Thursday, December 27, 2007

Appreciating Blindness

Finding God's will is humbling and requires faith. Is it shameful to spend a season waiting on the Lord? Is that waiting season ever in vain?

There is an elderly woman I have heard of but never met. "Ellie" rises each morning and waits on her front porch for the arrival of her friend, another elderly woman. Together they sit while her friend reads aloud from the Holy Writ. At the end of the Bible passage, hands are extended and eyes are closed in prayer, as the ladies commit the day to doing the Lord's will. Ellie is blind.

Yesterday, a friend mentioned how she wishes to have a calling in her life, but she's still clueless what God wants. What can a girl do, except cast her talents out like bait? It's not much; in fact, it's a pretty helpless and pathetic state in which to exist. Waiting, waiting, fishing for a future; waiting for bait to be bitten and God to reveal His will through opening a door. My friend is blind too; not in the same physical sense as Ellie, but she feels like she's groping around in the dark.

Both Ellie and my friend are in an unglamorous situation. Neither is self-sufficient. God must be sought continually for another ration of rest and sustenance. Would anyone envy them?

A state of being like Laodicea's is generally thought more agreeable. A shining symbol of self-confidence, Laodicea was a church that could stand on its own two feet. God called the church to task for its stubborn independence: "For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked." (Rev. 3:17) How the rebuke must have smarted--and that from the Maker of the universe.

I think I share a lot in common with that place. Freethinking, I can whip up future plans like no other. (Some would re-term "freethinking" in this context as "folly.") Unlike Ellie and my friend, I have my life figured out. My future plans are in the bag. Determining for sure that those plans are truly for my best and the best for God's Kingdom is another matter entirely. I don't have that kind of discernment.

Obviously, there is something lacking in a Laodicea mentality. The key is not that God wants a to live without purpose. Without a clear plan, getting lost is easier than you think. My family proved this point a few years ago, as we circled Memphis for the fourth time, exiting toward the ramp we thought led to Texas, finding ourselves in Mississippi and wishing we'd never stepped foot in Tennessee in the first place. Phew. If that happened in the space of only a few hours, how much worse could happen traveling through life with no planned route or destination? It's a scary thought. Having some kind of plan is smart. Although a detailed daytimer to guide us to our 70th birthday is probably unnecessary, an idea of the skills God wants us to develop is helpful.

Yet before the life planning happens, is it wrong to have a season of deciding, where we try to discover God's will? Is it shameful to be compelled to wait in perfect simplicity--in blind trust--for God? It feels shameful. It's humiliating (and humbling.) Worse yet, it's frightening. I don't envy Ellie's blindness or my friend's. Their respective situations require faith. But I am confident, as they are, that waiting on the Lord is never in vain.
While Laodicea experienced true spiritual blindness due to pride, Ellie and my friend simply appear blind. In reality, their eyes are being opened to a deeper level of trust in Christ. They are resting in the fact that the Giver of Sight will one day show them a wider view. That doesn't sound like blindness to me.

Corrie ten Boom wrote, "Never fear to trust an unknown future to a known God." What is more, Christ said, "You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden." (Matthew 5:14) Although these two people may feel purposeless and their waiting may seem futile, they may yet achieve a higher purpose: glorifying God by becoming radiant beacons of selfless trust. That's not so bad, is it?

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