Self help for day to day problems.
Excerpt
Chapter 6:
How to Handle a Rough Sea
The coast of Oregon can be treacherous. Some time ago we were reminded of that when a boat capsized killing several fishermen on board despite a heroic effort on the part of the Coast Guard to rescue them.
For twenty years I had a fishing friend out on the Oregon Coast. His name was Curt Roth, and he was a native Oregonian. His father had come from Norway as a young man and settled in Astoria. As Curt grew up, he learned that trade from his father. He became a Mackenzie River guide, taking fishermen down through the white water in search of those beautiful trout. Curt went back to his first love, fishing for salmon. He kept his boat at the harbor in Florence, Oregon. Occasionally he fished commercially but also as a sport fisherman. With only a few exceptions, he and I fished together every summer for more than twenty years.
During those years we established a pretty good record. Sometimes the salmon run was poor. Sometimes the weather was bad. There were times when charter boats, with the most sophisticated equipment, came back empty, but Curt and I never came back without fish. I don’t know if that qualifies for the Guinness Book of World Records, but if not, it should be.
The summer of 1980 I had a week in the middle of July for my annual salmon adventure. My only concern before I left was how I would carry all those salmon back on the plane. The run had been good, but the weather was unpredictable. I arrived late in the evening, and the next morning at dawn we went out. The harbor is located at the mouth of the Umpqua River. It runs parallel to the coastline and then takes you out to sea. It is a treacherous bar because the passage is narrow, and the tides run high. On the first day, the bar was rough and the sea was choppy. We fished the high tide and within twenty minutes we landed the first salmon, a beautiful eight pound silver. I didn’t even have time to pour myself a cup of coffee. The second rod was jumping up and down like a trip-hammer. That’s how it went for about an hour. Then the tide began to run out, and the winds picked up. Curt decided to head for the dock before the bar became too risky.
The next morning I was awake before dawn. There was a heavy fog, which is not unusual, and at daybreak it began to lift. It looked like a perfect day. But Curt, who had a sixth-sense about the ocean, felt that while the harbor was calm, there could be a rough ocean. It turned out that he was right. The radio reported winds up to forty miles an hour, and swells running from eight to ten feet. We spent the day on the dock. Curt tinkered with the equipment on the boat and sorted out the gear. I sat in a chair beside the boat and supervised him. It was a marvelous day, a time to unwind, to relax, and to watch the sea gulls. After all, there were still at least three days of salmon fishing ahead of me.
However, the next morning, the story was the same. The sea was too rough. We spent a second day on the dock, and the next morning the story was the same. That’s how it went, and on Saturday the Coast Guard said that there would not be any change over the weekend. The winds were from the northwest, and there was no sign that they were going to abate.
We had no choice but to go back to Eugene. I confess that I had a few demons visit me that weekend. There was the demon of disappointment, having come all that way to fish for an hour and sit for four days on the dock. There was the demon of doubt. Maybe we should have gone out in spite of the warnings. There was the demon of self-pity, reminding me that I had to go back to Columbia where the temperature was about 105 degrees.
On Sunday morning the newspapers carried the story of a tragic boat accident in Florence. A boat with seven people on board tried to negotiate the bar on Saturday, and the boat capsized. Two people lost their lives. The others were rescued by the Coast Guard. It was a rather grim reminder that if you don’t really know the ocean, you had better respect the captain’s judgment.
Now I’m not going to tell you anymore about the fishing trip, except to say that I didn’t have any trouble carrying my salmon back. I want to think with you about one of the miracles that is recorded in Matthews’s Gospel. It’s a strange story, and if it had a title, it might be called “A Head Wind and a Rough Sea.”
“Then he made the disciples embark and go on ahead to the other side, while he sent the people away; after doing that, he went up the hillside to pray alone. It grew late, and he was there by himself. The boat was already some furlongs from the shore, battling with a headwind and a rough sea. Between three and six in the morning he came to them, walking over the lake. When the disciples saw him walking on the lake they were so shaken that they cried out in terror: ‘It is a ghost!’ But at once he spoke to them, ‘Take heart! It is
I, do not be afraid.’
Peter called to him: ‘Lord, if it is you, tell me to come to you over the water.’ ‘Come,’ said Jesus. Peter stepped down from the boat, and walked over the water towards Jesus. But when he saw the strength of the gale he was seized with fear; and beginning to sink, he cried, ‘Save me, Lord.’ Jesus at once reached out and caught hold of him, and said, ‘Why did you hesitate? How little faith you have!’ They then climbed into the boat; and the wind dropped. And the men in the boat fell at his feet, exclaiming, ‘Truly you are the Son of God.’ (Matt. 14:22-33)
I don’t know how you feel about a story like that. Some people will accept it at face value, simply because they have been taught that you accept everything in the Bible at face value. There are others who will have questions about it, and wonder how it could happen.
It seems to me that there are two high points in the story, and I want to suggest what I think they are.
1. The first high point is that moment when Peter stands at the side of the boat, looking out into the darkness at this figure coming toward them across the water. He calls out, “Lord, if you are who I think you are, then tell me to come to you.” Jesus answers one word, “Come.”
Jesus was always doing that. He invited people to get out of the boat. He wanted them to leave the little hiding place where they felt so secure, and join him in the adventure of life. You see, Peter’s boat was his security. He felt safer there than he did on the streets of Jerusalem. It was where he felt at home. Peter had grown up on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. When he was in his boat, he could take charge. He knew what a boat could do, and he knew that in a head wind and a rough sea, the important thing was to stay with the boat. Then Jesus said one word, “Come,” and Peter went over the side.
Jesus was always doing that. He invited people to come out of the places where they felt most secure, and join him in the adventure of life. Some of them responded as Peter did. Others never got up their courage.
I think of that day when Jesus and his disciples visited the famous pool at Bethesda. It was like a famous shrine. There were stories about miraculous cures that had occurred there. From time to time the water would be stirred up. It may have been the effect of the moon, or the atmosphere, or the temperature of the earth. The people didn’t know about those things, and they assumed that it was an invisible angel who stirred the water. The first person to get into the water when it was stirred had a chance at a miracle.
As Jesus walked among those people, he saw a man who had been there for thirty-eight years. Do you know how long thirty-eight years is? It is a life-time. Jesus asked, “Do you want to be made whole?” The man never got around to answering the question. He told Jesus how long he’d been there, how hard it was, how no one could help him get to the pool in time, how whenever the waters were stirred somebody else always slipped in first. Oh yes, he’d seen some marvelous cures, but his own case, was very sad.
Jesus did not shed any tears, or speak soft words of sympathy. He said, “Rise to your feet, take up your bed and walk,” And he did.
I don’t know whether it was his disability, or his self-pity that meant the most to him, but what ever it was, he stepped up and began to live.
Or I think of that marvelous story of Zaccheus, a tax collector, probably the most despised man in Jericho. He was short of stature. People looked down on him, not just because he was short but because he was so despicable. Zaccheus knew it. It had been true for a long time, and he knew how people felt about him. But there was a certain security in that as far as Zaccheus was concerned. People were afraid of him. They gave him a wide berth. He felt invulnerable, and he hid behind his reputation.
Then one day, Jesus came to Jericho. Everybody turned out to see him. Zaccheus climbed up into a sycamore tree along the parade route where he would be able to see better. Jesus came to that point and suddenly stopped and looked up into the tree and saw this man hidden among the branches. Jesus said simply, “Zaccheus, come down. Tonight I intend to be a guest in your home.”
I’m surprised that Zaccheus didn’t fall out of the tree. No one ever came to his house. If he’d issued invitations, no one would have responded. Then here was Jesus, asking him, Zaccheus, to be the host.
Zaccheus stepped out of the boat. He entertained Jesus and opened up his home. When the meal was over he picked up his wine glass and made a little speech. He said, “This is such a big day in my life. I’m going to give half of everything I have to feed the poor, and if I’ve wronged anyone I will restore to that person seven-fold.”
I wonder if you have been hiding in some little boat of your own? We all build our little ark in which we can hide from the storm. It may be illness. It may be self-pity or self-righteousness. It may be a reputation. It may be possessions. It may even be a kind of religion that protects us from life. Whatever it is, it is the one place we feel the safest. Jesus comes along and invites you to leave it behind, and join him in the adventure of life.
II. The second high point in the story is when Peter steps out of the boat. He takes a step or two and then suddenly realizes where he is. In this moment, he is seized by panic and begins to sink.
One of my friends thinks that this is how Peter got his name. His given name was Simon, and Jesus was the one who first called him Peter. Petros means rock, and the Church has always said Peter was so named because his faith was like a rock. My friend says it’s more likely because on this night, when he tried to cross the water, he sank like a rock.
He managed to cry out, “Save me, Lord.” And then there is this marvelous line: Jesus at once reached out and caught hold of him.
That, again, is something Jesus did over and over again in his ministry. He reached out and caught hold of people. When they felt as if they were going under, he was there to hold them steady. Jesus and Peter climbed back into the boat, and Jesus said, “Why did you hesitate? How little faith you have!”
You see, anytime you give up something that represents security to you, it can be frightening. You suddenly discover how cold the water is, how wild the winds can be, and how deep the waves are. You may lost your self-confidence, and feel panic. You may discover, however, that God does not abandon you. If you call on him, he reaches out to take hold of your life.
I’m not suggesting that you will see Jesus walk on water. What I am suggesting is that God knows precisely where you are, and God can reach you in an infinite variety of ways.
On a Tuesday evening early one summer, the managing editor of the Tulsa Tribune, a man named Gordon Fallis, jumped into Keystone Lake. After he made the jump, he realized that he didn’t really want to die, and he managed to hold on until he was rescued.
He had been crouching on a narrow ledge, thirty feet above the black swirling waters of the dam. A driver stopped and called out, “It’s kind of dangerous on that side of the railing, isn’t it? Mr. Fallis responded, “I’m just fishing.”
As he told about the experience later, he said, “Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined the events in my life would put me on this ledge. Personal degrading circumstances that ruin people’s lives. Business experiences that continually weaken fibers of success-oriented men and women. Fear and frustration.”
The car had gone to the end of the bridge and was turning around. That’s when he jumped. The moment he hit the water, he knew that he wanted to live, not die. He swam. He treaded water. He dog-paddled. He found some steel beams with steps. He hung on. He heard a siren and saw a light. A rope was dropped down to him to hold him steady.
This is how he described what happened next:
A sheriff’s lieutenant drove me to Tulsa. He may go down in my book as the most gentle, kindest man I’ve ever known. My City Editor came in from his rural home to help me. My family came to comfort me.
The physician at the hospital where they took me was big, blustering and friendly. My lawyers visited me at the hospital. They came as friends.
A wealthy friend called, demanding the best medical care possible be given me, and offered to pay all expenses. Hundreds of people, including my newspaper’s owners, called my house. Always the same question, “What can we do to help?”
Friends brought in dinners for my family. To all these people I say thanks - especially to my physician who said, ‘You were suicidal, but you are not now suicidal.’ My final salute is to my family. I’ve always been needed for the paychecks I bring in to provide haircuts, buy Christmas toys, and help pay for repairs to the numerous autos in my driveway. Now I feel wanted with all the fervent love and passion that eleven children and a wife can muster.
How does God reach out to you? He can come through the help of friends, through the kindness of strangers, through a simple hand clasp. He may come to you through a song that brings back memories of childhood, or through the prayers of those who care about you. It may be someone who simply says, apropos of nothing, “I Love You.” These are God’s messengers, his angels who reach out when you feel yourself going down.
I have to tell you that I don’t know whether or not Jesus walked on the water, but I do know that he comes to us when we call to him. William Cowper wrote a number of the hymns that we sing. He had a particularly difficult adolescence, and there was a time when he tried to take his own life. Then he found help, and it brought about a whole new understanding of life for him. He tells about it in one of those beautiful hymns:
God moves in mysterious ways his wonders to perform:
He plants his footsteps on the sea
And rides upon the storm.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread, are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.
Chapter 7:
How to Sleep on a Stormy Night
I want to think with you about how to sleep on a stormy night. There is a classic story in the New Testament, which is evidence that it can be done. It is the story of Jesus and his disciples crossing the Sea of Galilee. It was late in the evening when they embarked, and before they were halfway across the sea, a sudden storm came up which whipped the waves into a frenzy and threatened to capsize the boat. The disciples were doing everything they could to keep on course, when suddenly they realized that Jesus was asleep in the back of the boat. If you remember that story, you will remember how they roused him, and seemed put out with him that he should be sleeping at a time like that. Peter said, “Master, we are perishing. Is it nothing to you?” As far as I know, that is the only story in the Gospels in which you find Jesus asleep. And it was on a very stormy night.
There are several texts appropriate to our thinking but the one that I have chosen comes at the close of the Fourth Psalm. It is a short Psalm in which David affirms that the Lord will hear him when he calls. The Lord has been with him in times of distress; the Lord has lifted up the light of His countenance upon him. And he concludes the Psalm by saying, “I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep; for thou alone, O Lord makest me to dwell in safely.”
The question is how we can sleep on a stormy night.
1. The first thing I want to suggest is that we learn to make the proper use of our waking hours.
Darrell Berg, my preaching friend, suggested a sequel: how to wake up on a clear morning! Well, that should perhaps come before, rather than after this sermon. They are two sides of the same coin. How we use the hours of the night that are reserved for sleep depends upon how we use the hours of the day that are for activity. You may have heard about the man who consulted a doctor about a snoring problem. The doctor was very sympathetic. He asked, “Does your snoring disturb your wife?” “Disturb my wife,” the man exclaimed, “It disturbs the whole congregation.” There are some of us who may have to learn how to stay awake before we will ever learn to sleep. In the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes, there is a beautiful passage about how there is “a time for every purpose under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant and a time to pluck up; a time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance.” The author doesn’t include the couplet “there is a time to sleep and there is a time to be alert” but he might have.
I don’t think that there is any better antidote for insomnia than the awareness at the end of the day that I have been faithful in those tasks that were assigned to me. John Wesley, the spiritual father of Methodism, was one of those rare individuals who achieved the work of a dozen lifetimes. He was known, and sometimes ridiculed, for his self-discipline and faithfulness to his appointments. One day a lady asked him how he would spend his time if he knew that he would die the next day at midnight. He replied, “Why, preach at Clouchester tonight and tomorrow morning, at Tewksbury in the afternoon, go to my friend Martin’s house for entertainment, converse and pray with the family as usual, retire to my room at ten o’clock, commend myself to my Heavenly Father, lie down to rest and wake up in glory.” He had no qualms for the night, because he used the hours of the day as God intended.
Ron Meredith tells the story of the sad day when the family pet, a faithful old dog, died. His son looked up at him with tears in his eyes and asked, “Dad, do you think there will be dogs in heaven?” Dr. Meredith says that he gave the only answer he could. More eager to comfort than to explain, he said to his son, “What kind of heaven could it be without a dog?”
As father and son talked together they soon realized that with a lifeless body on their hands, there must be a burial. So, with the respect that is due every dog that has been some child’s close friend, a hole was dug and the valued pet was gently laid to rest. When the job was done and the father turned to go, he noticed through the corner of his eye that his son was breaking off the branches of a tall dry weed. From these he made a cross, and without a word placed it on the grave. With the job done, he pulled his wrinkled baseball cap down over his tear-splashed cheek and swung one leg over the frame of his bicycle. Then he said, “Dad, I guess we all have to die some day, don’t we?” Nothing more needed to be said. He had done what he could under the circumstances; he had quietly accepted the facts of life; and then he confidently turned toward life’s next pursuit.
Well, when a person has done all that they can under the circumstances, accepts the facts of life, and then turns confidently toward life’s next pursuit, they are not likely to be bothered with sleepless and restless nights. The answer to how to sleep on a stormy night is incorporated in how we use our waking hours.
II. Now the second thing that I want to say is that it would help us if we could learn to get things out in the open.
It is not only unfinished business that robs us of our rest at night. It is also our unresolved fears and anxieties. We need to be willing to get those things out in the open which bother us, and threaten us. We sometimes manage to repress them, and keep them buried in the subconscious. But at night, when we are physically weary, our guard is down, and these unnamed and unchallenged fears come out of hiding to plague us and keep us awake. There is an old story about a man who was awakened out of a deep sleep one night by his wife, who had heard a noise downstairs. He got out of bed and went down to investigate, and found himself face to face with the intruder. The robber said, “Hands up! Keep still and hand over your valuables, and nothing will happen to you.” The man did as he was told, and gave the burglar the silverware. Then he said, “I wish that you would do me a favor before you go. I want you to come upstairs and meet my wife. She has been looking for you every night for twenty years!”
Well, I don’t want to pose as a hero, because I am no braver than the next man when it comes to dark corners, or unpatrolled streets, or the strange noises that creep through the house at night. But I do know that it is better to get our fears and anxieties out in the open, where we can see them, than to repress them and wind up as their slave all our lives.
I don’t believe in ghosts, but there was one winter night, some years ago, when I almost became a convert. We were living in Bellingham, Washington, at the time, in a neighborhood where there had been a certain number of incidents involving prowlers. We were seated at the dinner table, and it was already quite dark. Suddenly the back doorbell rang. I went to answer it, and lo and behold, there was no one there. I thought that was strange, but I didn’t particularly worry about it. I had just seated myself at the table when it rang a second time. I went back, thinking that whoever was there had not waited for me to answer the first time. Right away I began to think that it might be mischievous youngsters. When it happened the third time, I began to get suspicious. I imagined a prowler who was just waiting to catch me off guard. My wife, who is a very calm and practical kind of a person, refused to get excited about it, but my imagination began to run riot. Finally I slipped out of the front door, armed with a fireplace poker, and hid in the bushes to catch whoever was spying on us. I waited out there a long time, and it was bitterly cold, but no one appeared. When I went back in the house, my wife said, “It rang three times while you were out there.” Well, to make a long story short, it turned out to be a short in the wiring, and when those two little wires touched, they made the bell ring. It was very easy to fix, and when it was fixed, the bell-ringing episode was over. In the meanwhile, my imagination had concocted a whole gallery of sinister characters, just waiting to catch me outside and hit me over the head, for some diabolical reason!
Sometimes those fears that keep us awake at night can be laid to rest so easily, if only we can get them out in the open, and face them. Sometimes, there is “a short” in a person’s nervous system, and the signals that it sends out are like sinister warnings of danger. We are unwilling to trace the trouble and set it right. We need to be honest with ourselves, and ask ourselves just what it is that has us frightened. Time and time again it will turn out to be something that yields to a minor repair job.
Bishop James Pike has an interesting theory that one reason why people are sometimes unwilling to let go of consciousness and fall asleep, is that sleep is a little form of death. He points to the way in which children connive and plot to stay up at night past the bedtime hour. Even after they have been put down for the last time, they invariably need a glass of water, or they are hungry, or they want to check on something they have forgotten to do. It annoys their parents, who cannot understand why they should be so obstinate. But as adults, we do the same thing. We put off the bedtime ritual as long as possible. We fight sleep, he says, in the same way in which we fight off the approach of death. We are afraid to give up consciousness. We are reluctant to give in and admit that sleep, even as death, is part of God’s wisdom in creation, making renewal a reality.
Whatever it is that causes us anxiety, we need to face it, openly and in the light of day. Many of our fears can be justified, and come from good and valid reasons. But in any event, if a person will face them, they will not be so apt to come marauding at midnight, to rob him of his rest.
III. That brings me to the third and final thing to be said, which is simply that the best way to sleep, on any kind of a night, is to “let go and let God.”
I don’t know who it was that first hit upon that apt phrase, although in the back of my mind I want to attribute it to E. Stanley Jones. But the meaning is clear. It means that we relinquish the feeling that we have to manage the affairs of the universe, and turn them over to the One who is really in charge. After all, God managed to keep things going for several millennia before we arrived on the scene, and the chances are that he can manage for another eight-hour shift while we sleep. I am not depreciating the idea that He needs us in order to achieve His purposes; I am simply saying that God is in charge, and has resources other than our little lives to keep things on an even keel.
Dr. Weatherhead tells in one of his books how he had to ask himself if he really trusted in God. “As President of the Methodist Church for one year,” he wrote, “I have traveled around a great deal lately. On Saturday nights I have always trusted my hostess to provide breakfast on Sunday morning. I have not found it necessary to say to her on arrival, ‘Have you laid in enough food for tomorrow’s breakfast?” I have not said in retiring for bed, ‘You won’t forget to get breakfast, will you?’ I have not wakened in the night, stolen along the passage, knocked gently at her bedroom door and said, ‘Breakfast won’t be forgotten, will it?’ I trust her, and therefore I dismiss the matter from my mind. Indeed, it usually does not even arise in the mind. In doing so, I dwell in the atmosphere of trust.”
That’s the secret of how to sleep on a stormy night. We can dwell in an atmosphere of trust. God has managed for a long time, and we can turn things over to him for the hours between darkness and light.
Some years ago Bishop Enslee was in Paris, and happened to meet two tourists from England. In the course of the conversation, the talk turned to American politics, and one of the ladies said, “You Americans have one serious lack in your country — you need a king.” It was about the time of all the furor over Roosevelt’s third term, and Enslee replied, “Well, some people think we have one now - but we really don’t, and furthermore, we don’t really want one.” “Oh,” the lady persisted, “you really ought to have a king. At night one sleeps so well when he knows that there is a king on the throne.” When the Bishop told about it later, he said, “I knew that there was a King on the throne, greater than any earthly monarch. And she was right, one does sleep better when he remembers the King on the throne!”
That is what the Psalmist meant when he said, “I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep, for thou alone, O Lord makest me to dwell in safety.”
One of the great merchandisers of our time is a devout churchman and Methodist. His name is J. C. Penney. He started out as a clerk in a dry goods store, and today his name is a household word across the length and breadth of the land. Many years ago he had already made a sizeable fortune, and he was ready to think about retiring. Then came the crash of 1929, but because he had a sound financial basis, he wasn’t immediately affected. Then the banks began to close, and suddenly this man, who thought that he was invulnerable, was stripped of seven million dollars. At the age of 58 he was broke and at the bottom of the heap. He was soon in a sanitarium with a nervous breakdown. He didn’t have enough to pay for his care; he thought that he was a failure and that everyone else did too. He couldn’t sleep.
Early one morning, unable to sleep, he dressed and walked down the corridor of the institution. From the chapel he heard the thread of an old, familiar hymn:
Be not dismayed whate’er betide,
God will take care of you.
All you may need, He will provide,
God will take care of you.
He entered the chapel and sat down in the back. Someone began to read the words from the New Testament, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.” There was a prayer, and suddenly this unstrung man groaned inwardly, “Lord, there is nothing I can do. Will you take care of me?” Even as he asked it, in his distress, he sensed the answer. He was assured that God’s own boundless patient strength would help him. He walked from that chapel with the fear and despair dissipated. His tread was light; his heart was soaring. He amazed the doctors with his recovery. Within two weeks he was home again; he arranged to be baptized and to join the church, and he went on to rebuild his shattered life. The rest of the story is history.
“How to sleep on a stormy night?” Well, the answer depends on how you use the waking hours, and whether or not you will be willing to face the things that trouble you, but most of all it depends on your willingness to let go, and to let God!
Chapter 18:
How to Defeat the Blues
I have a desk drawer where I deposit, from time to time, assorted items that may have some value. These items include newspaper clippings, poetry, old letters, magazine articles, odds and ends. I’ve always had this marvelous fantasy that someday I’m going to open that drawer and discover that the materials have all arranged themselves into a perfect sermon lying right on top.
One day I was rummaging through the drawer in search of a quote that I needed, and came across a newspaper clipping from the San Francisco Chronicle. It was about the Golden Gate Bridge.
The article pointed out that it has been described as the most beautiful suspension bridge in the whole world. If you have seen the bridge, you probably would not dispute it. If you have stood on one of those San Francisco hillsides looking out over the Bay on a clear day, or perhaps when the fog comes creeping in and hides the Bay and the city so that only the cables of the bridge rise above it as if they were suspended in mid-air. There are no words to describe its beauty.
The bridge has been the scene of tragedy. It has been called “the number one location for death by suicide in the western world.” The bridge was opened in 1937. By the time that article was written, more than six hundred people had died by leaping into the Bay. No one knows how many other attempts were made, or how many persons stepped back in the last minute without anyone knowing how close they had come.
Now, that is a paradox: indescribable beauty on one hand and on the other, unspeakable sadness. You have to wonder why the Golden Gate Bridge should be a place where people are tempted to act out their death wish. Maybe it has something to do with the perfection of the bridge, which serves a stark reminder of the imperfection in our lives. Maybe it has something to do with the majesty and the elevation of those cables, which underscore a sense of insignificance and unworthiness that some people seem to feel.
Whatever the answer, it’s true that in the midst of beauty, you can find sadness. Here we are, born into a world so beautiful that it can scarcely be described, and yet feeling somehow as if we don’t deserve it. We are unworthy of it, or something terrible is going to happen if we allow ourselves to enjoy it.
I want to think with you about the blues. Depression is a serious problem, and it’s a very widespread problem. People who suffer from depression learn how to camouflage it. They go on functioning in school, in church or in the community, perhaps even in the family circle. On the outside they seem to be perfectly content and satisfied. They may be the life of the party. But on the inside, they are hurting desperately.
We took some friends to see the Churchill Museum in Fulton. During the dark days of World War II, Churchill more than any other individual managed to sustain the spirit of the British people. He was a symbol of confidence and certainty. He flashed that “V” for Victory sign, and people felt that as long as Winny was in charge, everything would be all right. It is something of a shock, then, to learn that he suffered from depression. He expected to be all washed up in public life by the time he was forty. He was a hypochondriac. When he was turned out of office at the end of World War II, he became so depressed that he didn’t care whether he ever saw Britain again. It made him nervous to stand at the edge of a train platform when an express was going through. He was afraid that desperation would seize him and he would end everything. There are people who exude confidence and inspire it in others, but are filled with dark fears and anxieties within themselves.
Who gets the blues? No one is immune. There was a novel a few years ago with the title, “Even Cowgirls Get the Blues.” I can’t speak for cowgirls, but I can tell you that even preachers get the blues. People who are financially secure suffer from the blues as much as those who struggle in poverty. People with robust health are vulnerable, as well as those who are frail in body. Some of the most creative spirits that this world has known, giants in art, music, philosophy and education, theology and religion, have suffered from the blues.
What causes it? It is always hard to say, because the blues don’t seem to need a cause in the ordinary sense of the word. You would think that failure would cause people to suffer the blues, but the blues can strike in the moment of victory. The mood is unpredictable, and no one really can anticipate when it will come.
I was curious about the derivation of the term “the blues.” It seems that some three hundred years ago, more or less, there was a troop of French soldiers whose uniforms were blue. They caused a lot of misery for the British, and the British referred to them as the blue devils. Gradually that expression came to mean anything that threatened one’s wellbeing or happiness or security. In our country, it was shortened to “the blues.” Washington Irving, in one of his novels, described a character who was “haunted by the legion of the blues.”
What we would like to know is how we can defeat the blue devils.
I want to share a psalm with you. It’s a very short psalm, and it was written by someone who knew that it meant to be discouraged.
Out of the depths have I called to thee, O Lord; Lord, hear my cry.
Let thy ears be attentive to my plea for mercy.
If thou, Lord shouldest keep account of sins, who, O Lord,
could hold up his head?
But in thee is forgiveness, and therefore thou art revered.
I wait for the Lord with all my soul,
I hope for the fulfillment of his word.
My soul waits for the Lord more eagerly than watchmen for the morning.
Like men show watch for the morning,
O Israel, look for the Lord.
For in the Lord is love unfailing, and great is his power to set men free.
(Psalm 130)
This suggests at least three things you can do if you want to beat the blues.
1. In the first place, tell somebody about it.
That’s what the psalmist did. “Out of the depths have I called to thee, O Lord.” When depression strikes, the first thing that you can do is to tell somebody about it. Obviously you’ll not want to tell everybody. Nor, do I think you would want to tell just anybody. There are some people who would only add to the weight you feel. The important thing is to tell somebody, somebody you trust, somebody that will hear you out. It does not have to be someone who is a skilled counselor or has a graduate degree in psychology. When you share the burden with somebody, who will really listen, you are better equipped yourself to handle it. It’s not easy for most of us to do. Our pride gets all mixed in. We’re afraid that people will think that we are weak. We think that everybody ought to be able to handle their own problems. But there are some problems that are not meant to be handled alone. You may discover, as the psalmist did, that there is something to confess. That makes it even more difficult.
So we are tempted to suffer in silence. But the worst thing you can do when you have the blues is to try to hide it. The best thing you can do, is to tell somebody about it. It allows you to ventilate your soul. It gives you a chance for a better perspective on what the problem really is. And always it helps to know that somebody else knows.
Alan Paton, the author from South Africa, went through a difficult experience of grief. His wife died and it seemed to him that life was not worth living. Eventually he wrote a book about it, in the form of letters addressed to his late wife. The book is called “For You, Departed.” In the last letter he says this: “Something within me is waking from long sleep, and I want to live and move again. Some zest is returning to me, some immense gratefulness for those who love me, some strong wish to love them also. Writing this book has taught me to accept the joys and vicissitudes of life, and to fall in love again with its strangeness and beauty.”
What did he do? He told somebody about it. The writing of the book was a catharsis. It was a chance to ventilate the problem and to get it out where it could be seen and shared. And the result was that he was once again able to fall in love with all the strangeness, the beauty, and the fear of life.
If you want to beat the blues, tell somebody about it.
II. The second thing you can do is to be patient.
That’s what the psalmist did. “I wait for the Lord with all my soul.” He waited eagerly, like people wait for daybreak.
There are times in life when the best thing to do is to do nothing. That may sound like a contradiction in terms, but it takes some doing to do nothing. Most of us are busy people, and we like the feel of being busy. We like to deal with problems promptly. It is almost as if we feel that if we keep busy we can out-run the blues. That’s a mistake. Sometimes we can’t outrun the blues, and all we can do is wait them out.
Some years ago the Boston Herald carried a series of articles on what a person should do if they were lost in the woods. The very first thing was to persuade yourself that you are lost, and that aside from the few housekeeping chores, there isn’t much that you can do about the situation by yourself. You see, most of us would go thrashing through the woods, using up our strength, trying desperately to find a way out. The article suggested that a person should find an open space, and then wait. Make yourself as available as a politician in an election year, because there will be people who are looking for you.
There are many reasons why it is wise to wait. For one thing, your judgment is not going to be at its best when the blues surround you. It’s not a time for making significant decisions. For another, waiting has a way of getting you back in touch with the source of your being. It puts you in touch with life.
I have a friend on the West Coast who had a heart attack some years ago. He was a fine preacher, and a very popular speaker. He traveled back and forth across the country, speaking at religious gatherings, conventions, and banquets. Some of us wondered how he kept up the pace, and it turned out he couldn’t. One night, waiting for his turn at the rostrum, he began to feel nauseous. He had to leave the platform and be taken to a hospital. It was a heart attack. When he was ready to leave the hospital, the doctor told him to walk two miles a day. He was not to walk to the office and back. He was to walk for the sake of walking.
He made some discoveries. He said that he hadn’t walked from the time that he was a young man. He began to develop a new sensitivity to the world around him. Gradually he became aware of the chirping of the birds, the grace of a seagull flying, and the fact that there are flowers of many different colors along the way. Then he finally was allowed to return to the pulpit, his first sermon was on the importance of walking!
Jesus walked. Of course, there were no automobiles, or trains, or airplanes then. Everyone walked. On one occasion he rode on the back of a donkey, and that was on Palm Sunday. There are a few stories in which he went by boat across the Sea of Galilee. But mostly he walked as he taught his disciples, and he walked through the villages as he ministered to people. Perhaps that is why, in the Sermon on the Mount, he spoke about the birds of the air and the lilies of the field.
The most helpful thing about waiting is that it gives the healing process a chance. Mortimer Adler said once in an interview, “There have been two or three occasions when I was desperately unhappy. I stopped working, stopped thinking. I couldn’t see any light ahead and I did not know when the light would come. But the light did come. The clouds disappeared. And I did not do it by any device of my own. A door opened.” And then he added these words, “If you live long enough, you learn to be patient.”
When the blue devils surround you, the first thing to do is to tell somebody, and the second thing to do may be simply to wait.
III. The third thing that you can do is trust your Heavenly Father.
That’s what the psalmist did. He said, “In the Lord is love unfailing, and great is his power to set men free.”
Those are perhaps the two most important things I can tell you this morning. When you are threatened by the blue devils, remember that God’s love does not fail, and that God’s power sets men free.”
Many years ago, when we were living in the Pacific Northwest, a little girl named Pamela was lost one night in the woods. She’d been on a picnic with her family. They were picking blueberries. She wandered away from the others, and as daylight began to fade, they missed her. They searched feverishly, without success. Somebody went to call the sheriff. Volunteers showed up. In the morning they found her and she was all right.
She was leaning against a tree stump. She had pulled branches and leaves over herself to keep warm. The temperature during the night had dropped down into the thirties. Her shoes were missing. Her dress was torn. There were scratches and insect bites on her arms and face. Bus she was alive.
They wrapped her up in a blanket and carried her out of the woods. A reporter managed to ask Pamela a few questions. He wanted to know if she had been frightened. She said that she was. He asked if she cried, and she said, “No, not much.” He wanted to know why she didn’t cry. She said, “I knew my dad would find me.”
How can you beat the blues? Share it with somebody, then wait; and finally trust your Heavenly Father, who sets us free.
Garrison Keillor tells a story of a group of Methodist pastors going to Lake Wobegon for a seminar on rural ministry. The pastor of the Wobegon church was their host. At the last minute he arranged with his good buddy Wally to take this group of pastors out on Lake Wobegon on Wally’s brand new twenty-six foot pontoon boat for a cruise and barbeque.
The problem was that there are twenty-five pastors. Twenty-five plump, Methodist pastors and a barbeque grill on a twenty-six foot boat is a bit of an overload. They get out on the lake and the wind comes up and the boat begins to rock. Pretty soon the coals are scattered across the deck and the pastors are in the water. Can you picture it? Twenty-five Methodist pastors out there treading water, standing as tall as they can, trying to find the soft bottom of the lake, putting their heads back to keep their mouths and noses above the water. They are frozen in place looking straight up. They can’t see where the horizon is. They don’t know where the shoreline is. Then Wally’s nephew, Brian, only twelve years old, happens by the lake. He looks out and sees this sight, and he begins to wade out into the water calling all the time, “Come this way. Come this way to the shore.”
We are given the ability to stand tall so that others can do so as well. Thanks be to God.
Read more about How to Find A Guide for Spiritual Fitness and Dr. Clarence J. Forsberg HERE.
Copyright 2008 Dr. Clarence J. Forsberg. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.
Post a Comment