June 1 - June 5, 1990
June 1
God, when the job at hand is more than I can handle,
God, when the pressure weighs heavy upon me,
God, when things are out of my hands,
when I am helpless, lost and looking for answers,
God, when I’ve buried my head in the sand,
sulked in my sorrows and wondered aloud
in a roomful of sufferers, selfishly cried “Why me?”
God, when I don’t know the answers,
God, when I think I need to know
as a matter of survival, life and death,
God, the power and the glory
and the answer, God, is yours.
June 2
Parul is not happy with her mother today. They don’t want her going to India —because of money, because of safety, some other time maybe —and she’s disappointed. She threw some shoes at her mother and walked out of the house, eleven miles to 520 Stewart.
She got rained on several times along the way.
She’s never been anywhere, she says, and now, forget it, she doesn’t want to go to India. “One day we’ll go together,” I said, and she said, “No, I don’t want to go.”
I brought her to her uncle’s house. She’s not sure what will happen next. She’s even having second thoughts about medical school.
“This too...” I said, but she wasn’t ready to believe me.
Tomorrow, God, I pray for Parul.
⇋
“I talk to God a lot. In the shower, in the car. Some people might call it prayer, but I like to think of it as a kind of thought process, a figuring out.”
“Does he hear you?”
“God? Sure. God hears us whether we’re talking to him or not.”
“Hey, Joe, come on, what makes you think God would take the time to listen to you?
“I don’t know, Jim. I don’t know why. I just know he does.”
“How do you know?”
“He answers.”
June 3
Faith: such that I long for, a faith of such power to give me the strength to recognize my weakness, to repulse all illusions of my own credits, to relinquish my whole self —faith to say no more me, just God. Faith, trust, that I could walk within every shadow of darkness, that I could believe that light awaits me, that darkness will be defeated.
God, you lay it all out for us. You give us a one word direction and it ought to be easy. But I... the self gets in the way, and yet you have given us the self, too, God; you leave us all sorts of mysteries and then you give us this mind, that wants so much to know.
Thank you God, for the promises you have given Josh today and for the strength you have given to Don; for the smile you have given to Parul today and for the grace you have given her family. Thank you God for everyone close to me —Annie, Mom, Dan —and thank you too for everyday people, most of whose names I do not know, but thank you God for their patience —your patience —and acceptance of a man with measly faith. I am afraid to be weak, God, and I am afraid of relinquishing myself, even to my maker, but thank you God for your ears and your hand and your presence. Thank you for your strength and your smile and your grace, your light and your direction.
P.S., just one thing more: God bless my studies and my tests this week. I need you.
June 4
The thought occurred to me that things will never be the same.
This wasn’t a pessimistic thought, either. Josh has realistic hope of a lasting remission. Don went to work today; he’s feeling much stronger and it makes me consider that with the extent of last week’s pain for him followed by this week’s recovery, the chemo might really be doing what we want it to do.
So I thought: what if Don’s tumor disappeared and Josh’s remission were complete? Things wouldn’t be the same; they would be better for the ways we would —and will! —be stronger: in spirits, in confidence, in faith. There is, of course, a “best case” scenario, to believe that Josh and Don will live forever. And why not? By faith, God promises that they will!
For now, however, I must continue to pray.
June 5
How about this:
Every thought is a prayer to God, and every prayer has an answer within it. God is with us all the time, and when we remember this and believe this, his spirit responds in us and directs us. God directs us as long as we acknowledge his presence (Proverbs 3:6), but when we forget this, where are our thoughts, our prayers? Even then, God is still with us, waiting for us to call on him again.
Every thought is a prayer, how about that? But every day —isn’t it a shame? —we spend so much time being thoughtless. And still God is with us, waiting for us to come to our senses, to think, to pray.
God is more than an abstract thought, however. The proof is not, and cannot be, my own, but it is this: our thoughts do not sustain themselves. One private thought cannot sustain another, yet there is an answer, always, like the voice that came to Moses and said “I am.” God is an answer. Yahweh is the answer to our prayers. God is not a thought; God is “I am,” the answer.
But what about the so-called great thinkers of the world, those who say they do not pray because “there is no God”? God is still the answer, waiting for the question to be asked, the prayer to be prayed, the thought to occur (There are thoughts that have not yet occurred, even to the greatest thinkers). Every thought is a prayer, I said.
So what about the thought that God does not exist (and who has never cried, “Where are you, God?”)? Isn’t this simply thinking without direction, aimlessly pondering, oblivious meditation? Thoughtlessness, really. And still God waits with an answer. Is there a God? Yes, Yahweh say, I am.
⇋
God, with apologies*
God
adj.
I AM: considered apart
from concrete
existence
or
(AM I) a specification
thereof.
I AM: theoretical;
not applied
or
(AM I) capable of being
put into effect.
I AM: thought of
or
(AM I) stated without
reference
to a specific
instance.
I AM: Fine Arts. with
nonobjective
design, form
or
(AM I) content.
* with apologies to Concise American Heritage Dictionary, 1980.
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