Day 61
A Mouthful
I wonder if Porpoise ever get thirsty. I swallowed some salt water once when I was a kid while swimming in the bay near Seattle. Once was enough. Maybe baby Porpoise have the same experience. We, like the Porpoise, must learn to shut our mouths when confronted with certain circumstances.
We had a very good friend named Judy. She is a very passionate, energetic gal. Judy had a ravenous appetite for God. She was actively involved in helping other people and participating in every spiritual growth opportunity known to man. We would see Judy at least two or three days a week, sharing meals together, visiting people or just hanging out.
Judy loved men. She collected them, a different one every few months. Judy loved to bring the new one over to our home. Predictably, she would capture the opportunity when the guy finally had to use the restroom to whisper energetically, “Whaddya think? Whaddya think?” She always got the same response from us. “He seems nice.” (Hey, these were nice guys). For one reason or another, these relationships never lasted. My wife and I spent countless hours listening to the stories she would tell about the interpersonal difficulties that would inevitably arise during the term of these relationships.
A week went by and we didn’t see or hear from Judy. We called. She was fine. She had met a new man and was “completely in love with him.” They were spending every possible moment together. Another week went by. No Judy. We called again, same story. Several weeks went by, nothing from Judy. She didn’t answer her phone so we left voicemails. Nothing. No response.
One evening as we began discussing how worried we were about her, there was a knock on our front door. Judy wobbled into the living room before we could rise to get to the door. She’d obviously been crying – eyes swollen and bloodshot, cheeks reddened, and a maroon nose. Still standing, she lifted her head to gaze at us as she lifted her arms and imploded, “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! What have I done?” she sobbed, as the waves of heartbreak convulsed from her soul and crashed against the walls of our living room.
During the next ten to fifteen minutes, Judy shared that the young man she had dated over the last several months was of another faith….a non-Christian. Judy had begun to attend fellowship gatherings with him. She decided to become one of them and was baptized into the another faith. As the weeks passed after her baptism, she began to learn things about this other faith and this young man that troubled her deeply. Now, here she sat in an apparently (to her) irreparable predicament: The relationship with the young man had ended and she did not want to be one of them anymore but, “I’ve done it and I can’t undo it!”
The life of faith involves inadvertently swallowing salt water from time to time. Yes, we’re the one’s who open our mouths and swallow the stuff. These acts can be intentional or unintentional. Of course, once you’ve swallowed something, you’ve swallowed it. No, you “can’t undo it.” However, these occurrences are rarely fatal.
We experience “T’s” in the road during our faith journey, reaching places where we realize we missed the sign that read, “Dead End” or “No Thru Street.” The point is that when we come to the realization like Judy did, the lie we buy into that traumatizes far too many, has several dimensions: A. We are somehow unique (the first person to have ever swallowed salt-water during their faith journey). B. We are somehow permanently and intrinsically changed for the rest of our days. C. There’s no going back or moving ahead. It’s over.
Judy’s story illustrates a very important truth: We’re going to get a mouthful of saltwater navigating our ways through the seas of faith in life. Heck, we’re likely to swallow the stuff as well. It’s likely to happen more than a few times during our lives. When we realize we’ve swallowed something that we probably shouldn’t have ingested, it impairs our equilibrium. We become vulnerable to the elements of the lie I’ve described above. The overwhelming sense of guilt, shame, confusion and remorse cause many to become disillusioned and to give up on journeying further in the seas of faith.
The faith journey is not linear living where everything is predictable, certain, predetermined and there is no margin for error. Expect that you’re going to swallow some saltwater. Expect your worldview to be upset. Understand that “Jesus taught that when our pictures don’t look straight, God is often inviting us to enjoy them in their crookedness…It is on the crooked paths, in unwanted circumstances, that we find God’s plans for us – and some of the greatest things life has to offer.” [i]
Expect to swallow a mouthful of saltwater every once in a while. Porpoises do. Learn from it. Swim on. It’s not going to kill you.
NOTES
[i] Taylor, Tom PARADOXY – Coming to Grips With the Contradictions of Jesus, Baker Books, A Division of Baker Publishing Group, Copyright © 2006 by Tom Taylor. P. 14.
