Blessing and Letting Go, Part I

“Lord God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.”₁

As Lauryn nears the end of her high school career and the beginning of the rest of her life, the more dread and panic creep into my heart. It will soon be my turn to experience separation anxiety, a feeling I have not known since about age 4. As our children grow up, we know they will all eventually leave our nest, but we don’t like to dwell too much on that fact. Most of us as parents of very young children have the luxury of quickly dismissing these thoughts since that reality will not be most of ours for quite some time. But with a teenager halfway through high school, it is far too quickly becoming my reality.

Parents “inevitably begin losing their children as soon as they are born…”₁

This anxiety hits each one of us though along the journey of parenthood – when our child takes his first step (away from us), when she boards the school bus for the first time, when he has his first sleepover away from home, when she goes out on her first date – all of these milestones remind us of the speed of life and how short the time we have our children to ourselves. The author calls this “mundane grief.” The whole subject of “mundane grief” – the daily nontragic grief so rooted in family life- is remarkably absent from most discussions of loss, as well as from discussions of the family. It is not a coincidence, then, that one of the most overlooked daily practices of faith in families is the practice of blessing and letting go of the other person and your own lament and sorrow. The problem is you can’t just up and bless someone you love out of the blue. Blessing commits us to a way of being with one another and comes with some very sticky strings attached: the strings of attachment, separation, loss, and failure. To get to blessing, you have to go through (or maybe it’s best to say “muck around in”) its component parts. You have to acknowledge life’s limits. You have to offer and receive forgiveness as a step toward receiving and bestowing blessing. Finally, you have to let go in trust.

The author mentions the story of Jesus as a 12-year-old teaching in the temple as his parents search for him for three days. In one translation, Mary, who speaks so few words in the scriptural canon, exclaims, “Behold, your father and I have been looking for you in anguish,”… Mary and Joseph searched for three whole days – an almost unfathomable amount of time compared to parents nowadays who become hysterical when a child fails to show up at an appointed time and place. In essence, we are not all that different from Mary, the mother of God, who, as Gaventa₂ notes, contends with a child that is “profoundly hers and yet not hers at all.”

In blessing, we find reprieve and release. We step under the wide umbrella of God’s grace.

According to dictionary.com, certain definitions of bless include “to request of God the bestowal of divine favor on”, “to bestow good of any kind upon” and “to protect and guard from evil.” As our children grow and we repeat the phrases common in everyday life – “Have a good day”, “God bless”, “Goodbye”, “Love you” – we bless our loved ones. A hug, a touch, a kiss, a tear. These are all blessings we give all the time, marking our gratitude and care and granting peace and goodwill as our loved ones come and go. Blessings are also gestures that speak when words don’t… These small words and movements can feel so inadequate, so utterly mundane that we don’t even notice them. Yet they actually have great importance, and it can be helpful to recognize them for what they are. They are the blessings we bestow daily, coming and going, gracing others with our love, assuring them of our continued presence, and turning them over in trust to God and the wider world. Blessing is not an easy practice, nor is it one that calls attention to itself. But it is a trust-filled, hope-filled, love-filled practice at the core of Christian faith.

Blessings abound in Scripture, New and Old Testament alike. Some are given without much fanfare, others are wrestled over (Jacob w/the angel), lied for (Esau’s stolen birthright), create controversy (disciples shooing away the little children) and descend as a dove upon the receiver (Jesus’ baptism). Our society may not accord blessing the same status and power it assumed in Jacob and Esau’s time. But we underestimate its importance at our own risk and loss.

The practice of blessing, like a good benediction, declares our willingness to live joyously and gratefully within finite existence and to set our loves ones free to do the same.

We will continue with the subject of letting go next...

Blessings,

Crystal

_1. A favorite closing benediction of the author she heard given at a family retreat village.

₂. Quote from historian Anne Higonnet from Chapter 9 of In the Midst of Chaos

3. In reference to biblical theologian Beverly Roberts Gaventa mentioned in this chapter.

All green text comes from Chapter 9 of In the Midst of Chaos by Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore

Swapping Misplaced and Dashed Hope for Better Days

I don’t know about you, but I really would like to have a whole string of great days in a row. Unfortunately, I’ve gotten into this nasty habit of gauging a day by how cooperative the children were, by how many things I could cross of the "to do" list, whether I found a great deal shopping or if I feel slim, energetic and sexy or bloated, greasy, and gray haired. I started to meditate on this emotional roller coaster and God convicted me of a spiritual virus in my pattern of thinking called misplaced hope.
To a large degree, barring Job like circumstances, lousy days are the result of misplaced hopes and expectations. The day went as my misplaced expectations went and so followed the roller coaster of emotions. The key to long strings of good days is identifying the misplaced hopes and expectations and properly placing them back where they belong, on God.
This viral pattern of misplaced hopes focused its target in three large areas: self, others and things/ideas. By design, all of these false targets will eventually leave us feeling short-changed. Regardless of whether they are intentionally or unintentionally elevated above our hope in God, they become idols, and idols are designed to disappoint, because God is most concerned about the intimacy of our relationship with Him.
Misplaced hope in self leaves us feeling self-condemnation, self-conscious, burnt out, inferior or proud. Misplaced hope in others leads to anger, unforgiveness, co-dependency or feeling trapped. Misplaced hope in something or idea leads to debt, stress (due to lack of time), and/or exhaustion (due to lack of rest and genuine refreshment).
Replacing misplaced hope for the real article happens in a process. First you have to recognize a counterfeit hope. Here are a few verses for helping with that.
John 14:27 Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.
John 10:10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy; I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly.
Matthew 11:28 Come unto me, all you that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
John 7:37-38 In the last day, that great [day] of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.
Proverbs 13:10 Only by pride cometh contention: but with the well advised [is] wisdom
Matthew 5:23 Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee: Leave there thy gift before the altar and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother; and then come and offer thy gift.
Matthew 19:6 Wherefore they are no more twain (two), but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder (separate).
Misplaced hope in others can lead to bitterness, unforgiveness, strife, divorce etc..
What Jesus gives is rest, peace, refreshment, and life. However, if the thief has duped us onto buying into false hope, we feel empty, stressed, fearful and exhausted. Misplaced hopes give the thief, Satan, room to sow despair, destruction, death.
Try filling in the blank.
My _____ (children, house, job, finances, schedule, body, marriage, etc…) gives me stress.
Don’t dwell here. Just acknowledge where God puts his conviction of misplaced hope and confess it to Him.
1 Thessalonians 5:24 Faithful is he that calleth you, who will also do it.
In plain English this means, if God wants you to do it, He will do it by the enabling power of His Holy Spirit through you. Perhaps there are some areas of life that you know you are supposed to do (legalism/law), I mean called to, but haven’t discovered how to let Him do it through you. Perhaps there are areas that we you were not meant to take on at all. Beware of cultural standards of normalcy that you may not be called to…
Romans 14:4 Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant? To his own master he standeth or falleth. Yeah, he shall be holden up: for God is able to make him stand.
Truly, if you have faith in Jesus, you have the mind of Christ and He can show you the difference. Would you give Him the time to show you? Uncertain of some things, focus on crystal clear priorities first like getting to know the One in whom you are supposed to hope. Remember that the One you are transferring your hope to is the God of creation and resurrection. If anyone can remake (fill in the blank) that has been ravaged by misplaced hope and exceed expectations, He can.
1 Cor. 2:16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.
Can God fix it? He can do better than fix it, he can take a junker and recondition it into a priceless one of a kind classic that others ooh and ah over. The key to this is realizing that we don’t know how. It is like He’s the pro and we are the shop hand, just co-operating as much as we understand and relaxing with the knowledge that we don’t understand much of what is going on in the beginning, but knowing that it is going to be really good.
2 Corinthians 3:5-6 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God; who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit; for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life

Phillipians 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
Ephesians 2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
Zec. 4.6 Then he answered and spake unto me, saying, This is the word of the LORD unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the LORD of hosts.

Is. 40:31 But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
Properly placed hope in God’s promises of enabling grace for the moment, lead to peace, wisdom, love, rest and refreshment, creativity, joy, a thankful heart and abundant life.