“I haven’t written in this space for three weeks.  In my ten years of blogging, that’s a record for me.  And that’s because in these last weeks–months really, but mainly these last weeks–have been spent coming to grips with my dust-likeness.  That I am not the master of my fate.  That I am most certainly not the captain of my soul.”

Some people say, derisively, that Christianity is a crutch.

And to that I say Amen.  Glory Hallelujah.  Give me that crutch.  Because I am crippled.  More like paralyzed, actually.

William Ernest Henley wrote, I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul.  Yet he was a man who grew up in poverty and had a leg amputated as a result of tuberculosis.  Ironically, the poem was also chosen as the last words of Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber, before he was executed.

I would love to know:  Did they really believe it?  Or just want to?  Did Stephen Paddock believe it as well?  Or any of those he killed?  Or those who died–or lived–in the fury of the hurricane?

Should we believe it?  Is it really a statement of courage?  That those of us who came from dust and will inevitably return to dust actually are masters of anything?

I haven’t written in this space for three weeks.  In my ten years of blogging, that’s a record for me.  And that’s because in these last weeks–months really, but mainly these last weeks–have been spent coming to grips with my dust-likeness.  That I am not the master of my fate.  That I am most certainly not the captain of my soul.

Sixteen years ago, I went through a season of Anxiety.  And I say it with a capital A, because there’s no other good word to describe it.  You can say, I’m anxious about that interview.  I’m anxious about the bills.  But that’s nothing compared to Anxiety.  It’s like equating “feeling down” with Depression.  You just can’t compare the two.  Anxiety is all-encompassing, life-consuming, soul-sucking.

That was sixteen years ago, and after two years I had victory.  Then it entered my life again a few months ago, and has sought to control me these last weeks.  My life circumstances, ironically, are going great.  My kids are all thriving.  My husband is incredibly supportive.  I’m doing my dream job.  I’m not over-stressed.  But as anyone who has experienced it knows, it doesn’t matter what’s really real, Anxiety becomes the center of the universe.

I’m fighting hard, from many different fronts, and I have tremendous support.  I’m also managing to stay functional most of the time, even if “functional” sometimes feels agonizing.

But if there is one thing–one gigantic Truth that has ground me to the dust–it is that I am not in control.  Any sense of being master or captain of myself has dissolved into a blubbering mess on the bed.  I am nothing but a few molecules surrounding a soul.  That flesh has no real power, and that soul has no control over what happens to me.

And when I’m there–here–I have three choices.

1.  Live in denial; convince myself that I am in control even though I never will be.
2.  Live in anger and frustration that there is a God, but he doesn’t care.
3.  Trust that there is a God who is there and is not silent.

The last time I went through this, sixteen years ago, led to a Crisis of Faith.  I had been raised to know Christ–and I had personally tasted of his goodness–but my foundation was not strong enough to endure the bottom falling out of my world.  It led to an intensely personal quest for Truth.  True Truth.  Like, historical, scientific, philosophical Truth.  Not just something that made me feel better.

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