It is on this day each year that I begin the process of self evaluation. Looking back over the year and seeing, not so much how well I have done but where I'm at. I guess it's looking for the significance of having lived another year. From Thanksgiving to New Years in some respects is all about me and about now. I can't tell you how this form and function began or why I continue to do it. I used to look forward to it, but this year I am not. No particular reason that I can identify, but an uneasiness that began to settle in last night.
Some of it may be that Ann Marie is going away for a week beginning next Friday. It's strange but there is an emptiness and I miss her more before she is gone than the actual time she's gone. Could be a control issue? Having to let her go for someone else's benefit other than mine. I also know she needs these little get aways for herself and maybe that's another part of it. Why does she need them? Am I not providing all that she needs? Control? Fear of her being away or fear that she may not return?
There is also the mini evaluation that I just did a few weeks ago. I realize that it was just one small portion of my life but... it was less than flattering. Will I find more of my life to be the same? I admit that I have high standards when it comes to me. I constantly feel that I could have and should have done better in so many areas and especially when it comes to pursuing God. And it's not about the works.
This is what came to me yesterday as Ann Marie and I were being thankful for the ability to do nothing. Fear! Yes fear. I think I am finally getting the Outer Collapse - Inner Strength thing. My outer collapses take place because fear is greater than my inner strength. And yet inner strength is not the absence of fear. Inner Strength is the desire or ability to do the thing that fear says you can't. A terrorist who straps a bomb to himself and walks into a crowded place for the purpose of exploding the bomb and killing people, himself included, does not do so without fear. Yet he has a cause or a belief, in something so great that he is able to go beyond the fear and accomplish what he has set out to do. As wrong as his purpose, as deluded as he is in his beliefs he does conquer fear. I would bet that David faced fear all along the way in his encounter with Goliath. But, David's "knowing" was greater than Goliath. David's "knowing" also had to be greater than the fear of the possibility of his own death.
The word says that "to whom much is given, much is expected." As I was giving thanks yesterday for all I have been given, perhaps fear set in that says, I have not met the expectation. Fear that I haven't prayed enough, or long enough? Fear that I haven't been attentive enough and listened enough? Fear that I haven't been obedient enough or humble enough? Fear! Not relying on God enough?
As for Ann Marie, we have had or I should say I have had the opinion that I would go first because I never want to experience a day without her in it. She will leave a week from today but between now and then I have to think about her not being there on that Saturday. There is a fear that something could happen. That fear begins to take hold and it changes things. It puts me on the edge. I know that God is in control of the days that we are to live and when we will die but outside of very brief moments, our everyday lives include each other pretty much 24/7 and so there is come delusion that I can keep her safe.... if she's near me.
Fear is what I see, and what I get, when I take my eyes off my Inner Strength. FEAR is my outer collapse. Inner strength is not the absence of outer collapses or fear. Inner Strength is only visible in the face of fear. One's Inner Strength is the ability to "Be Still and Know." Like David who "knew" as he faced a giant. It's believing in God who is all the while effectually and fervently at work in me more than than the fear that tries to deceive and consume me.
In closing... calling myself a christian is not saying that I do not have any fear. Desiring to be a man after God's own heart does not remove fear. Walking in obedience and righteousness does not mean that I face no fear. I have many fears... but much of the time I have a belief about God, a trust in God, a commitment to God that is greater than the fear. No amount of self evaluation is going to eliminate fear. So I think I'll try another way to get past the fear of not evaluating myself and the fear that I may not have met the expectations of God and people. How about if I just accept the fact that I have not met all the preconceived expectations? What about just being thankful for the one's I have met because of a man called Jesus.
No comments:
Post a Comment