Tag: relationships

In Need of Rescue

“We have a semi-mobile baby on our hands – Torin has decided that he can get from one place to another by rolling across the room, so we frequently find him stuck under tables or against a wall, shrieking for someone to rescue him. Silly boy.” ~Kristin

Reading my friend’s post this morning on Face book I had to laugh as I pictured her 7 month old baby rolling himself into a predicament, then wailing at the top of his lungs for someone to rescue him.  My first thought was how determined this little one is. Not willing to merely lie around, staring up at the ceiling, cooing gently, he propels himself into adventure, one 360-spin at a time.  Pretty ambitious given his age.  

Twenty-some years ago my baby son similarly maneuvered himself into some interesting jams and reacted the same.  I can still recall little Matthew’s panicked shrieks emanating from a corner of my living room.

What strikes me in this moment is when we are young, helpless and in trouble we instinctively know how to call for help.  We recognize we are incapable of freeing ourselves.  We cry at the top of our lungs for a rescuer.  What’s more, we do so expectantly.  We trust that one who loves us will show up to bail us out of our misery and entrapment. 

Fast forward 30, 40, 50 years or more.  I don’t know about you but I’ve changed since my days of wailing infancy.   As years rolled on, rather than crying for a rescuer I began to rely on myself for delivery from tough situations.  Backed into a corner of my own making, I struggle and fight to free myself.  If I cry at all it is in the form of self-pity mingled with loud complaint.  Something like, “Why me?”

Somewhere along this journey, I embraced the lie that it’s easier to claw my way out of a corner alone than it is to ask for help.  Asking might imply weakness.  Worse, it would mean I have to trust someone to actually want to help me.  What if I cry and no one responds? What if I admit my need and someone tells me to pull up my big girl britches and deal with it? What if… 

The risks are real.  If I acknowledge I am incapable of freeing myself from this world’s ensnarement, if I allow myself to be vulnerable with others, if I trust someone to care enough to lend a hand through tough times, I might be disappointed by those people now & again.  More likely, I will be disappointed.  They’re human, just like me.

When Jesus said, “you must become as little children…” I wonder if He was pointing us to little Torins and Matthews pressed up against a wall, shrieking for a rescuer.  I wonder if He doesn’t look at us and shake His head and mutter to Himself, “silly child” as He sees our plight and awaits our cry of invitation for His intervention.  

Ultimately, I know Jesus is my Divine Rescuer.  I trust His ability to free me from dark places my heart rolls into in this lifetime. And His sacrifice on Calvary assures final delivery from my corner of this world. 

In the meantime, I don’t have to struggle alone.  I’m learning to heed instruction from Galatians 6:2 commanding us, “Bear one another’s burdens…” The Greek word for burdens here is baros meaning “heaviness, trouble, crushing loads.”  Life’s crushing loads are not meant to be carried alone.  We were created to live in relationship, loving others, allowing them to love us in return…however imperfectly…and, yes, crying for help when our back is against the wall. 

“Where’s Waldo?” A Single Woman’s On-Line Dating Saga

Perusing my local Barnes & Nobel bookstore, I held in my hands a copy of “Where’s Waldo: The Fantastic Journey”. 

Pouring over the colorful, eye-boggling pages I began to consider how much this book reminded me of my on-line dating experience.  Themed pages of giants, warriors, vampires, firefighters, farmers, & monks, all strangely representing various personality types of men I’d encountered along my cyber quest for love.  Though it’s been a few years, I vividly recalled a cast of conspicuously curious internet characters.

~Giants: men who were bigger than life or at least thought they were, who roared about themselves ad nauseum while looking down on others. 

~Warriors: men addicted to battles, trouble following them down every path. {In laymen’s terms they are referred to as “bad boys”.}   

~Vampires: Nocturnal males who prey on women, suck the life out of them, then move on to their next victim.    

~Firefighters:  Men who show up at the first sign of a flame but leave behind a scene of smouldering ashes.  

~Farmers: down-to-earth fellows, steady, reliable, yet slower than a John Deere in July and about as exciting as watching wheat grow.

~Monks: Tender, spiritual, non-verbal, funny dressers.

Each page displayed hundreds of near-identical characters with varying degrees of colorful clutter and debris surrounding them to further distract seekers from finding the One they sought.  Of course, Waldo was on every page but so deeply entrenched among a visual cacophony, the challenge was to find him among the bewildering frenzy of aberrations without curling up in the fetal position whimpering something incomprehensible.

The caption across the top of this literary treasure read, “Have you found Waldo yet?” And across the bottom, “Now with EYE BOGGLING EXTRAS!”

Indeed, my on-line dating experience unfolded much like pages in this Waldo compilation.  Promises to mingle with Christians, find bliss with my perfect match or  fall in love with my soul mate belied the fine print, common sense warnings that I most likely must stave off  hundreds…in my case thousands…of modern day giants, warriors, vampires, firefighters, farmers, & monks.  After countless hours, weeks, months spent looking for the “significant other” equivalent of a needle in a haystack, the Fantastic Journey was no longer quite so, well, fantastic. 

Those “eye-boggling extras”?  In my experience, they included photos of men flanked by Harleys, hound dogs, horses & hunting rifles, in addition to pictures of matches in costumes–from Superman to Shaquille O’Neal- and more than one fella sporting pumps and lipstick.  {Thankfully, the self-proclaimed nudist only posted pics of himself from the neck up.}

Photos were only the tip of the e-romance iceberg.  The biggest problem with on-lines daters, in my estimation is that most singles rush to fill out their profile while uneducated about and unrecovered from their previous relationship failures.  They haven’t invested in learning from their mistakes in an effort to move toward wholeness.  Whether newly divorced, recently widowed, or even single for years, many bring their trunk filled with unhealed wounds, self-exonerating blame, unrealistic expectations and unfulfilled fantasies into cyber space with them.  Unresolved issues clutter emotional landscapes, much like Waldo-type debris littering the pages of our story.

As singles, attracting quality people into our lives can prove a significant challenge.  Perhaps the best place to start is with our own trunks, unpacking the stuff we’ve been carrying around for years, embracing the call to health in mind, body & spirit, and working to become quality people ourselves.   Then, rather than searching for Waldo amidst a sea of frightening caricatures, we might actually discover there’s a truly fascinating individual smiling at us over the top of an inspirational anthology. 

Replacing the flamboyant children’s book on the shelf, I inquired of a store employee where I might find the self-help section.