Good morning…
“Did you read Wade’s devotional from this week?” my husband Steve asked over the weekend. (Wade is the middle school chaplain alongside Steve who is the upper school chaplain.) “His shared a vulnerable and touching story about the challenges he faces with his youngest son.”
I had seen the devotional come in, but had yet to take time to read it. So in the quiet of the night I experience it now.
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Chaplain’s Devotional for January 4, 2022 by Wade Reck
These days, the longest hour of my week happens in two 30 minute segments. Twice a week, my two boys go to martial arts class. For my older son Atticus, martial arts is not a challenge. For Lucas, it’s a different story. Lucas is struggling with a number of challenges in his young life. While we’ve yet to get to the bottom of Lucas’s struggles, we know social anxiety is a part of it. His karate class is big. He only makes it through the whole 30 minutes about half the time. All too often, I have to take him out before the end of the session after he either comes unglued or completely shuts down. We stay at it because the instructors are good with him. And he says he wants to keep trying. Some days, it really seems like he’s improving. Other days, it’s a trainwreck.
The trouble is…on any particular day, there’s no way of telling if the trainwreck’s coming. Every lesson, as I sit on the side and watch Lucas on the mat, I sit at rigid attention, hoping, praying that he’ll do well and be happy from one moment to the next. Things will start to go poorly, and my stress level rises. Things de-escalate. I take a deep breath. I just want him to be happy. I want him to do well. The time just crawls by.
For me, being a parent is all about faith. I have to have faith that Lucas will rise above his challenges. I have to have faith that the love, affirmation, and security my family and I try to consistently offer Lucas will serve as a compass of sorts in his life, directing his little soul along a path that will lead to health and happiness. I have to have faith that the skills therapists give him will help him learn how to thrive. I have to have faith because all the things I want for Lucas won’t happen tomorrow. We are on a journey. We have miles to go before we arrive. Faith involves trusting that we will indeed reach our destination though not as quickly as I would like.
I was thinking about Meredyth’s words in our all school meeting Tuesday morning. (Meredyth is the head of schools.) I heard Meredyth speak about how we all still carry the exhausting weight of this pandemic that just keeps on coming. The day when school is as it used to be (no masks, COVID testing, social distancing, illness, anxiety, and the like) just isn’t here yet. We must have faith. We too are on a journey. Though the easier days we long for aren’t here as quickly as we’d like, we must choose to believe…they will come. New challenges will always arise, but easier days will surely come.
In my church this past week, we read an excerpt from a Psalm. The line that struck me is this one: Happy are the people whose strength is in you, whose heart is on the pilgrim’s way (Psalm 84:4).
“A heart on the pilgrim’s way” – I’ve been thinking about this phrasing since I first heard it.
Evelyn Underhill, someone who wrote about mysticism, says there are three deep cravings of the self. The first, a craving which makes us all pilgrims and wanderers, ever searching for a lost home, a brighter tomorrow, a better country. We are all on a journey, are we not? We all long for more. We hunger for many of the same things though we travel many different pathways in search of them.
I think it’s important to keep a pilgrim’s heart, a heart mindful that we are in the midst of a journey. Though we are called to embrace the goodness and accept the challenges of each moment, it’s important to remember that each moment passes. It’s important to have faith that though challenge and hardship are a part of this journey, they are not where it ends.
And so we keep on walking, trusting that the One who made us walks with us still, believing that our Creator will guide us to all we truly need. A new day always dawns. Thanks be to God. And with each new day, we come across new, often unanticipated blessings in our travels.
As a new day dawns on a new semester, may you be blessed with faith, hope, and love.
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Wade’s tender description of journeying with his young son to a better day reminds me of an email I received Saturday as I returned home from the funeral, a service celebrating the vibrant twenty-three years lived by Ben Rau, a high school classmate of our youngest daughter.
“I am crying Sue and I don’t even know this sweet boy Ben,” wrote a friend. “It is my fear that these precious souls who don’t fit a formula feel sidelined in this world. Please tell me this was not a suicide or overdose – please tell me that this amazing, interesting, light-filled soul did not give into the darkness. So many of the details could have been describing my own son and we have had to push back so hard on the world’s influence to try to make him something he is not. Prayers for Steve, you and this precious family this morning. The most beautiful obituary I’ve ever read. Xoxo.”
“Gosh, the service was incredible,” I emailed her when I got home. “Ben’s dad and sister spoke. Incredibly moving and meaningful. Steve spoke and the lower school chaplain read scriptures and prayed. Each were down-to-earth, affirming. The music was exquisite, and the video montage of photos from Ben’s life captured such joy. I sat with my daughter and her friends. So much love and creativity and beauty shared into this world through Ben. He will be so deeply missed.”
“Yes, his was such a precious soul that did not fit the typical mold,” I explained. “He was extraordinary, as is his family. He was moving into such a season of hope and possibility, it’s just so sad he didn’t get through the hour that took his life.”
“I continue to pray for you and your son,” I wrote. “It is hard to protect space for uniqueness in this world so bent on conformity. Alongside all the amazing accolades, Ben’s family shared that mental illness began to play a role in his life,” I explained. “He was in treatment and seemed to be turning a positive corner. It is so hard to have his earthly journey end so soon.”
“Please keep me in touch with your son’s story as he matures into all God has planned,” I encouraged.
“A heart on the pilgrim’s way” – I too think more deeply about this touching phrase. God invites us to keep a pilgrim’s heart, a heart mindful that we, and every person we meet, are in the midst of a unique journey. I look back over Wade’s wise words.
“Though we are called to embrace the goodness and accept the challenges of each moment,
it’s important to remember that each moment passes.
It’s important to have faith that though challenge and hardship are a part of this journey,
they are not where it ends.”
Now I am drawn to Psalm 121, a song for us pilgrims journeying toward a brighter tomorrow.
I look up at the vast size of the mountains—from where will my help come in times of trouble? The Eternal Creator of heaven and earth and these mountains will send the help I need. He holds you firmly in place; He will not let you fall. He who keeps you will never take His eyes off you and never drift off to sleep (Psalm 121:1-3, VOICE).
…Sue…
