We Got a Puppy, Part 2 (Strategic Disappointment)
“We are not now what we shall be, but we are on the way; the process is not yet finished, but it has begun; this is not the goal, but it is the road; at present all does not gleam and glitter, but everything is being purified.” Martin Luther
“God, who is everywhere, never leaves us. Yet He seems sometimes to be present, sometimes absent. If we do not know Him well, we do not realize that He may be more present to us when He is absent than when He is present.” Thomas Merton
"Darkness is the place where egoism dies and true unselfish love for the 'other' is set free. Moreover, it is the birthplace of a vision and a hope that cannot be imagined this side of darkness." Constance FitzGerald
I recently recalled a specific episode of a 1990s sitcom called Mad About You. To recall a single episode after 20 years signals its impact on me! And I found it online and revisited it here. The 30-minute show was shot in one, long take with one camera--and no commercial breaks to offer a needed timeout from the tension.
Picture New Yorkers Paul and Jamie Buchman sitting outside their newborn’s door, willing themselves to bear Mabel’s cries as she learns to quiet herself. The new parents pace, they question themselves, they fear they are injuring their child. As Mabel's crying continues, everything in her parents wants to hold and hearten their baby. Paul and Jamie are weaning their daughter from their comfort. And it is excruciating--even to watch on TV.
Now picture young puppy parents, Bob and Judy Lewis, laying in their beds in the dark as still as possible, withholding their comfort. Their baby Biscuit is alternately whimpering and wailing in his puppy crate four feet from the bed on Judy's side. “Just a little longer,” Bob whispers. “I can’t bear it,” Judy cries and she hides her face in Bob’s neck. Teaching our pup to “quiet his soul like a weaned child” (Psalm 191) is anguishing.
A friend calls weaning “strategic disappointment.” How perfect! What I think he means (since neither he nor I have weaned a baby) is how God deliberately removes spiritual pleasures. He refuses to meet our grasping and clamoring with comfort. Instead, He helps us learn to hush ourselves in His gentle presence.
When what God has used to feed us no longer "works", or we sense His hand has been withdrawn, we have a few choices:
We can abandon the journey altogether.
We can double down, grit our teeth, and try harder.
We can persevere in a detached, intellectual style of faith by pure commitment.
Or, we can ask God what He might be doing instead?
Madame Guyon suggests that “The interior life, that is, the inward life of the spirit is not a place that is taken by storm or violence. That inward kingdom, that realm within you, is a place of peace, it can only be gained by love” (italics mine).
Like a parent who abandons the chubby hands of a toddler to teach her to walk, God seemingly releases us. Only Love can detach us from good things, even spiritual pleasures, so we can say--even stumbling in the dark: “You, Oh Lord, are enough for me. Not what You give me, but You alone.”
Love uses “strategic disappointments” to tenderly help us quiet ourselves and open our hands for more of Love Himself. Rest even in the dark, dear friend. He is at work.
JUDY