The spirit of a man can sustain him through sickness,
But who can endure a broken spirit?
—Proverbs 18:14
Two simple thoughts today. One, whoever argues that “no virus” crap—that pathogens/viruses aren’t real—really is a disinformation wacko. I’ve been practically bedridden for three days straight with classic cold/fever/aches symptoms in the middle of a beautiful early Autumn season that I had been enjoying, after some jackass I worked with was coughing and sneezing on me. Oh, and openly complaining to me about the fever he’d been working through. A short two days after he did that, my throat started to become sore (which I attributed to speaking too much during a long car trip,) and then the next day I woke up with all the symptoms at once, like a sledgehammer. Now, as of writing this article, I’m finally able to sniffle and sneeze my way through looking at a computer screen without my temples feeling like they’re going to burst from internal pressure. So I’m back to writing. I don’t generally take any medications, and I avoided it until the third day of this hell I was feeling, but I can’t overstate how helpful and relieving that Buckley’s formula is (ie. cough, cold and flu complete package). I will certainly give credit to God for the recovery process, but I don’t mind giving money to Buckley’s for the assist.
Secondly, and more importantly, is my growing appreciation of what medical professionals call “somatic” symptoms or “conversion disorders”, where a person manifests physical symptoms because they have unresolved psychological or emotional baggage. In extreme cases (according to what I can find) some people even have seizures or become paralyzed because of their inability to process what they’re feeling emotionally. Blood pressure, acidity (ph) levels, and healing speed are all affected by one’s emotional state of being, making existing problems much worse when it goes wrong. We all know the stereotype of the aging man who suddenly hears horrible news and then dies from a heart attack, right? This is one reason I’ve said many times that, in my estimation, the alarmist health nuts out there are actually the enemy of good living, because they create panic and stress among their followers, convincing them that they’re dying. Panic and dread is what actually ruins your health the quickest. Believing that everything you eat, drink, and do in your day is killing you is probably the easiest way to drive yourself into a self-induced health crisis. Never mind how much this must be exacerbated when you have children or dependents that you now believe you’re poisoning. It’s straight up psychological warfare terrorism.
Jesus said (Matthew 6:25-34):
Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air: They do not sow or reap or gather into barns—and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you, by worrying, can add a single hour to his life?
Worrying is specifically called out as being useless for extending your life. For every minute you spend worrying about what you’ll eat or drink, or about your body, you’re wasting the precious time God gave you to focus on Him and His priorities. Life is about much more than taking care of yourself and your needs. Your life is in God’s hands, not your own. Stop thinking you have control of things. Suffering is part of the deal everyone has to go through, and you won’t know the outcome until it’s over.
Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles strive after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you.
Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Today has enough trouble of its own.
Not only is this necessary to improve our relationship with God, but I’m starting to recognize how wise it is for our own well-being. Humans can only cope with so much stress/trauma before we either lash out at others, or begin to sabotage ourselves unconsciously. If we can’t find a way to relieve that internal pressure and face the darkness, we will start to go crazy and destroy things.
As as example, I knew a man for many years, also about my age, who was similar to myself; a bit of a know-it-all smartass, a stubborn man of principle, but in the end mostly a nerd. He wasn’t a Christian—certainly never born again—and so he never found peace in the Lord. Instead, traveled and found mentor figures that he thought were exemplary. He later returned and shared his modest stories of adventure, as well as list of accomplishments his mentors had given him to pursue. Among them was the need to get into a real fight and win, and to find a woman. He got a job as a security officer at the most dangerous hospital in Winnipeg (the murder capital of Canada), and began fighting drunks, psychos, and drug addicts on a regular basis, forcing them into restraints while trying to dodge needles and knives. Meanwhile, he had found a woman and was living with her. His checklist was steadily getting completed.
Now between the two of us, I was more interested in violence. When we were younger, he had taken martial arts classes, but I had gotten into “serious” school yard fights and went toe-to-toe against bullies who thought they were untouchable. I always hated those who thought they could scare others into submission. And truth be told, I wanted more excuses to do violence, because I thought I was dealing justice. Thanks to God I converted to Christ just before high school began, where fighting would have become much more consequential to my future, but this other guy had never been in a real fight even as a youth. He was a natural mediator, a referee figure, always trying to bridge divides and make amends between people; a more naturally Christian tendency. But thanks to his new idea of what being a complete man meant, he had to become violent and hurt others, even though he was against his principles.
What happened? Outwardly, he remained calm and sarcastic as always, bragging about his victories and “looking forward” to the next bout with a stranger. But I would later learn that his inner life was in chaos. While he slept, he would play out violent, apparently self-destructive urges unconsciously, punching his own body and sometimes even his girlfriend, without realizing it. He also began to eat compulsively—supposedly to offset the energy spent at his job—and got fat. Thankfully, myself and others who cared about him persuaded him that he had proven himself well enough, and could now quit, so he moved on and got an office job like he was always meant to.
For myself, I try to stay aware of what I’m avoiding. I can’t afford to be this sensitive and also live in denial. When I’m full of rage, I can literally feel the bile in my stomach burning a hole through me, and I don’t want ulcers. I have to write. I have to admit. I have to get it out.
My struggle to reverse Christianity's cognitive dissonance epidemic
In the preface to my book The Paradox of Fundamentalism, I wrote about how churches are immersed in cognitive dissonance—ie. the unwillingness to acknowledge things because they are uncomfortable. This was supposed to be the first of many books in a series called
A few of you may know that last Summer, due to a series of events beyond my control, my house’s basement flooded, and I was forced to gut it and renovate it. It just so happened that my insurance coverage kicked in a month before this, after several years of not having any available due to my basement getting flooded by another freak coincidence, back in 2020. Both times it was severe enough that my entire neighborhood was impacted, not just me, and so I don’t feel like I’m particularly unlucky. All things considered I got off easy. But emotionally, I was devastated. My heart didn’t care about the rational logic of what was going on; that no real harm was done, or that I could see it as an opportunity to fix things up, paint some rooms, etc. This was, to my unconscious, some kind of sign that nothing I do matters. Or maybe it was that I’ll never be safe. I still don’t know. Consciously I do believe what Jesus said, that I need to seek the Kingdom and stop worrying about this life, and yet apparently I couldn’t get over it.
Outwardly I was still my old self, but inwardly I was falling into a depression I’ve never felt before. Perhaps as a form of self-punishment, or self-soothing, I also began overeating. As the long winter dragged on, I started to feel foggy, forgetful, detached, and heavy. Yes, I was physically manifesting what I felt in my heart. I felt heavy, so I became fatter; I didn’t want to think about it; so I became forgetful. And even now, my memory of last winter is a complete blur. Friends and family tell me about what happened, and I recall it only as if I saw it on a TV show or something.
I only realized I had been in a haze of depression the first time I struggled to get out of my car, and that I must have gained something like 30 pounds in a few months. That set off alarm bells in my mind, and I began to trace back why I hadn’t been taking care of myself. It all began with the basement, I concluded. The first time it was flooded, I was so traumatized that I basically fell into a kind of obsessive mania where I blocked out everything else and quickly wrote Maybe Everyone Is Wrong during the midst of the Trump-Fauci global lockdowns, feeling like the world might actually end just like that, before I had the chance to say what I wanted to say about it. This time, however, I had no book to write (or rather, too many,) and just a hole where my comfort zone had been. A hole under my feet, stripped and meaningless. A place that could represent refuge and comfort—shelter from the world—now a reminder that not every crisis comes with a mission. Sometimes it just hurts.
If you’re lucky you’ll get the chance to repair it, then try to move on.
Dear friends, you all have something hard to deal with. And I know already, for most of you it is far more serious than my own tiny problems, despite how dramatic I get. But the Lord knows your pain better than I ever could, and better than even you do. He knows it very well, because He permitted it to happen. And guess what? You’re not supposed to cope with it on your own. Don’t hide it from God. Don’t pretend to be strong. I’m a weak person, and I only benefit from reminding myself of that. It’s much easier to be “strong”—that is to say, to fall into denial, build up cognitive dissonance, and delude ourselves into thinking we’ve buried it successfully. God doesn’t want you to bury your pain. He wants to you come to Him as a child runs to their Father, weeping for consolation. He is not ashamed of our broken spirits.
The LORD is near to those who have a broken heart,
And rescues those who have a contrite spirit.—Psalm 34:18
And again:
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit,
A broken and a contrite heart—
These, O God, You will not despise.—Psalm 51:17
And again:
So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to goad me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me.
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.—2 Corinthians 12:7-10
God forces us to recognize weakness. The longer we deny it, the more we hurt. There’s no point fighting it, brother and sisters. Please, don’t try to be strong for long. We’re not made for it. Listen to me now, confess. This is not a confession of sins, as if you have angered God and need more forgiveness—because you are already forgiven if you are in Christ—but confess your struggle to cope. Confess your misery. Confess your exhaustion. Confess your heartbreak. Confess your patheticness. Confess your weariness and impatience, and your failure to get over it: that “thing” you always tell yourself you’ve gotten over. Just let it out already and weep with God.
Let me confess to you, reader, that I’ve written most of this article with tears streaming down my own face. It crept up on me, and since then it won’t stop. These words are written through weeping eyes, from the depths of my heart. And while I would like to pretend I’m writing this for your sake, that’s not the real motivation. I write like this because it’s all I know how to do when I’m at the end of my rope. Actually, I haven’t cried like this in many years. I didn’t cry this much when my own father died, when I was seventeen. I guess I need it now more than then. And I guess there’s nothing like getting older to trick a man into thinking he’s also getting strong, huh? And nothing like being stuck in a state of aching, feverish delirium for three days straight to destroy a man’s ego and make him cherish the simple gift of clear thoughts and steady hands. Thanks be to God, the Almighty Creator, for my weaknesses! Thank Him for the Word of God which instructs me to admit weakness so that I don’t destroy myself in denial. Thank you, Lord and Father, for these tiniest of rebukes you give me, which are already given so sparingly that I shouldn’t even mention them, and which are so minor that others will laugh at me for even counting them. They know what true impairment and suffering looks like, and I don’t. Thank you for still treating me like the child I am, Father.
Maybe it’s time to recognize that I hate being “strong”. I hate thinking it’s all in my hands. God, bring me as low as I need to be, as often as I need to be, to keep me mindful of my place. Remind me that you are fully in charge. Everything must be done according to your will, and my job is merely to endure this world and testify to your greatness in it. May you rebuke all of us, and bring all of us into the fear and submission that necessarily comes before the comforting of the Spirit:
For thus declares the One who is high and exalted up, who inhabits Eternity, whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, but also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit—to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.”
—Isaiah 57:15
Amen.
You know, it’s funny, but I can feel a weight lifting off of me already.