Michelle DeRusha

Every Day Faith. Faith Every Day.

doubt

Learning to Live the Questions

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The necklace — a choker with a velvet strap and a single brilliant faux sapphire — sat within reach, right at the edge of the open desk. I wanted that necklace; I had to have it, the desire for it so strong it made my stomach clench. So while my third grade teacher bent low over my classmate’s shoulder, I quickly reached behind their backs, slid my fingers into the open desk and then slipped the velvet strand into the front pocket of my corduroys.

Regret rushed in almost instantly as the thrilling high of holding the treasure in my hand crashed into gut-wrenching fear. Stealing, I knew, was a ticket straight to hell. I’d broken one of the Ten Commandments, had committed a mortal sin, and there was only one way out of the hell fires for which I was bound: confession.

…I’m writing about doubt, unbelief, questions and hope for one of my favorite online venues, SheLoves Magazine, today. Join me over there? 

It Begins with the Leap

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I watch him for a while as he swings across the pool from one dangling ring to the next. He makes it look so easy, so effortless, soaring over the water like a gymnast. “I’m going to try that,” I announce to my husband, heaving myself out of the water. “I’m going to try those ring things.”

“Really? I think it’s a lot harder than it looks,” Brad says.

“Yeah, well, I’m going to try it anyway,” I say, striding toward the line.

No matter that I have arms like silly string. No matter that I can muster a total of six man-style push-ups. I will master the rings. I will soar from ring to ring across the pool like Jane of the Jungle.

I get in line, shivering behind six beefy-armed men. The fact that there are no other women in the line gives me slight pause. The one man I’d watched earlier continues to glide over the water each time his turn comes, grabbing and releasing the rings in a graceful rhythm. I keep my eye on him, studying his technique, watching his timing.

When it’s finally my turn, I wipe my hands on my bare legs and grab the ring with my right hand. And then I take a giant step back and leap off the edge of the concrete.

I don’t even make it to the second ring. Instead, I swing forward, paw at the air with my left hand, miss the second ring entirely and then swing back again. I neglect to let go of the ring in time. My body hits the concrete wall, and I slide like a dead fish into the cold water.

I come up sputtering, a crowd of onlookers peering over the side of the pool, calling down, “Are you okay?” One guy simply says, “Whoa.”

Noah still talks about “the time Mommy hit the pool wall and fell into the water with everyone watching.” I shudder when I think what I must have looked like, flailing gawkily in my tankini, my body smacking the wall like a side of beef on a hook.

Still, I don’t regret trying the Tarzan rings. Despite my damaged ego, I’m glad I gave it my best shot.

I’ve leaped a lot in my life, especially in recent years. I leaped into moving to Nebraska (okay, maybe we call that one “was dragged against her will”). I leaped into faith. I leaped into writing. Most recently I’ve leaped into public speaking. At some point in the midst of all these leaps, I’ve smacked into a wall – a wall of disappointments, doubts, failures, frustrations and fear.

Leaping is scary. Yet I also believe that despite the risks and the fear, it’s necessary. Because if you don’t ever leap, you won’t ever know what could have been. And what could have been might have made all the difference.

For me, leaping has made the difference between unbelief and faith. It’s made the difference between living passively and living passionately. It’s made the difference between existing comfortably in the box and thriving in the wild open.

It’s true, sometimes when you leap you fall; sometimes you smack hard into a wall and get the wind knocked clean out of you. But sometimes you soar. You may not realize it in the moment, but in leaping you are soaring into the start of something new, something beautiful and life-changing and good.

It all begins with the leap.

Tell me, what leap has made the biggest difference in your life? 

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This story ran last Saturday in the Lincoln Journal Star.

{and I know I’ve used this picture of Rowan leaping into a Minnesota lake a bunch of times on this blog, but I can’t help myself – it’s such a great picture, and that kid is absolutely fearless!}

Hear It on Sunday, Use It on Monday: What To Do When Doubt Takes Your Breath Away

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He drops the bomb at dinner, over meatloaf and baked potato: “I think I might be in a not-believing-in-God stage.” My heart sinks. “Really?” I ask, peering at Rowan around the vase in the middle of the table. “What makes you think that?” I try to sound casual, nonplussed.

“I just can’t get over the idea of being dead,” Rowan explains. “It seems so weird to think that once you’re dead, you’re just gone, like, not existing at all.” Now he’s trying to sound casual. But his eyes are wide, unblinking. He stares at me hard across the dining room table, holds my gaze. I can tell he is afraid.

“It’s okay,” I tell him, spooning sour cream onto my potato. “Everyone doubts sometimes, everyone wonders about God and death and everything. It’s going to be okay.”

“Yeah!” Noah pipes up. “I had my not-believing-in-God stage all the way until the start of fourth grade. Then after that I was fine.” I’m not sure I knew this, but I nod vigorously anyway, like Noah’s example is proof that everything will indeed be okay.

I’m still thinking about that dinnertime conversation a few days later, though, when I read the story of the road to Emmaus. I’m having trouble with verse 16:

But God kept them from recognizing him.

Two of Jesus’ followers were walking together, three days after his crucifixion. Jesus appeared alongside and began to walk with them, but they didn’t know who he was. Not just that they didn’t recognize him, but that God kept them from recognizing him, the text reads.

I don’t like this verse. I search Bible Gateway for other translations, hoping for a different interpretation. Nearly all of them translate the verse the same way or very similarly.

Why? Why does God keep the men from recognizing Jesus? I wonder. Why would God intentionally keep us from seeing him?

I wrestle with the text for days, reading and re-reading the story. And while I’m not sure I get an answer to the why?, I finally realize something important. It’s true, Jesus is exasperated by his followers’ disbelief. But instead of throwing up his hands and walking away, he begins to teach them. Again. From the beginning. He starts way back with Moses and the prophets, and he points out each and every instance in which the Bible paves the way toward his resurrection.

When his own disciples doubt him, when they waver in their faith, Jesus brings them back to the Bible.

He brings them back to him through the Bible.

It’s only later, after Jesus has been revealed to them in the breaking of the bread, that the two disciples realize this. “Didn’t our hearts burn within us as he talked with us on the road and explained the Scriptures to us?” (Luke 24:32), they say, astounded. The Scriptures had stirred their hearts to God’s presence; their brains simply needed time to catch up.

There’s a lesson in here for all of us.

When we are lost, when we begin to doubt God, when we can’t see him, even when he stands right in front of us, we need to return to his story.

Open the book, Jesus says. The proof is right there.

And so, even though Rowan’s declaration of doubt takes my breath away, and even though I’m terrified he’ll suffer a lifetime of questions and uncertainty, much like me, I do what Jesus does with his own wanderers. I bring Rowan back to the Bible.

And we begin again.




And a quick note: Kim from Kim’s Country Line won the free copy of Matt Appling’s book Life After Art. Kim, Rowan picked your name from the bowl this morning — congratulations! I sent you an email – please email me your mailing address so Matt can mail you your copy of his book!

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Where to Look When Jesus Goes AWOL

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“It doesn’t feel like Christmas down here,” says Rowan, my youngest, as we sit on the wicker couch looking out at the bay. I know what he means. The house we’re staying in for the holidays in Florida doesn’t have a Christmas tree, or lights or stockings or even a fireplace for that matter. We didn’t bring the ceramic nativity that sits on our coffee table at home or our stash of Christmas CDs.

Not only is the decorative accoutrement of Christmas lacking, I’m also missing the everyday spiritual scaffolding that props up my faith. Even though I’d packed my Bible with the best intentions, it sits in the bottom of my suitcase, unopened. On vacation I forego my early morning quiet time and sleep in instead. We skip church and get lazy with dinnertime devotions. I forget to pray. There I am, two days before Christmas, and it feels like Jesus has gone AWOL. Without my routines I feel spiritually unmoored. Christmas feels hollow, empty. Suddenly I don’t trust that I can find God without a host of carefully orchestrated rituals.

…I’m over at Prodigal Magazine today, writing about where to look when it seems like God is missing. Will you join me?

 

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