I've been working since Christmas on Eric Metaxas's bio on Bonhoeffer. I'm not half-way through yet, but this morning I read something that hit home. He was preaching on Jeremiah, a sermon I'd love to read in its entirety because it seems that I too am wrestling with God a lot these days. And the way Metaxas describes Bonhoeffer's wrestling as Bonhoeffer compared it with Jeremiah's wrestling, resonates with me and my own current wrestling.
"He (Bonhoeffer) was beginning to understand that he was God's prisoner, that like the prophets of old, he was called to suffer and to be oppressed--and in that defeat and the acceptance of that defeat, there was victory." p. 210
And from Bonhoeffer's sermon: "The triumphal procession of truth and justice, the triumphal procession of God and his Scriptures through the world, drags in the wake of the chariot of victory a train of prisoners in chains. May he at the last bind us to his triumphal carriage so that, although in bonds and oppressed, we may participate in his victory!"
These days God is leading a processional of reality and truth straight through the heart of my being, awakening a deep internal struggle within me, making me wrestle with Him as he breaks down false supports and lies that I've leaned on for too long. He is stripping away everything that is not of Him, orchestrating hard, sin-tainted events to show me the brokenness of those supports, leaving me nothing strong enough but him to lean on. Tearing down my idols. Elevating himself to his rightful place.
It is right for him to do this. And good of him to love me so much. And oh so very painful and hard to experience. I don't know if any of this makes sense to anyone but me, but I do know it's worth the wrestling. Isn't it? Yes, it is. It's worth the sacrificing of things that are already broken to be closer to him who is perfect. It's a more real place to be--accepting the defeat of myself and my brokenness and the brokenness of others to lean on the one true God. But, damn, if it doesn't hurt to be so broken and see the brokenness of it all.
Have I said it before? It's not supposed to be this way. Sin is so. very... wrong.
Am I wrong to compare my suffering to Bonhoeffer's? Or Jeremiah's, for that matter? Maybe I am naive as to what kind of suffering they experienced, but not wrong to borrow from the words they use to describe their feelings about it all. I'm not a feeler, after all. I need all the help putting words to this as I can get!
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