Telling the Truth

"Good writing is about telling the truth." - Anne Lamott

Well, here goes.

Life is hard. There. That is the truth. Any questions?

I was talking to my mom this morning about a friend of hers who is having a really tough time at church. Her friend said that she was ready to quit the church, to just give up and move on. My mom suggested to her that there may be some good reasons not to quit, and I think her friend decided to give it another go, but that's not always the way that conversation plays out.

We compared notes and discovered that we both know people who expect church people to behave better than non-church people. Unfortunately, just like anyone else, church people can be awkward or inconsiderate. Or even just plain mean.

My pastor is fond of saying that too many people expect the Christian life to be like a cruise. They want to just sit back and enjoy the ride. Those people are offended when God has the audacity to interrupt their cruise with things like calls to difficult assignments or suggestions about being kind to one's enemies.

They signed on to escape life, not to be thrown in headfirst.

In a recent sermon, one of my favorite pastors shared this story, written by Barbara Brown Taylor:

“Several summers ago I spent three days on a barrier island where loggerhead turtles were laying their eggs. One night while the tide was out, I watched a huge female heave herself up on the beach and dig her nest and empty her eggs into it. Afraid of disturbing her, I left before she was finished. The next morning I returned to see if I could find the spot where her eggs lay hidden in the sand. What I found were her tracks leading in the wrong direction. Instead of heading back out to sea, she had wandered into the dunes, which were already as hot as asphalt in the morning sun.
          A little ways inland I found her: Exhausted, all but baked, her head and flippers caked with dried sand. After pouring water on her and covering her with sea oats, I fetched a park ranger who returned with a jeep to rescue her. He flipped her on her back, strapped tire chains around her front legs, and hooked the chains to a trailer hitch on his jeep. Then I watched horrified as he took off, yanking her body forward so that her mouth filled with sand and her neck bent so far back I thought it would break.
          The ranger hauled her over the dunes and down onto the beach. At the ocean’s edge, he unhooked her and turned her right side up. She lay motionless in the surf as the water lapped at her body, washing the sand from her eyes and making her skin shine again. A wave broke over her; she lifted her head slightly, moving her back legs. Other waves brought her further back to life until one of them made her light enough to find a foothold and push off, back into the ocean. Watching her swim slowly away and remembering her nightmare ride through the dunes, I reflected that it is sometimes hard to tell whether you are being killed or saved by the hands that turn your life upside down.” (Barbara Brown Taylor in The Other Side Magazine March & April 2000)

Ultimately, the real life that we are called to as Christians might be more fulfilling than a cruise and it might even save us in the end. But in the thick of things, sometimes it's hard to tell whether we're being saved or killed.

And that's the truth.