One Who Is In Love

I’m on the 15th chapter of Disappointment with God by Philip Yancey a book that I had chosen to finally buy yesterday afternoon because I needed something that will help me make sense of all the things that do not make sense happening as of late. I have not read a book this fast since I was in highschool. But this one, I devoured hungrily because it had all the painful questions I want to ask about the faith and it talked about all the struggles associated with not being able to find answers.

If I were to talk about my life in a chronology, it would be painfully confusing because fragments of the past and present would intertwine and merge themselves into a reality of my own understanding.

At this point I am confused whether to write for an audience or to write simply for myself. The toggle bar on the upper right hand remains unmoved from my private blog and it looks like I will let it stay here. My palms sweat a lot these days. And there is just so much unrest because of things not making sense. So many things in a disarray that my mind is tightly wound up in knots almost impossible to unravel.

Yet here I am. Still making this attempt. And one thing that is piercing through me about this book is how it talks about the divine irony of God’s hand moving upon this earth and my life. I love these ironies and how it hits me right in the gut like a dramatic punch line. This book has many punch lines. But I am still waiting for the big one. Yes, I am reminded that I have completely forgotten about the person of Jesus and it is this lapse in memory that makes me wander off far from the truth and travail so anxiously about the circumstances shaking my ground.

I’m disappointed with God. Yes. But, I’ve forgotten, in all these 2000 years and more, He’s experienced so much disappointment I haven’t even bothered asking him how he felt. It’s not easy to associate God with feelings. There was a time when I did think about it. I was in my grandmother’s house and all camped up in the guest room working on my thesis. A large reprint of Christ crucified painting was hanging on the wall. The painting was one of those realistic paintings where you can see the drops of blood and the painfully contorted flesh pierced by those unrelenting nails. I was aching just as bad that time from betrayal and neglect. I wanted to hurl accusations to the Lord’s face but instead I saw the pain He bore and I stopped. He knew. He knew what was feeling. He knew what betrayal felt like. He knew what abandonment felt like. He knew what it was like to give it all only to be forgotten.

It seems like I run into the same pit stop over and over. That painful story of giving your all only to find it misunderstood, overlooked and forgotten. I have not been able to completely make sense of this story. But I am slowly starting to find its sense in how Jesus has experienced the same thing. How the King of Heaven and Earth has been misunderstood, overlooked and forgotten.

I have not fully imagined what it would have been like for him to strip himself of His divinity to take on our human form. I am suddenly awakened by the reality of how much restraint He practiced in the face of His own trials and the scoffing of many. This restraint makes me draw a little bit closer to the reality of His story and His existence in my life today. It’s not much of an illumination but it has made me look twice. A king destined to rule the universe, who can cause plagues and famine to wrap over the land, who can still the storm with the raising of His hand, holds back His power in exchange for our love.

What might! What tenderness! And how can one not fall in love with such a man?

I have forgotten to see God as a person. A real person. Not a cause. Not a purpose. Not a dream. Not an ideal. But a person.

One who is in love with me.