Annie Dillard once wrote, "I don't know beans about God." ..... But maybe I don't need to know beans about God in order to have a vital, loving relationship with Him. I can still know His presence and power in my life. I can still rely on Him to keep me sober day by day. I can forgo intellectual certainty and rely on what grace tells me is true of God. I can forgo cleverness and decisiveness in favor of bewildered trust -- not because I get it all, but because I know that I can't.
It wasn't until I'd been in recovery for several years that I could look back and see how these questions and doubts compelled me to take the spiritual journey I've chronicled here. It wasn't a direct path -- a clear route to God -- that I took. I stumbled a lot. I fell on my face. Hard. And even now, my daily journey of faith is messy and unpredictable. Lingering questions still tag along.
But these days, I don't shoo them away. I welcome them, hold their hands, and keep an eye out for answers I may or may not find. Lately, I've come to realize it's the pestering doubts and unresolved issues, not the answers or certainties, that most often lead me forward on the path of grace. So it's fine with me that the final destination, where all the answers are known and understood, is nowhere visible yet.
"my daily journey of faith is messy and unpredictable"
ReplyDeleteI am so glad you said that, Jeannie. Mine is too.
Yes, I really liked this excerpt from Heather's book. It seems that the so-called certainties of faith weren't helpful in her recovery process -- or at least she had to find new, different kinds of certainties. If you get a chance to read her book, I know you'll like it.
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