I was worried that I had failed as a mom, I was quite sure I had failed as a wife, my health was in a precarious situation and I was facing some surgery, my job was constantly stressful.
I was watching the Discovery Channel and there were archeologists exploring caves where prehistoric folks had lived. It was a very interesting show about what food they ate and where they had their fires, all the details of day to day life. And then they showed the tiny skeleton of a two year old baby girl with her skull crushed. It hit me really hard and I felt an immense grief for this little person. I had a baby niece at the time and the frailty of human life overwhelmed me.
I decided that the concept of God no longer made sense. No good and compassionate God would let a little baby’s head get crushed. He wouldn’t leave me struggling with all these issues in my life either. The whole thing seemed preposterous. So, I decided to abandon faith. It seemed like a reasonable path.
The next day was Sunday and I looked forward to sleeping in. But I woke up early and paced around the house, restless. I couldn’t figure out what to do. I ended up getting dressed and going for a drive. I ended up at church where I was quite sure I no longer wanted to be. But I snuck up the balcony steps and sat in the back and wept. That was the beginning of a pattern that lasted for weeks. Every Sunday, I would plan to sleep in and skip church and every Sunday I ended up in the back of the balcony crying. And slowly but surely, I started to hear what Bob was saying and it started to open me up to some new possibilities.
I began to realize that these circumstances were largely of my own making. I was able to consider that maybe humans are built in frailty just as beautiful glass is necessarily fragile. But neither the glassblower nor God hopes for the creation to be crushed. Sometimes you just have to take the broken pieces and fit them together into a new mosaic.
It’s all still quite a mystery to me and I still think about that little Neanderthal baby sometimes. But there is something profound and beautiful and worthwhile in being open to faith. It’s an honor to be on the journey with you.
