“But I didn’t want that past! Why did it happen to me?”
Some friends and I discussed our pasts today and more than one grew up with an alcoholic parent.
In the midst of our discussion, I reminded them facts about all our lives.
It’s no surprise to God what family we’ve been born into. He put me in the family he did all those years ago. The adventures and the agonies, the joys and the fun, all went into the person I am.
Today I have a choice. Shall I can argue with God for making me into the person I am?
Or perhaps I should embrace the pot I’ve been modeled into by circumstances and situations? (See Romans 9:20-22)
I understand far better, now, that not everyone chooses a healthy or responsible way of dealing with their personal hurt.
It’s been of immeasurable help for my lay counseling work. It has informed my writing. It has shut my mouth at times when I would judge. And it’s left me with a heart that aches and eyes that tear up.
But I’ve had to embrace the hurt and grant forgiveness–deserved or not.
Like the velveteen rabbit, I’d like to think it “made me more real.”
Did God create me for a purpose with this past?
When you don’t believe in a loving God who created you for a purpose, it’s more difficult to wrap your brain around past challenges.
I can’t possibly comment on the horrors so many people have endured in their lives. No words can well express my sadness for the grief visited on them by people who should have loved them.
I cannot explain why anything happened in anyone’s life–including my own–but I believe that all life has purpose and meaning.
We do not need to be a victim to our past.
Some of the difficulties in my life were self-inflicted. Some were the products of another person’s failings. Many I had no control over–especially the blessings.
It’s important to remember how little control I’ve had over my blessings when I complain about my challenges.
Blessings out of my control–and yours
When the chair is tilted back at the dentist and a friendly dental assistant asks me to open my mouth, I always think of King Tut.
The man lived millennium ago, the richest man in the world, but he did not have glass windows, much less screens to keep out the flies. Someone may have cleaned his teeth, but they could not fill the cavities. His mouth probably hurt most of the time.
King Tut drank out from rude goblets, though they may have been made of gold. He didn’t own a single plastic item, nor did her listen to music with the great-high fidelity I can pick up on my car radio, not to mention my phone.
He died young from an illness curable today.
I have to say, given a choice, I’d rather live in the United States today than be the pharaoh of Egypt long ago.
In 21st century North America, the majority, if not all of us, live in a better home with more resources than the most important ruler of the world–for most of the history of the world.
Even women.
Look at history
In Barbara Tuchman‘s In a Distant Mirror or Antonia Fraser’s The Weaker Vessel, the authors noted that if we were suddenly transported back in time (15th century or 17th century England, it doesn’t matter which) we would be shocked by three facts:
1. All women between 15 and 45 would be in some stage of pregnancy.
2. Everyone’s face bore smallpox scars.
3. Everyone’s teeth–what there were of them–would be a disastrous mess.
My husband and I laugh that no matter the age in which I lived, I would not have been among the wealthy.
I’d probably have been one of King Tut’s slaves, or a 17th century peasant. No matter when I lived smallpox would have scarred my face.
I’m thankful I was born in 20th century California.
This takes me back, as always, to 1 Thessalonians 5:18: “in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
It’s all about turning the prism and looking at your life from a different angle. If you make an effort, you can find something to be thankful for.
Even if it’s just living in a house with glass windows.
Tweetables
Glass windows, clean teeth, and music: a life better than King Tut. Click to Tweet
All our life has a purpose, whether we want to recognize it or not. Click to Tweet
Pregnant, smallpox scars and miserable teeth: modern US lives are better than all of past history. Click to Tweet
Michelle: love this post! As the daughter of an alcoholic, and with alcoholism rampant in my family-of-origin (on both sides, going back multiple generations)–it spoke to me.
Hi Michelle…too ill to say anything coherent, tonight, but I loved this post.I have bookmarked it to revisit.
Thank you, both. I’m glad it was meaningful–and it’s a lesson I needed to be reminded of myself. I probably should get my teeth cleaned more than twice a year!