Let’s Go Hit Rock Bottom!
I’m reading an awesome book, Leszli Kalli’s Kidnapped: A Diary of My 373 Days in Captivity. The young Leszli boarded a plane in Columbia to go work on a kibbutz in Israel. She never made it because the plane was hijacked by a leftist guerrilla group that lead her to a life in the jungle for the remainder of her captivity. I’m impressed with how early her wisdom kicked in:
My strength is slowly fading. I feel as if I’m sinking little by little, as if there is no way out of the huge hole I have fallen into. I just keep on falling and falling. I think the despair will taper off when I finally surrender to the situation and touch rock bottom.
A little later she writes:
I wish I could turn back the clock to tell them how I feel about them (friends and family), and I regret not having expressed my feelings in the moment… I swear that if I make it back, I will express all these things: who I am, what I feel, my fears and my truths, my joys and my sadness.
This confirmed to me something we try to practice in our community: honest appraisal of our condition and honest authenticity within it. I encourage people to hit rock bottom. And we promise to stay with them while they do so. We also encourage people to be vulnerable and real. And we’ll be vulnerable and real with them. We try not to withhold our affections in the midst of all this trauma. It’s a powerful reality that results from this determination. I don’t think these two revelations are mutually exclusive. They are partners. I’ve seen it here at our church: the more honest we are with our condition (i.e. my life SUCKS!), it creates the atmosphere for authentic expression, which is chaotic but also beautiful. It’s real, let me tell you!
To be honest, the people I mostly am in contact with, who are attracted to my blog and to our church community have mostly experienced the encouragement of denial towards life and pretense in the midst of this denial. This isn’t just a religious problem, a Christian problem or a church problem, but a human problem that finds its greatest expression in religion and the church. It is a beautifully contrived escapism. The sooner we realize the truth of our condition, authentic living can be released in the midst of it. This is the way through.
I was also reading Oswald Chambers the other day in My Utmost For His Highest where he writes:
Sorrow is one of the biggest facts of life; it is no use saying sorrow ought not to be. Sin and sorrow and suffering are, and it is not for us to say that God has made a mistake in allowing them.
Something about Jesus, for the joy set before him, endured the cross. That about says it for our community too. So get used to it quick. Then find joy in the midst of it. This is what I believe is immediately necessary for honest, authentic and joyful community life.
The fine art photograph is the amazing creation of my friend Jorgen Klausen and is from his Mask Series.
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Great post. The folks in the congregation I serve have been having a lot of conversations about being honest about the pain and struggle of parenting in a culture of the “Perfect Parent” or “Perfect Child”
this, i believe, really is wisdom. great post. thanks.
the bondage and gagging of our shallowness is beautifully expressed in the ugly photo.
once you’ve hit rock bottom (and i hope my experience was)… the joy of not being at rock bottom is huge. good relationships are vital though, because people can help you remember where you’ve got to when you slide into the memory of where you were.
Good point about encouraging people to hit rock bottom. I too encourage that. To me that is the state of humbleness that we’re called to. Many people fear that and try to keep people from hitting rock bottom. But it is in that point of rock bottom that I believe that people can really understand their need for God and surrender themselves to Him.
A very good friend of mine died at 30. I’m content I said the things I need to say to him before his sudden departure. I always think about people I care about and things I want to say to them, if one day they weren’t here anymore because of this experience. It important to realize life can change in a second. I hold on to the thought of this. Life is not permanent.
my rock bottom taught me to be grateful for every day and to trust in Christ. tried to run my own life, didn’t work out so well for me
But to wake up in the morning and to give each day to God, to pray for wisdom and guidance to make each day what He wants for me, to give it all over to Him, trusting in His will for me, knowing that I will fail and He will love me still … would never have made a decision to try and live a life like that without hitting rock bottom
it sucked, it was painful, it lasted way too long and I would never want to have to do it again. and yet, rock bottom was the best thing that ever happened to me - God shining through our broken places
Me alegra saber que en`cuentro gente con las mismas determinaciones que yo tuve un dia en cautiverio.
Quiero rescatar solo una cosa mas: Lo que no nos mata, nos hace mas fuertes. Gracias. Att: Leszli Kalli.
Felicitaciones por este blog.
Leszli Querido: Perdóneme para usar un traductor en línea. Gracias por su comentario. Amo su libro. Voy a leer en él en mi iglesia esta mañana. Entiendo su opinión sobre la iglesia, y mi blog intenta tratar esas ediciones. Voy a comentar más respecto a su libro en mi blog esta semana. Espero que poder permanecer. bendiciones! david