The Power of YET

Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, YET I will rejoice in the Lord.  I will be joyful in God my Savior.  The sovereign Lord is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of deer, he enables me to tread on the heights.

~Habakkuk 3: 17-19

Holding two truths at the same time, especially when one of the truths feels heavy seems really difficult, right?  I suppose I didn’t used to think about such things.  Holding good and bad, grief and joy, hurt and wholeness, despair and hope.  When my eyes were less wide open (aka when I was youngER), I saw things much more black and white and less in grey.  I feel much more now that grey is often where things sit. In the face of holding these things together, it isn’t quite as easy to have answers, especially black and white answers when we see such brokenness.  In the past that might have scared me a little.  Doubting or questioning would have caused more pause.  But I realize more than I used to that questioning the brokenness around us isn’t bad.  Questions aren’t as easily answered and sometimes we need to pause, not to answer, but to allow ourselves space to be able to carry grief and joy at the same time.

As I was drawn to this passage coming off of the last couple of weeks where this seemed to be the sentiment, I was carrying the weight of what I was seeing around me: death, sickness, bad parts of humanity while still holding and seeing in front of me what God was doing in the midst of all of the bad.  It is definitely a spiritual battle this mission life that we live.  The wind can get knocked out of you when you realize so much of the battle IS spiritual and that maybe I’m just not holy enough to handle it.  But like the brokenness itself, those are lies from the enemy.

In the midst of the brokenness of humanity around us and spiritual {battles} (what felt like uphill battles we were in the midst of), Christ was present.  In the lives of those around me, in spite of me, in spite  of my brokenness, God worked.  He changed lives, He changed courses of young lives, He opened eyes to see Himself in ways we could never imagine.  He gave people insight in to JESUS.  Eyes and bodies that would not step foot in a church were seeing and experiencing JESUS!

A simple prayer I prayed during these last couple of weeks was

to see God in His creation and in His created beings.

That prayer was answered.  In the face of unknown diagnosis, in the face of brokenness, we were able to see hope and joy.  Holding joy and grief at the same time.  It is a difficult place to find yourself.  It IS possible to do though, but I encouraged myself to hold both of them loosely.  The grief will not always remain or it will at least be held differently, but so will the joy, the hope.  It will not always remain in the same way and it will not be held equally as it is now.  To hold both loosely gives space for the enormity of what both of those are and names what they are, but it also puts to place that it can be temporary.  We don’t have to LIVE in this space forever, it isn’t permanent.  Just as these verses in Habakkuk talk about, the power of YET, is in itself powerful.  There is hope after the grief, there is joy in our Savior.  It isn’t to minimize the grief or the pain or the brokenness, but it embodies it and allows us to carry both the grief and the joy of knowing there is more, there is beyond and we can have hope in that, joy even and strength to continue even when we don’t want to.

The power of YET.  It is powerful and although it is uncomfortable to sit in the place of YET, the place of holding brokenness and hope, we realize as we sit in this space that Jesus, the risen Savior and Redeemer of all things sits with us.