So yesterday I reposted a post on how COPS is a commentary on the despair in our world, or at least USAmerica. I lamented why this world seems so screwed up, where God is in the mix of all this screwed-upness, and what I am I to do in the face of all the screwed-upness in my own backyard (which truth be told is in a lovely culdesac in the exurbes of Grand Rapids, very far removed from all the screwed-upness…).
Some people commented and identified with my lament and helplessness. But one fellow scriber thought that me “devoting 2 hours of your time to watch a show like COPS is a comment on your despair.” And then he wrote the perfectly Christian response: “I’ll pray for you.”
I was pretty pissed after I read that. I was like, “who is this guy to suggest that I have ‘despair’! I am perfectly hopeful and UN-despairing thank you very much…and you can take your prayer and shove it where the sun don’t shine!” (Sorry Pistol, but that’s how I felt…at the time.)
But as I thought about it throughout the day and more this morning I realized I am despairing.
About a lot of things.
Then I read a post by another fellow scriber called “Hour of Complaint” by Jemila Kwon in which she just writes a list of cathartic complaints. I resonated with so much of what she wrote.
And then I started tearing and thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown so I though I would bleed my own soul all over the blogosphere.
So here is my own “Hour of Complaint”:
- I feel like I’m not doing enough.
- Other people are luckier than I. They look better, do better, perform better, care better, and are just better.
- I feel like I suck.
- I feel helpless.
- I feel mildly depressed.
- Why am I depressed? Christians should not be depressed but should have the “joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart, damn it! (where?)”
- There are big pieces of me that confuse and scare the shit out of me that I feel are hopelessly irreconcilable. Lord what am I too do?
- I think I am still affected by being kicked out of ministry a year and a half ago…and feel I’ll never be good at being a pastor nor be able to “do ministry” again.
- Am I making the biggest mistake of my life by going to seminary?
- How am I to start a church? How can I be a pastor and even THINK I could teach and shepherd with so much personal brokenness?
- Sometimes I want to chuck it all to the wind, move to Canada, and just live an anonymous simple life known by no one.
- Like Jemila: I am genetically prone to deep thinking and anxiety–not fair!
- I hate West Michigan.
- Even more I hate West Michigan Christians…a bunch of fakers, the whole lot of ’em.
- I identify more with the .alt/indy crowd here now than the ubermajority (like 97.32%) Christian culture.
- I want to love the Bride of Jesus and devote myself to Her, but that Bride seriously disgusts me sometimes.
- I’m becoming cynical. Am I a genetically wired cynic?
- I’m a bundle of contradictions that seem hopelessly irreconcilable.
- I turn 28 this year. Have I made a difference, yet? Will I make a difference or am I resigned to a normal, boring, TYPICAL USAmerican life, let alone a normal, boring, typical USAmerican Christian life?
- Life is not the “Leave it to Beaver” episode I was conned into believing growing up in West Michigan. Life bites. Life is a struggle marked by one broken refrigerator, missed opportunity, health scare, rejection, and car failure after another.
Lord, come quickly, to sooth and heal and restore what the locusts have eaten…
-jeremy
PS- thanks for your words, Pistol, and for praying…
” I’m a bundle of contradictions that seem hopelessly irreconcilable.”
I am thinking this is everyone. Certain blessed/cursed individuals simply live with a higher awareness of our contradictions. Ordinarily, the brain smooths out these pesky inconsistencies that cause cognitive dissonance. In some of us, that function has been muted, allowing us to experience a more piercing and wild range of human contradiction consciously. This is amazing and a gift. It’s also like having surgery without anesthesia: at times, you don’t *want* to be that aware 🙂
I like your list 🙂 You added a few I can say “yeah,” too!
WOW! Thanks for the explanation…and here I thought I was just crazy 🙂 I guess it is a gift, but like you said “It’s also like having surgery without anesthesia: at times, you don’t *want* to be that aware” YES, YES!
Did I say you weren’t crazy? I though I just said you’re not unique 😉
heheheh 🙂
Does that feel better now?
Let me know.
I’ll pray for you.
sounds like you’re nearly ready to answer the call to pastor the flock. Ready to carry the burden of a people just like you.
blessings
Glenn, wisely said.
Wow. With all that going on, looks like I’m going to have to pray harder.
As for #10, I’m a living example that you can serve faithfully and fruitfully as a wounded healer. I am legally insane and yet have managed to serve in ministry for 17 years, and, with God’s help, touch a lot of lives for Christ.
Don’t get me wrong, though, I haven’t had my moments either. In my second year of ministry a woman wrote an 8-page single-space, small-font letter calling for my resignation. Fortunately, they decided she was crazier than I was, so they kept me.
Hang in there.
meant to say “have had my moments” in paragraph 3 above.
welcome to my world.
To the man who will soon be a shepherd-in-training to the flock I attend, I feel your pain. I am a few years (OK, 10 is more than a few) older than you and went through a period you described so vividly a few short years ago ….. why didn’t I get the promotion …. does anybody really need another chair that looks exactly like 50 that are already on the market …. there are starving children/wars/etc and I make office furniture???? What got me out of my funk is that I finally took to heart that I am not in control. God has a plan for me and in time all will become clear (or maybe not .. either way, it’s out of my hands). It still frustrates the control freak in me, but I’m getting better at dealing with it. Judy Howard Peterson (chaplain at North Park U in Chicago) was speaking at a camp I attend this summer. Fascinating lady. Her motto is to “live in expectation” instead of “living with expectations”. Basically this means to look around you every day to see what opportunities God has presented you instead of entering life with a predetermined expectation of what is to occur. I have tried to follow this and am amazed what happens when you look around for opportunities.
You have experienced much in your life and have met with/influenced some of the most powerful people in this country. I envy the time you spent there. But God decided you had fulfilled your portion of his mission and moved you on. You have been chosen to be a leader of his people. That is an incredible and awesome responsibility. Be patient. God will provide and make things clear.
On #10, remember John’s message from Sunday (I think it was this Sunday, anyway)… Jesus became human to experience humanity and better relate to man …. maybe you are struggling so that you can experience what members of your flock will feel and better relate to them?
Hang in there. I, too, will pray for you.
P.S. I’m with you on #11 if you make it somewhere warm, I hate snow ………… when do we leave??????
I like you…even more at the reading of this post…(maybe Jemila will inspire me as well)
me…kicked out of ministry once, flunked out of seminary…er..twice…and deeply prone to ponder deeply (typical musician-artist)…cynical as heck and amazed that I am working in a FT ministry
I cannot, however, relate to Michigan since I love it here at the Left Coast here in SoCal…short sleeves this week (sorry about that)
I have no words…simply put: thanks! folks, thanks for the wisdom, sharing from your own stories, and for the prayer. I guess I’m a tad angstey right now, but it is so comforting to know I am surrounded (whether virtual or present) by such a great cloud of witnesses who have gone through it (and still are…) before me.
I feel better after venting and even more so after reading your kind words. Jesus spoke to me through you all…so thanks.
-jeremy
i know i am a day late and a dollar short, but i just wanted to let you know i read your post and am glad you are feeling better now. peace be with you
Jeremy,
Our friend, Eugene H Peterson, writes, “Prayer is suffering’s best result.” Your cry of despair echoes the cries of Lamentations. EHP goes on to write,
“The sufferer, by praying, does not ask God to think well of him or her, but to enact redemption…” You are poised for authentic pastoral ministry within the often confounding, sometimes comforting processes of redemption.
If you ask me (and I admit no on has) everyone despairs now and then. And everyone indulges that despair as well. Not to address your despair – to deny it – isn’t doing anything more than lying.
I watch COPS myself, or I used to. I don’t watch much TV now. If I happen to see it on and have a few minutes, I’ll watch some of it. I want to remind myself of some realities of our world that I am insulated against.