My Take
DiVoran Lites
Recently, I turned my life over to God in a way I’d never done before. Since I became a Christian in 1969 I have needed to “minister.” I would beg God to help me want to “make cold calls,” as the salesmen call them, but it never did feel natural. Oh, I visited homes of my Sunday School class and made calls, and I began to counsel over the phone so much I thought that was all my life was good for. I had anxiety attacks and cringed when I heard the phone ring because sometimes the caller would keep me for three hours, or more, telling me her problems. I could name names, but of course I won’t. Here are only a couple of examples: an older woman that I discovered later was a heavy drinker who loved to talk about her problems, but who never sought a solution of any kind, as far as I know. Another was a young mother whose husband used her for a punching bag. Nothing ever got solved there either, but being on the phone was my life after laundry, cooking, and dishes, so I persevered.
When I found an escape route for the young women and her two boys, she refused to leave her husband. I was a novice at all this, but I began to wonder if it was truly my calling. I began to see that it was what social work, counselors, ministers were trained for. I read, When Helping You is Hurting Me, by Rene Berry, and a book about setting boundaries. I studied the Bible in a deeper way.
During all this time, I had at least one friend that really cared and was praying for me. I had two children and a husband to care for, I wasn’t a refugee or in the middle of a war, it was just that, I wasn’t tapping into my trued nature, which I thought was garbage, anyway.
At last a doctor told me I was carrying too much stress and that I was going to have to stop taking on people’s problems. I eased out, and slowly got to a place where I had more time to be myself. I just had to find out who that was as far as God was concerned.
I don’t regret all that I learned about human nature in those years. I’m super-grateful for the people who did love me and whom I loved. It was refreshing when we could counsel together and it built my confidence.
One of those friends invited me or I invited her to an art class we saw advertised in the newspaper. I was in love right away and went on to another twenty-years of art classes. I met some cool people too and am still friends them.
I wrote three novels and went to a writing group facilitated by a brilliant woman who had attended Smith. Love it all. There still was, however, that small well of sadness I felt sometimes as if it were a permanent part of my nature. If I got sad, I told myself over and over that the only fix was to volunteer somewhere. That’s what everybody said, and I believed it. Finally, I told God I would let him decide what I would do with my times. He could bring whatever or whoever he wanted into my life. I would wait on Him. For me that took nerve.
He did lead however. I would wait and he would send a person or an opportunity my way. I learned I was valuable to Him no matter what. I also learned that I was serving Him out of love for Him and for His creations, not out of fear or the need for reward.
Now I paint, I journal, I go on walks with friends, I shop sometimes at thrift stores. I have time, plenty of time to do whatever comes my way. There are trials of course, but I feel I am learning to rely on God more and more. It is good.
Yesterday, I went to the SPCA to cancel a pickup appointment I had made for a desk. I’d realized how fond I was of that desk and that I wanted to keep it, so no pickup.
When someone says that apples grow on orange trees and the moon is square, remember you don’t know everything. Perhaps somewhere in the universe these things are true, let it go.
Old Things R New 