution that satisfies the call of Christ. We cannot look to government to accomplish that goal. That can only be done individually as hearts are changed to reflect the image of the Master. This will fly in the face of everything Americans have been taught is good and right and healthy. We proclaim from both pulpit and pew that we are new creations; that the old has passed away. Let it be so, then. Let us embrace a new economy. Let us call ourselves, first, last, and always, Followers of the Way. Let us not be Americans, or Chinese, or Korean, or any other descriptor of the way we look or the ideology we have been raised in. Let us be hope and peace, mercy and grace, faith and love in a world that may have forgotten how, or never knew in the first place. Let us consider others better than ourselves. Let us be the Samaritan and watch out for or “neighbor.” Let us bless those who persecute, pray for those who would do harm. America is not our home. It is our mission field. We would do well to remember to whom we owe our first allegiance and our last breath.

Dealing with myself

Having a dual diagnosis of ADHD and OCD is difficult, to say the least. While some would question a classification of mental illness for what used to be considered behavioral and/or parenting issues, having had to deal with it all my life, I would not. I suppose it would be different if what I dealt with was debilitating and obvious. My greatest struggle is that, for all outward appearances, I appear to a completely well adjusted, normal middle-aged man in full control of all my faculties. I have no outward ticks or physical abnormalities; I do not speak pedantically or with darting, furtive eyes; I do not laugh at awkward moments, or cry for no apparent reason. I come across as intelligent, thoughtful, and sensitive. I am well spoken and understand, to a greater or lesser extent, politics, economics, current events and happenings, and am gaining a deeper understanding of my place in the world, and my relationship with God. I care deeply about humanity in general, and have learned to be a good friend, husband, and father. Yet, so much of that comes at the great cost of the demanding and tiring maintenance necessitated by the requisite to maintain a bearing that reflects the normalcy demanded by the social order. As I struggle to deal with severe ADHD, accompanied by clinical depression, and OCD, accompanied by anxiety, this travail is seldom seen by others, though rarely is it less than just below the surface.

When the cost of maintenance becomes too great, the façade begins to crack, and people begin to experience a cognitive dissonance, as what they have come to understand about me is brought into question, and they begin to see something in me that does not match the carefully crafted persona I have fashioned through years of painstaking and deliberate construction. Worse still, there are times when the safeguards I have put into place to insulate others from my ‘eccentricities’ falter, and I unintentionally subject others to either my manic good nature, or my frustration, spilling out as flashes of irritation, and, sadly enough for a teacher of impressionable children, sarcasm and cynicism. While the latter is less likely to occur, it does happen occasionally. Oddly, if it happened all the time, people would become used to it and would be able to discount it as ‘there he goes again.’ However, when it is only the occasional break in an otherwise positive demeanor, it can be confusing, disconcerting, and cause for concern. While I know what is going on, as do those who are close to me and privy to my thoughts and peccadilloes, others do not have the same inside knowledge. For those, I can occasionally present as a man divided against himself, double-minded, and erratic. I am none of these; but without an intimate understanding of my inner workings, what else can those outside my inner circle surmise? While I used to do so, I no longer have the temerity to judge them. What they perceive is someone out of balance; and for most people, perception is truth.
I have the great desire to insulate others from myself, but I cannot. I have to earn a living. For me, that means teaching thirteen- and fourteen-year olds American history. Interacting with impressionable middle school students can offer a difficult and complex situation for someone dealing with both ADHD and OCD,. Still, it is what I do; it is what I want to do; it is what I feel called to do. I am a gifted storyteller, able to integrate enthusiasm with history, fact with fascination. I have learned to bring history alive, and, when I am right with myself, there are few who do it better. I do not say these things easily or lightly, and I have learned to use them to the fullest of my ability. However, when I am struggling through the miasma that sometimes breaks over the levees I have carefully maintained, the unwary and uninitiated can get wet. Of greatest concern to me is when the breakwaters are breached and I am initially caught unaware. That is frightening to someone whose professional career depends on dependability, and is contingent on a stable and consistent deportment.

Fear is a great motivator and educator; it can, in a normal and ordered individual, cause one to seek redress and learn valuable lessons from mistakes made. In those who have spent an average of seventeen years hiding their disability from others (in the case of OCD) before initial diagnosis and treatment (and been successful most of the time), and dealt with ADHD for most, if not all of their lives, fear can cause one to seek better ways of hiding; we have understood that, though we are experts at learning from our mistakes, we often continue to make them. While it is humiliating and frustrating to us, it can come off to others as recalcitrant or resistant behavior; I only wish that were so, as that is something I could chose to bring to an end.