When the Wind Gets Knocked Out of You

Photo found on the internet Sometimes in life something blindsides you, and you feel like the breath has been knocked right out of you. You're gasping for emotional air, feeling like the walls are caving in, most of all feeling wronged, unappreciated, unwanted, ... or worst of all, abandoned or tricked by God.

I felt that way when my friend and confidante started dating the guy I'd fallen head over heels for, during the time I was out of the country on a service project.

I felt that way to a smaller degree--but it still hurts to think of it--when I was let go from a church music job "for budget reasons," and I was depending on the income and fellowship there.

I felt that way when I once didn't get a job I really wanted.

I felt that way when one of my direct reports verbally ripped me to shreds--anonymously--on an evaluation.

As time has passed and I've thought about the big disappointments and hurts in life, I've realized that none of them were actually about me.

In fact, one can actually generalize that the hurts and disappointments in life are rarely about us. They are more likely to be the effects of living in whatever circumstances create our hurtful situations. When we suffer loss--jobs, love, status, money, the approval of others--there's often a "rest of the story" which reveals no smirch on your personal worth or capability. Sure, you may see some faint connection, but you also have to give yourself the room to be human.

I repeat: It's rarely about your personal worth. It's usually about the circumstances created by life on a sinful earth that has limited resources and people with limited vision.

And too often it's because we are casualties of others who are wrestling with their own deep flaws.

So, at such times when deep disappointments and hurt come, how do we deal with it? I'm no expert. But I think we have to look for what we can learn and discard the rest, including the resentments or blame that tend to build up toward others and/or God when we feel let down.

Once you and I realize that it's really "not all about me," once we drop all the self-centered talk, once we quit tending our own fragile egos and our perceptions of our "rights" in life, perhaps we can begin to effectively live out the poem by Teresa of Avila (1515–1582), quoted by one of our mathematicians at Senior Recognition yesterday:

Christ has no body but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
Compassion on this world,
Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good,
Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world.
Yours are the hands, yours are the feet,
Yours are the eyes, you are his body.
Christ has no body now but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
compassion on this world.
Christ has no body now on earth but yours.

Sometimes I suspect we can only truly embody Christ as we, too, are broken, rejected, unwanted, treated unjustly and criticized as He was. The glory is that the goal of this life experience is more than just being broken; it's that we can, in the midst of pain, dwell in His presence and be sure of His plan for our lives.

I know what I'm doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for. Jer. 29:11 (Message)