Nicole

(Group Five)

What was your upbringing like, and how did you find yourself in the group you did?

Well, I’m an interesting case study, because if my life had proceeded normally, I would have ended up in group two (the strivers), but because it took some unusual turns instead, I’ve found myself in group five (the disheartened).

I once came across a quote that described me as a child, from Isaac of Nineveh.

He said, “What is a merciful heart? A heart aflame for all of creation, for men, birds, beasts, demons, and every created thing; the very thought or sight of them causes the merciful man’s eyes to overflow with tears. The heart of such a man is humbled by the powerful and fervent mercy that has captured it and by the immense compassion it feels, and it cannot endure to see or hear of any suffering or any grief anywhere within creation.”

That was me. Luckily, I had a very protected childhood and a stable, loving family, so there was a buffer between me and the world. But around age ten, I became aware. I became aware in one blinding flash of all the cruelty, terror, and pain of human life. It pierced me to the core and I went into a shock, numbing my emotions for years in order to survive.

Then at age twelve I was hit with severe mental illness, but was able to power through silently (somehow), while engaging in destructive behaviors in private. But at age sixteen, I began to suffer from chronic migraines. My last two years of high school were spent with a home tutor because I was unable to attend classes.

Today, I’m legally classified as a “disabled dependent” and my physical and mental condition has kept me from ever attending college, holding a job, or living apart from my parents.

So I’m in group five for a couple reasons.

One, my life has turned into a flaming train wreck. And two, I’ve seen a lot of evil.

How does God fit into all this?

I was not raised in a religious family. For the vast majority of my formative years, I would have described myself as atheist/agnostic. But around age sixteen I started having inexplicable yet undeniable encounters with God. They forced me to have to drastically recalibrate what I took for granted as the limits of reality.

Brennan Manning once wrote that he heard the voice of Jesus speaking tenderly to him when he was lying in a gutter after drinking himself senseless. That’s pretty much my story, except my gutter was metaphorical. But like him, it was when the pieces of my life fell to pieces around me that I encountered the undeniable voice and presence of this captivating Person, radiant with gentleness.

At the last conference, someone asked Tina, “How do you know when you’ve achieved wholeness?” And she replied, “You can breathe.”

It was like that when I first encountered Jesus. There was a sort of primordial familiarity there that’s difficult to convey. And somehow, I could breathe for the first time.

You know Christ’s parable about the man who stumbled across the treasure hidden in the field? That’s me. Except I only found it because I tripped and fell face-down first. I happen to think that the greatest treasures in this world are only visible to those who have fallen flat on their face. And that treasure is worth all I’ve endured, a million times over.

Rich Mullins remarked that the disciples didn’t initially understand what they signed up for, they only saw Jesus, and that was enough.

Oh man, I didn’t know what I signed up for, but I’m so glad I did.

What is the most common barrier that keeps people from intimacy with God?

The idea that we can fix ourselves.

Are you familiar with the Greek myth of Sisyphus? It describes a man who was cursed to roll a boulder up a hill, only to have it roll back down again, for all eternity. It perfectly describes being stuck in the mindset of self-salvation.

We keep telling ourselves, “This time the boulder will stay up. This time I’ll get my life together. A little more willpower, a stronger resolve, a new lifestyle program, and this time will be different.”

It was the thought process I lived with for years. Until, one day, when the boulder crushed me for the thousandth time, I did the one thing you’re forbidden to do in this paradigm – I admitted defeat.

It was then that the voice of God washed over me like cool water in a dry, dusty land.

“Welcome to the kingdom, child."

Defeat isn’t the end. In fact, it’s the beginning of something wildly more beautiful and freeing.

Could you elaborate on that?

There’s one thing that’s inevitable in life. We will either operate under a framework of expectation or a framework of grace.

The framework of expectation weighs us down with criteria of what’s required to be a successful human being. It’s imbued from our parents, the media, religion, our culture as a whole. It demands we fix ourselves through our own inner resources, to become this image of perfect self-possession that’s perpetually held before us.

So we end up frantically trying to outrun our own brokenness, hoping to find ourselves at the end of the day, and at the end of our life, with more merits than demerits. But our failures follow us and haunt us and we hate ourselves for it. The yoke of expectation is unforgiving.

Literally, it offers no forgiveness. All you can do is try to rack up some more good karma to mitigate the bad.

And when we live under the yoke of expectation ourselves, it’s impossible not to unconsciously pawn it off on others. Not only because living under expectation automatically locks you in a competitive mindset, and not only because the failures of others make our track record look better in comparison, but when we hold ourselves up to an exacting standard, we can’t help holding others up to it too.

Which we despise in ourselves. And the vicious cycle continues. There’s seemingly no escape.

The yoke of expectation is a burden none of us can bear. And the more we squirm, the tighter its grip on us.

This is what initially struck me when I explored Christianity for the first time as a teenager. Most religions, like most outlooks on life, operate under a paradigm of merit, of expectation.

What goes around comes around. You get what you deserve. Karma and everything.

There’s no real room for drunk-in-the-gutter failure. At least, failure that you don’t have to make up for later, or work your way out of through self-generated effort. But what if you don't have any bootstraps to lift?

Yet it was when I found myself face-down in the mud, the charred remnants of my life scattered around me, that I was confronted with the distinctly compassionate presence of Jesus.

At first I recoiled, expecting one more voice of “You should have…” or “Why didn’t you…” or “Have you ever tried…” but what I encountered instead was an all-encompassing love that simply said, “Here, let me take that for you. You’ve been burdened with it for too long.”

The only person who can withstand the yoke of expectation carried it already on our behalf. Us, the ragamuffins and hooligans who don’t have two merits to rub together.

And all he asks is that we fix our eyes on him and he will transform our hearts into the likeness of his and nothing will ever separate us from his love.

What’s the first beatitude? Blessed are the poor in spirit.

Jesus is like, “Dude, you wouldn’t even need me if your own efforts hadn’t already failed you catastrophically.” Not only does Christianity have room for failure, but it’s premised on it. Failure is expected.

And this, I think, is the only way to possess real freedom, true satisfaction of soul.

If we can have a lasting peace with God that is not attained by our good behavior, and consequently can’t be forfeited through our screw-ups. This is what Jesus offers. His yoke is easy and his burden light because it is of grace, not expectation. Our merits don’t have the capacity to make him love us and our demerits don’t have the ability to make him stop. We can breathe.

Incidentally, this is not a license to antinomian abuse, either.

You can love your child not matter how much poison they drink, but you’re still going to try to get them to stop consuming it… because it’s killing them.

When you hand your whole self over to Christ, he’s going to get to work freeing you from everything that’s destroying you. But it’s his grace, not your own effort, that’s effecting the change. Your only choice is to stay tethered to him or turn away.

But his perpetual love is a constant. It’s always there to greet me when I get tired of self-destruction and wander home again.

This is the gospel. You broken ones, you nobodies, you who don’t have a single bootstrap to lift, the kingdom of heaven is yours.

All is grace.

What is the hardest thing for the disheartened to overcome?

A sense of betrayal. My life wasn’t supposed to end up like this. My kids weren’t supposed to turn out like that. He wasn’t supposed to leave me. It’s brutal.

What is the biggest hurdle to healing?

The lure of normalcy.

I heard someone say once, “What screws us up the most in life is the picture in our head of how it's supposed to be.”

From infancy, our culture presents us a script of the way a life is supposed to unfold. So we are shocked and ashamed when unpleasant reality intrudes, when our well-ordered lives unexpectedly derail.

But the interesting thing I’ve noticed about the gospel is its emphasis not on avoiding suffering but the offer of a Presence in the midst of it. A peace that transcends circumstances, even when our world crashes down around us.

Most people don’t know what to do when lives don’t follow the script. They will either try to fix you, try not to think about it too much, or shoot you a pitying look, saying, “That’s too bad.”

But Jesus walks right in and meets us in the brokenness, when our failures and our fears threaten to engulf us. He covers us with overflowing grace and radiant goodness that makes the idol of normalcy seem like a faded dream in comparison.

What is one essential someone from your category needs?

I hate to say it, but… other people.

The disheartened can’t make it through their turmoil alone.

Was there a development or insight that was particularly transformative?

I wouldn’t recognize my life if it weren’t for Friends Ministry, to be honest.

There’s a temptation for the disheartened, I think, to focus so much on our pain and grief that it threatens to bury us. For years, all I could see around me was people who had their lives together. I was tired of being conspicuous. I stick out like a sore thumb in public, because I’m rocking back and forth while talking to myself. Resentment was starting to consume me.

So one day my therapist told me about this group called Friends Ministry that serves meals to the homeless.

I showed up one Saturday in this small, crowded church basement. There was a homeless woman who was clearly high as a kite singing “His Eye is On the Sparrow” with tears in her eyes. I saw them take up the offering in the sweaty baseball cap of a guy with three teeth.

It was love at first sight. I belonged.

And over the years, they’ve become a family to me. They have loved me with raw, unconditional love. They gave me something to fight for, a community full of people who fell off the track or normalcy a long time ago.

Without a sense of belonging and purpose, our pain will swallow us whole.

What advice would you give the disheartened?

The same advice that Tina continually gives me. Go back to what you know.

Here’s a story.

One night I was lying on my bedroom floor crying (because mental illness is a jerk). The darkness and terror of the world was descending on me and I couldn’t move. Then I looked to the left and saw a box. I knew what it was and experienced an irresistible compulsion to open it.

For years, every time I had a spiritual experience, I would write it down and put it in this box.

Most of them I haven’t shared with anyone because they’re so powerful and sacred. And I don’t want people to think I’m crazier than they already do.

As I went through the scraps of paper, I was bathed in what I knew to be true, to be real. I will sooner forget my own name than who Jesus has revealed himself to me to be.

The encounters I’ve had of him, the knowledge of who he is that they disclosed, have been imprinted so powerfully on me that I couldn’t forget if I tried.

And this is the only thing that enables us to breathe when we’re confronted with the brutality of the world, the derailing of our lives, the awareness of our own wretched choices and failures.

Who he is.

Intellectual knowledge will wither away in the hour of trial, while clichés and easy answers mock the wound, but remembering who you know him to be is the only way through.

You will have a better chance of convincing me I’m not conscious right now than you to make me doubt the glimpses I’ve had of Jesus. I don’t understand his timing and I’ll never understand his will, but his heart I know for certain.

Breathe in, breathe out. Live another day.

What advice would you give someone who loves a person in group five?

Oh, be patient with us. And please don’t try to offer any clichés, easy answers, or superficial palliatives. I know it’s scary to not be in control, and the church places such an emphasis on Having An Answer, but it stings like salt in the wound sometimes.

One day I was on the verge of having a mental breakdown. It was 7 a.m. and I called a friend who I knew was awake. For the first five minutes after he picked up, I couldn’t get a word out, I was sobbing so violently. He just began to pray out loud for me, having no clue what was happening. As usual, he listened, he reminded me to go back to what I know, he was a living embodiment of what was true.

Being a gentle, consistent, loving presence in the midst of the snot and tears is the best you can offer.

Pizza also helps.

Are there any verses in Scripture that have had an impact on you?

Matthew 11:28-30. All day, every day.

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

But I’m also partial to the description of the “fruit of the spirit” in Galatians – “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”

The whole gospel is contained in those two.

Not only does the fruit of the spirit described Christ’s character, but it describes what he transforms our hearts into as well. Notice how it's not the fruit of ritual or deed or effort, but the fruit of the spirit. He produces it in us. We just stay intimately connected to him, like a branch to a vine.

Christianity isn’t ultimately about a collection of intellectual doctrines, or studious good works. It’s about a heart condition.

Reciting psalms 23 and 42 also help when I’m having a panic attack.

Are there any songs or books that have helped you?

Oh man, the books of Brennan Manning saved my life. Especially “The Ragamuffin Gospel.”

There’s too many songs to list, but one called “Beauty From Pain” was instrumental while my world was falling apart. I also love the music of Rich Mullins, because he understands brokenness.

Years ago, someone gave me a children’s book called “The Crippled Lamb.” It details the story of a lamb that is left behind while the flock is grazing in far pastures because his limp prevents him from following. But while he is waiting, he sees a child in the stable and goes over to comfort him. Then it is revealed that he unknowingly had the privilege of welcoming Christ into the world.

Upon reading it, I burst into tears.

This is my story. I was left behind – the crippled lamb, the runt of the litter – wondering what was wrong with me, why I had to be the outcast, the failure. But it was my cripple, my being left behind, that enabled me to experience Christ so profoundly.

And now, I wouldn’t change a thing.

Any closing thoughts?

There are two quotes I want to be read at my funeral. The first is the famous one from St. Augustine, where he says, “You have made us for yourself, O God, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you.”

The other is from Brennan Manning.

He wrote, “One spiritual writer has observed that human beings are born with two diseases: life, from which we die; and hope, which says the first disease is not terminal. Hope is built into the structure of our personalities, into the depths of our unconscious; it plagues us to the very moment of our death. The critical question is whether hope is self-deception, the ultimate cruelty of a cruel and tricky universe, or whether it is just possibly the imprint of reality."

"The parables of Jesus responded to that question. In effect Jesus said, 'Hope your wildest hopes, dream your maddest dreams, imagine your most fantastic fantasies. Where your hopes and your dreams and your imagination leave off, the love of my heavenly Father only begins.'"

Go back to what you know. Have mercy on yourself. He is with us.

Breathe in, breathe out. Live another day.

All is grace.

Nicole is a professional hermit and toe-sock-wearer who blogs at nicoletheragamuffin.tumblr.com.