"You're trying to be un-rejected."
That's what a friend told me.
"Stop looking back. Stop dissecting the why's and wherefore's and asking what your fault in it was. You've done that. You couldn't prevent this from happening. Stop trying to figure out a way to have a lifelong marriage. You have tried to reconcile a thousand times and gotten a thousand solid no's. Stop trying to drag a 200-lb man up Mount We-Can-Make-It who doesn't want to go there with you. Sometimes love means letting go, honey. Stop trying to be un-rejected and just lean into the reality that you've been royally, terribly, cruelly dumped."
Wow.
That's pathetic.
Her words stung, but they smarted with truth, the painful truth.
Who is this desperate woman within me who bursts with longing for a life that has been decimated? What is that all about? Why does the panic of grief swirl within my chest taking my breath away? Does my inner woman really believe that if I can figure it out, sift through every detail and put each piece in place, get my head wrapped around each tragic part, that it'll be miraculously mended? Like it never happened?
Chasing un-rejection requires an astonishingly low level of self-respect or an incredibly high level of self-cruelty. What purpose does it serve? Maybe there's a smidge of nobility of intention there, but I suspect not. Maybe it started out from the standards of what a Christian wife should be and do. But it sure went ten kinds of haywire from there.
One time at a 12-step group for wives of men like my husband a young mother spoke up. She was absolutely beautiful with long, curly red hair, a smattering of adorable freckles, and big blue eyes. But, when she spoke she just waaaah-waaaah-waaaah-ed over her husband, this man who had behaved terribly destructively, didn't want her, or to be a responsible father, was horribly selfish, and on and on.
I sat there thinking, "Good heavenly days, woman, get a grip! Have a little dignity. Why are you letting yourself be wrecked emotionally, financially, spiritually, mentally, and in every other way by a man who couldn't care less about you? Seriously, how pathet..."
Oh.
Ummm...
Darn.
Stasi Eldredge wrote in her book Captivating
"To the woman He said, '...Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.' ... Woman is cursed with loneliness (relational heartache), with the urge to control (especially her man), and with the dominance of men (which is not how things were meant to be, and we are not saying it is a good thing - it is the fruit of the fall and a sad fact of history).
Isn't it true? Aren't your deepest worries and heartaches relational - aren't they connected to someone? Even when things are good, is your vast capacity for intimacy ever filled in a lasting way? There is an emptiness in us that we continually try to feed. And can't you see how much you need to have things under your control - whether it's a project or a ministry or a marriage? Are you comfortable trusting your well-being to someone else? And haven't you felt "this is a man's world?" felt your vulnerability as a woman to be a liability? Most women hate their vulnerability. We are not inviting - we are guarded. Most of our energy is spent trying to hide our true selves, and control our worlds to have some sense of security.
When a woman falls from grace, what is most deeply marred is her tender vulnerability, beauty that invites to life. She becomes a dominating, controlling woman - or a desolate, needy, mousy woman. Or some odd combination of both, depending on her circumstances.
(Captivating, 49-50)
Dominating, controlling, desolate, needy. Ok, ok, Stasi, I heard you.
When someone decides not to love you enough to work it out, there's nothing you can do to make them love you and work it out mutually, humbly, and respectfully. You can't control the situation, can't beg enough, can't manipulate and cajole him into changing his heart or choices. You can't do anything about it. Nothing. You can only repent, pray, and forgive, and sometimes it's imperative, especially if there's been abuse, to do so waaay over here, while that person is waaay over there. Just breathe in and out walking with God one foot in front of the other.
So where do I go from here? What do you do once you give it over to God? That's scary for a control-freak like me. What do you do once you let go, once you fully accept the rejection and abandonment, once you let the heartbreak wash over you and you surprisingly don't die from it? You live. And live knowing you cannot hold onto ashes anymore.
The only answer I can come up with that truly, deeply satisfies is Jesus and how He loves me.
Will never leave or forsake me - Romans 8.38-39
Is with me - Psalm 34.18
Comforts me - Matthew 5.4
Values me - Luke 12.7
Fights on my behalf - Exodus 14.14
Redeems me - Psalm 103.4
Strengthens me - Isaiah 40.31
Never changes - Malachi 3.6
Calls me His own - Psalm 43.1-3
Sings over me - Zephaniah 3.17
God looks at my heart, at my soul, at my witness, at me and says with fatherly love, "To mature Anna and cut off the dead parts, the selfishness, inflexible, ugly, fleshly nature and refine it into Christlikeness, she needs to experience rejection and an unwillingness to reconcile. She needs to have her heart crushed so she can learn to find joy in Me alone. She needs to develop thankfulness for what the journey teaches her. She needs to learn to find gratefulness within suffering and loss."
He allows it for my good.
I've danced back and forth with thankfulness not just in, but for this season of grief and pain. Sometimes grateful, sometimes really, really not grateful. But, it's funny how when you lay down your idols and the hurts you've hugged to your breast and begin to say "thank You, Father" for not only every good that You provide, but also for the complete upending of life, for the sorrows and fires... thankfulness for all the details of life starts to grow within you. Ann Voskamp's book "One Thousand Gifts" is imperative reading on thankfulness through suffering. Seriously, stop reading right now and buy it. I'll wait right here. It'll rock you.
The more I study the Word and lean into Emmanuel, who though I rejected Him and constantly struggle with ingratitude, am disobedient, strong-willed, mouthy, and full of sin, leans in so close to whisper words of perfect love, and of acceptance, and of forgiveness and redemption, the more I can't escape the thankfulness that wells up within me. Reconciliation with God was born out of His pursuing me, not the other way around.
I ran.
I run.
He runs after me.
That's what a friend told me.
"Stop looking back. Stop dissecting the why's and wherefore's and asking what your fault in it was. You've done that. You couldn't prevent this from happening. Stop trying to figure out a way to have a lifelong marriage. You have tried to reconcile a thousand times and gotten a thousand solid no's. Stop trying to drag a 200-lb man up Mount We-Can-Make-It who doesn't want to go there with you. Sometimes love means letting go, honey. Stop trying to be un-rejected and just lean into the reality that you've been royally, terribly, cruelly dumped."
Wow.
That's pathetic.
Her words stung, but they smarted with truth, the painful truth.
Who is this desperate woman within me who bursts with longing for a life that has been decimated? What is that all about? Why does the panic of grief swirl within my chest taking my breath away? Does my inner woman really believe that if I can figure it out, sift through every detail and put each piece in place, get my head wrapped around each tragic part, that it'll be miraculously mended? Like it never happened?
Chasing un-rejection requires an astonishingly low level of self-respect or an incredibly high level of self-cruelty. What purpose does it serve? Maybe there's a smidge of nobility of intention there, but I suspect not. Maybe it started out from the standards of what a Christian wife should be and do. But it sure went ten kinds of haywire from there.
One time at a 12-step group for wives of men like my husband a young mother spoke up. She was absolutely beautiful with long, curly red hair, a smattering of adorable freckles, and big blue eyes. But, when she spoke she just waaaah-waaaah-waaaah-ed over her husband, this man who had behaved terribly destructively, didn't want her, or to be a responsible father, was horribly selfish, and on and on.
"Whyyyyy, doesn't he love me enough
to stop this behavior?
Whyyyyyy-hyy-hyy when I would do
absolutely anything for him
and have loved him all my adult life?
What am I going to dooooo-hoo-hoo?"
I sat there thinking, "Good heavenly days, woman, get a grip! Have a little dignity. Why are you letting yourself be wrecked emotionally, financially, spiritually, mentally, and in every other way by a man who couldn't care less about you? Seriously, how pathet..."
Oh.
Ummm...
Darn.
Stasi Eldredge wrote in her book Captivating
Isn't it true? Aren't your deepest worries and heartaches relational - aren't they connected to someone? Even when things are good, is your vast capacity for intimacy ever filled in a lasting way? There is an emptiness in us that we continually try to feed. And can't you see how much you need to have things under your control - whether it's a project or a ministry or a marriage? Are you comfortable trusting your well-being to someone else? And haven't you felt "this is a man's world?" felt your vulnerability as a woman to be a liability? Most women hate their vulnerability. We are not inviting - we are guarded. Most of our energy is spent trying to hide our true selves, and control our worlds to have some sense of security.
When a woman falls from grace, what is most deeply marred is her tender vulnerability, beauty that invites to life. She becomes a dominating, controlling woman - or a desolate, needy, mousy woman. Or some odd combination of both, depending on her circumstances.
(Captivating, 49-50)
Dominating, controlling, desolate, needy. Ok, ok, Stasi, I heard you.
When someone decides not to love you enough to work it out, there's nothing you can do to make them love you and work it out mutually, humbly, and respectfully. You can't control the situation, can't beg enough, can't manipulate and cajole him into changing his heart or choices. You can't do anything about it. Nothing. You can only repent, pray, and forgive, and sometimes it's imperative, especially if there's been abuse, to do so waaay over here, while that person is waaay over there. Just breathe in and out walking with God one foot in front of the other.
So where do I go from here? What do you do once you give it over to God? That's scary for a control-freak like me. What do you do once you let go, once you fully accept the rejection and abandonment, once you let the heartbreak wash over you and you surprisingly don't die from it? You live. And live knowing you cannot hold onto ashes anymore.
The only answer I can come up with that truly, deeply satisfies is Jesus and how He loves me.
Will never leave or forsake me - Romans 8.38-39
Is with me - Psalm 34.18
Comforts me - Matthew 5.4
Values me - Luke 12.7
Fights on my behalf - Exodus 14.14
Redeems me - Psalm 103.4
Strengthens me - Isaiah 40.31
Never changes - Malachi 3.6
Calls me His own - Psalm 43.1-3
Sings over me - Zephaniah 3.17
God looks at my heart, at my soul, at my witness, at me and says with fatherly love, "To mature Anna and cut off the dead parts, the selfishness, inflexible, ugly, fleshly nature and refine it into Christlikeness, she needs to experience rejection and an unwillingness to reconcile. She needs to have her heart crushed so she can learn to find joy in Me alone. She needs to develop thankfulness for what the journey teaches her. She needs to learn to find gratefulness within suffering and loss."
He allows it for my good.
I've danced back and forth with thankfulness not just in, but for this season of grief and pain. Sometimes grateful, sometimes really, really not grateful. But, it's funny how when you lay down your idols and the hurts you've hugged to your breast and begin to say "thank You, Father" for not only every good that You provide, but also for the complete upending of life, for the sorrows and fires... thankfulness for all the details of life starts to grow within you. Ann Voskamp's book "One Thousand Gifts" is imperative reading on thankfulness through suffering. Seriously, stop reading right now and buy it. I'll wait right here. It'll rock you.
The more I study the Word and lean into Emmanuel, who though I rejected Him and constantly struggle with ingratitude, am disobedient, strong-willed, mouthy, and full of sin, leans in so close to whisper words of perfect love, and of acceptance, and of forgiveness and redemption, the more I can't escape the thankfulness that wells up within me. Reconciliation with God was born out of His pursuing me, not the other way around.
I ran.
I run.
He runs after me.
HE runs after me.
I love your beautiful heart! You are a tremendous blessing. And..Yes! You are so right. Thankfulness! "Life change comes when we receive life with thanks and ask for nothing to change." Ann Voskamp Ugh. That's a tough read. Learning to give thanks for the ugly beautiful is one of the most difficult yet growth inducing steps. YOU are taking those steps! HUGE. MONUMENTAL. FABULOUS. BEAUTIFUL. Here's me cheering you on!! (insert picture with big puffy pom-poms and then me, jumping up and down, cheering you on...creating such a spectacle that my kids are tempted not to claim me as their mama....!)
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