Lord
, simply opens the door to the grieving process. We suddenly find ourselves at the verycore of our pain and sadness: the heavy emotional burden that has to be released before we can feel right again. By allowing the grief to enter through the front door of surrender, healing can slip in, quiet and unannounced, through the back door.
The tendency is strong to say, “… God won’t be so stern as to expect me to give up that!” but he will; “He won’t expect me to walk in the light so that I have nothing to hide” but he will; “He won’t expect me to draw on his grace for everything” but he will.
O SWALD C HAMBERS
Willpower isn’t the key. Letting go is.
For many years I’ve heard men and women from all walks of life say things like:
“I’ve invested too many years of my life trying to make people be what they don’t want to be, or do what they don’t want to do. I’ve driven them—and myself—crazy in the process.”
“I spent my childhood trying to make an angry father who didn’t love himself be a normal person who loved me.”
“I’ve spent years trying to make emotionally unavailable people be emotionally present for me.”
“I’ve poured my life into trying to make unhappy family members happy, even though they don’t seem interested in making the slightest effort.”
“I’ve given the last twenty-five years of my life trying to make my alcoholic husband stop drinking.”
What they are all saying is something like this: “I’ve spent much of my life desperately and vainly trying to do the impossible and feeling like a dismal failure when I can’t.” It’s like planting carrot seeds and trying passionately, creatively, and desperately to make those little plants grow prize tomatoes—and feeling defeated when it doesn’t work.
By relinquishing control and surrendering to God, we gain the presence of mind to stop wasting time and energy trying to change and control things we can’t change or control. Surrender gives us permission to stop trying to do the impossible and to focus on what is possible.
I wish I could say that surrender, letting go, is a onetime event. As I mentioned in the previous chapter, it’s not. Yielding to the Lord is a continual, daily, sometimes hourly process. When God and I were locked in a wrestling match in that hotel room, it was only round one. Unbeknownst to me, down the road there were many more rounds to go. 1
Less than three months later, our baby arrived, six weeks early and with a few surprises of his own. On the day Nathan was born, something was wrong. Terribly wrong. Hewas blue, not breathing well, and his little cry sounded muted. Instead of placing him in my waiting arms, the technicians scurried around trying to help him breathe. John held my hands, and we prayed for Nathan, asking God to help him and to guide the doctors’ efforts.
I kept asking the nurses if Nathan was all right, but all I could get out of them was, “He’s in good hands” and “They’re helping clear his passageways.” When I asked if I could nurse him, they said they didn’t know. An hour later, impatient with vague answers and frustrated about being separated from my son, I asked the delivery nurse to wheel me into the care unit where they were working with Nathan. The pediatrician on call came over to talk with us. I didn’t know this woman, and I didn’t want to believe a word she was saying.
“Mrs. Vredevelt, your son is not oxygenating well, so we’re trying to help him with oxygen and IVs.”
“Is this life threatening?” I asked.
“It could be,” she replied. “It’s also my observation that he has Down syndrome. I’ve called a cardiologist to examine him because I think his heart isn’t functioning properly.”
At that point I wasn’t tracking well and blurted out, “What does this mean?”
“It means he will be mentally retarded, Mrs. Vredevelt. There is also a higher incidence of leukemia for those with Down syndrome.