Joy in the Pit of Despair

This weekend has been a rough one on my health. I have just felt icky all weekend. My hands hurt like crazy. My squeezing in my ribs hurts a lot today. I have started getting horrid, sharp nerve pain in my legs again. I am struggling like crazy with fatigue and memory problems. I woke up this morning for the first time in awhile with the first thought that entereed my mind being, "I am so stinking tired of all this pain... I just want it to REALLY stop."

Through my back problems, playing music was such an outlet. I would process through a lot of stuff by closing the door to the study and just play the piano and guitar for hours, worshipping, reminding myself of all the promises God has given me. However, with the issues I have now with my hands, playing the piano hurts and it is very unsuccessful many times. I can't use my pinky and can barely use my ring finger. So I am playing with three fingers. My fingers physically will not go some places on the guitar. The pick slips and I can't feel it slipping, and it starts sounding weird, and I realize it has turned all the way around. I have no sense of where my fingers are unless I am looking at them, and I think, "woah! The sounds way off!" and I look down and realize my hand is 2 frets higher than it should be.

This weekend I was working on a song called, "He's Always Been Faithful" by Sara Groves. The words to one of the verses said,

 

Morning by morning I wake up to find
The power and comfort of God’s hand in mine
Season by season I watch Him, amazed
In awe of the mystery of His perfect ways
All I have need of, His hand will provide
He’s always been faithful to me.
 

I felt it was super ironic to sing these words as I was struggling so to play the notes. This one outlet I had in my life to really feel close to God, to bask in his presence, to internalize His word and His promises is feeling like it is being stripped from me. I don't feel like whatever this is that is stripping my hands of the ability to play music is a "perfect way." I don't really feel like God is being faithful to me in feeling like I can't worship anymore.

The song goes on,

 

This is my anthem, this is my song
The theme of the stories I’ve heard for so long
God has been faithful, He will be again
His loving compassion, it knows no end
All I have need of, His hand will provide

He’s always been faithful to me.

The Bible is full of God's examples of His faithfulness to people after many struggles. Mary. Hagar. Sarah. Job. David. Abraham. Joseph. The list goes on and on.

Yet, today I am really trying to rest in the words of Paul. Paul didn't really ever just have his life just fall in to place like some of these people. He was in and out of prison. He had some sort of "thorn" he dealt with that he kept askingGod to take it away, but it seemed God never did:

⁷ To keep me grounded and stop me from becoming too high and mighty due to the extraordinary character of these revelations, I was given a thorn in the flesh—a nagging nuisance of Satan, a messenger to plague me! ⁸ I begged the Lord three times to liberate me from its anguish; ⁹ and finally He said to me, “My grace is enough to cover and sustain you. My power is made perfect in weakness.” So ask me about my thorn, inquire about my weaknesses, and I will gladly go on and on—I would rather stake my claim in these and have the power of the Anointed One at home within me. ¹⁰ I am at peace and even take pleasure in any weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and afflictions for the sake of the Anointed because when I am at my weakest, He makes me strong.

- 2 Corinthians 12:7-10

However, Paul wrote some of the most joyful passages in the Bible:

¹⁸ Now I’m sure of this: the sufferings we endure now are not even worth comparing to the glory that is coming and will be revealed in us.  - Romans 8:18

 

 ²⁸ We are confident that God is able to orchestrate everything to work toward something good and beautiful when we love Him and accept His invitation to live according to His plan.  - Romans 8:28

 

³⁸ For I have every confidence that nothing—not death, life, heavenly messengers, dark spirits, the present, the future, spiritual powers, ³⁹ height, depth, nor any created thing—can come between us and the love of God revealed in the Anointed, Jesus our Lord. - Romans 8:38-39

 

³² Instead, think back to the days after you were first enlightened and understood who Jesus was: when you endured all sorts of suffering in the name of the Lord, ³³ when people held you up for public scorn and ridicule, or when they abused your partners and companions in the faith.  ³⁵ Remember this, and do not abandon your confidence, which will lead to rich rewards. ³⁶ Simply endure, for when you have done as God requires of you, you will receive the promise. - Hebrews 10:32-33, 35-36

 

 ¹² Do not forget to rejoice, for hope is always just around the corner. Hold up through the hard times that are coming, and devote yourselves to prayer. - Romans 12:12

and of course, the most famous passage on joy:

 

⁴ Most of all, friends, always rejoice in the Lord! I never tire of saying it: Rejoice! ⁵ Keep your gentle nature so that all people will know what it looks like to walk in His footsteps. The Lord is ever present with us. ⁶ Don’t be anxious about things; instead, pray. Pray about everything. He longs to hear your requests, so talk to God about your needs and be thankful for what has come. ⁷ And know that the peace of God (a peace that is beyond any and all of our human understanding) will stand watch over your hearts and minds in Jesus, the Anointed One. - Philippians 4:4-7

The whole book of Philippians was thought to be written while Paul was in prison. And not the prisons like we have today... but where he may have been sitting down in a deep hole in the ground, chained to a wall, with no light or windows. Paul was really in the Pit of Despair. I think to the Princess Bride scene where Wesley finds himself in the Pit of Despair. There is no hope of escape, and all that he will know there is torture.

Yet, he did not let the Pit of Despair bring his spirits into the Pit of Despair. He still rejoiced in God's goodness. He knew that God was faithful even when his circumstances suggested otherwise. He knew the promises that God had for him and he trusted that God would provide all He needed.

Buttercup's love gets Wesley through his pit of despair in the Princess Bride. It even gives him the opportunity to only be "mostly dead" instead of losing all hope of life.

True love. This is what revives Wesley. He goes from mostly dead to full of life (even if he has to be carried the whole way in and out of the castle). God's true love revives Paul's spirits while He is in the Pit of Despair, and gives him life and joy again.

I hate that I can't play music right now. I hate that even writing this blog has been super painful on my hands. I hate that I feel like my ways of worship and reflection seem to be taken away from me. I unfortunately don't have a magic pill with a chocolate coating to make it go down easier that will transform my spirits magically to joy. But as the days go by, I hope that I can look to the way Paul approached his life in the Pit, knowing that God would set his feet upon the Rock, and he would have joy. And rest in God's true love to bring me life again, in whatever form that is.

 

Have fun storming the (joy) castle! Think it'll work? It will take a miracle!

 

²² How enduring is God’s loyal love;
the Eternal has inexhaustible compassion.
²³ Here they are, every morning, new!
Your faithfulness, God, is as broad as the day.
²⁴ Have courage, for the Eternal is all that I will need. My soul boasts, “Hope in God; just wait.”

 - Lamentations 3:22-2