Someday

During the month since Ramsy died, I have spent a lot of time thinking and writing and reading and learning. One of the things that has been on my mind is the language that we use to describe times of crisis, or to comfort each other in times of crisis or loss. I love language and the different moods that can be created by the choice of words, but I have been struck many times over the past year by the realization that the words we use are so often inadequate to convey exactly what we feel or think.

One instance of this (and I cannot recall whether this phrase has been said to me personally, but I have heard it over the years here and there) is when we talk about "The Reason" that a sad event has occurred, as if there is only one. "We can't know The Reason why this had to happen," or "When we get to Heaven ourselves God will tell us The Reason for this tragedy."  I think I understand what we mean when we say this, but looking through the lens of my recent experience, it sits uneasily.  It is not quite enough, to my mind. It seems to reduce life to an equation, or a series of direct cause-and-effect events, or a chess game in which we are pawns to be sacrificed when necessary- and too bad for us.  But life is so complex, the more so because we are spiritual beings living in a physical world that does not run the way it was designed to, and where we experience spiritual as well as physical sufferings.  A simple answer to everything does not fit.  What is The Reason the tsunami happened in southeast Asia a couple of years ago?  What is The Reason for the terrible imbalance of wealth in the world?  Who can give (or accept) a one-sentence explanation for Candace Derksen's death?

The kind of response that I sense in my mind and heart is in a song by Nichole Nordeman called "Someday":

I believe in the rest of the story
I believe there's still ink in the pen
I have wasted my very last day
Trying to change what happened way back when

I believe it's the human condition
We all need to have answers to "why"
More than ever I'm ready to say
That I will still sleep peacefully
With answers out of reach for me until

Someday all that's crazy, all that's unexplained
Will fall into place
And someday all that's hazy through a clouded glass
Will be clear at last
And sometimes we're just waiting
For someday

We are born with a lingering hunger
We are born to be unsatisfied
We are strangers who can't help but wander and dream
About the other side of someday

Every puzzle's missing piece
Every unsolved mystery
More than half of every whole
Rests in the Hand that holds you for someday

And someday all that's crazy, all that's unexplained
Will be beautiful, beautiful
And someday all that's hazy through a clouded glass
Will be clear at last
And sometimes we're just waiting
And waiting
For someday

This kind of response allows for the complexities of life, and the ups and downs of our feelings, and all kinds of mess. Did you see that line in the last chorus? And someday all that's crazy, all that's unexplained will be beautiful, beautiful! As a middle-aged woman, I have seen in my own life and in the lives of others the miracle of something beautiful arising out of horrible circumstances.  Although I would not have chosen the painful experiences that I've had in my life, by walking through them I have become a more compassionate person; have made deep and lasting friendships; have had people added to my family whom I love; have learned who God is for myself instead of only hearing about him from others.  Remembering this gives me hope that good things will continue to come even out of great sorrow if I allow my heart to remain open and soft.

Another thing to consider: as humans, we live inside the created structure of time, while God lives outside of that structure.  To me this often-overlooked fact helps account for some of the great mysteries of our spiritual experience. I don't know how it works, and I don't know that anyone could explain it to me so I would understand (how does one explain to a goldfish that one day it will live outside of water?); but when I think of the time/non-time fact I am reassured that I don't really understand how the universe works and that I don't have to stretch to come up with answers to why things happen the way they do. I can rest in the "I don't know" and trust that someday- after I too have gone to live outside of time and hang out with Jesus and Ramsy- the things that I need to know will become clear to me, and that Jesus will show us all the beautiful things that came of this that we did not get to see here.

I don't know why I have to wait here so painfully while Ramsy has gone home ahead of me, but I believe that I would not understand any reasons right now even if they were shown to me. I think that's for Someday.