You seem to look upon depression as the hand of the enemy crushing you..Do you think you could see it instead as the hand of a Friend pressing you’d own to the ground on which it is safe to stand?

- Parker Palmer

The above statement has been a strong encouragement for me in days when joy seems to be buried in the dust. The irony is, I was doing many things of great impact, but they all don’t add up to my happiness.

I’m feeding 300 needy families every week, erecting children sponsorship programs in communities, speaking weekly for universities and organizations. But why would it matter if I am impacting thousands but begrudging its cost?”

Jesus once said, “For what will it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, but loses his own soul?” He knew that the accumulations of achievements and impact are not what will bring deep satisfaction we long for. Perhaps I had lost sight of the fundamental meaning of work.

I wrestled with God, “God, I am pouring so much to others, who pours back to me?”

He asked, “Am I not enough Tam, if it’s just you and Me?”

“Yes Lord you are, but you also promise friends along the way to show your love”, I argued.

I prayed to God to surround me with people who can hold my hand as I lift up my staff as Moses did for the Israelites in battle. Three times I asked the Lord to remove this thorn, three times, He chose not to—and said, “My grace is sufficient, for My power is made perfect in your weakness.” So He often just gave me the gift of Himself.

—

I was admiring the trees at my backyard; its leaves shed every day and the gardener would sweep its dry leaves. Weekly, would they also trim its overgrown parts. So I whispered to God, “Just like the trees, there are many who come and go in my life. Sometimes the shedding is great and they left a big hole in the tree. Why Lord?” In response, His Spirit came alongside my groaning, “Do you know that the leaves need to fall off, its branches trimmed, so the tree can grow to its fullest potential? It sheds in order to grow for the purpose which the tree serves— a covering for many.”

Perhaps this is the life that Jesus has grafted for me—that of long loneliness, that I may extend the encouragement, “I’ve been there and the Lord has carried me through” to usher others into His sufficiency. This is the cost of my calling.

Is this the portion the Lord has for me to be an effective leader, or a portion I make myself bear with my tendency of putting up walls? Or Is it the devil' who tries to blur my perception of reality?

I do not know. I do hope, there will be a greater relief in taking up my cross. That my disbelieving heart would believe, Jesus has taken up that big, heavy, Calvary cross so that mine can be lighter and smaller. But this is where I am at.

In this too, work become joyless

It was a gradual change—that what had started as an exciting opportunity, filled with wonder, has turned to a very stressful work to which affects my well-being. What I was experiencing was what Thomas Merton described when work loses its vitality:

Unnatural, frantic, anxious work, work done under pressure of greed or fear or any other inordinate passions cannot properly speaking be dedicated to God, because God never wills such work directly. He may permit that, through no fault of our own, we may have to work madly and distractedly, due to our sins, and to the sins of the society in which we live. In that case we must tolerate it and make the best of what we cannot avoid. But let us not be blind to the distinction between sound, healthy work, and unnatural soil. 

At home, my family would know I sigh-ed a lot. To which, I believe is not a good testament of the grace I’ve been given. With constant worry and stress, I was showing the work was upheld by my own abilities and strength. I could not be farther from the truth. At the height of my stress, my friend sent me an encouragement by Francis Chen:

Worry implies that we do not trust that God is big enough, powerful enough or loving enough to take care of what’s happening in our lives. 

Stress says that the things that we are involved in are important enough to merit our impatience, lack of grace towards others, and our tight grip of control.

Both worry and stress communicate that its okay to sin and not trust God because the stuff in my life is somehow exceptional. Both reek of arrogance. They declare our tendency to forget that we’ve been forgiven. That our lives here are brief, that we are headed to a place where we won’t be lonely, afraid, or hurt ever again.

As Unto The Lord

Why are we so quick to forget the truth about our work?

I’ve failed to learn to enjoy the satisfaction of a job well done.  I’ve failed to take joy in the satisfaction of the quality of the work more than in the gratitude or approval of others.

What I had forgotten is two truths: One, that work is from God. Two, work is done for the Lord. When our work is from God, whether it is feeding the poor or teaching in the local school district, we take joy and pleasure because it is from the hand of the Lord— a gift. And we offer back to him, what we do with our hands. In this truth, instead of unnatural toil, our work can be joy-filled, grace-filled work. Thomas Merton mentioned the antidote to the so-called, “unnatural toil”: excellence, truth, diligence, and generosity. Each of these four virtues can be pursued to a fault, however. The pursuit of excellence can become perfectionism, the pursuit of truth bigotry, diligence nothing more than hectic activity, and even generosity can be misguided. Pursued to this fault, our work becomes deadly and no good work at all. So whatever is the cost of my calling, we can count it all joy, as unto the Master.

For this, I go again to the feet of Jesus, clinging on to Him for direction, for vigor, and for perspective. So now I understand—like that tree with its falling leaves—that though growth comes with a sense of loss, it can still be counted as joy. That whatever my portion be, though now I may see in part. But one day in full.

For that end, I rest my hope—the eternal reward—to see Jesus face to face. Where my loneliness disappears, and everything makes sense.

x,

Tam