Saturday, July 19, 2008

• Overcoming Adversity

  Currently Listening On the Road to Beautiful By Charlie Hall ~I Will Overcome~ see related

  
  

  
  The writing prompt, "Overcoming Adversity," over at the Featured Grownups site got me to really thinking about a particular part of my own journey.  Adversity is a part of life, that's true enough... even for me, the Eternal Optimist.   Most people are a bit surprised to learn that I have been through the adversity that I have experienced, because of my uber-positive outlook on life.  But it is because of the way the adversity was overcome that I have such a positive outlook.  A word - I am about to make a very long story very short... trust me, this is the short version.
  
  In 2004, I had been working in professional church ministry for just over 5 years.  In those 5 years, I had learned to become a work-aholic, and as a youth pastor, consumed with immersing myself in teen culture.  The fact that no one counseled me to actually take my days off didn't help; especially with a work-even-on-your-day-off approach being modeled for me.  I knew what it meant to be a rock star (an upcoming blog topic in itself), and I knew what it meant to fight with every waking moment to keep that rock star status.  Like many who buy into the rock star myth, I ended up needing a drug to keep me going, to see more results.  My drug of choice?  Relationships.  Don't get me wrong, relationships are important... if you're going to be a pastor to emerging generations, they're pretty much mandatory... but I was way out of balance.  My primary relationship with God, and my secondary relationship with my wife and son, all took a backseat to... relational ministry.  Simply put, everything... every last detail... of my life revolved around the students in my youth group.  I was results-driven, and addicted to the high of the relationships which fed my rock star ego.
  
  It was then my drug betrayed me.  One student, who had been a major leader, made some lifestyle choices that blew up my results-driven mentality, and devastated me emotionally.  I bought into a lie, which was whispered to my soul, that what I was doing didn't actually matter.  I needed more and more of my drug, and my dependence on the relational high I got from my students gripped me ever tighter.  Another student leader dropped out, and another began manipulating situations in a very dark manner (I hope no one is offended if I call it what is was - witchcraft).  Being so results-driven, this all screamed "FAILURE!" in my face.  And like many rock stars who feel like a failure, and begin to believe that they are a failure, I needed my drug even more... and I needed even more of it.
  
  I completely understand why so many people stop going to church... and why so many men and women leave pastoral ministry - it's hard, and unbearable when the very ones who you devote yourself to so entirely, turn on you and tear you down in the exact moment when you need the most support.  Let me just pause and say to anyone reading this who has been burned by church people or a pastor or Christians in general, "I am so sorry.  I pray that you can forgive us."
  
  To say I was broken is putting it mildly.  Broken and strung-out and burnt out.  Rumors were flying all over about my being manic-depressive, or bi-polar, or mentally unstable (I can now see that I was somewhat emotionally unstable, but definitely not mentally - this is the problem with Water-cooler Psychologists*: they have no idea what they're talking about).  Adversity?  Yes, I know all about it.
  
  I also know the healing power of God.  It was instantaneous, it was real, and it was lasting (at least for 4 years now)!  It was at an event called IYC in Nashville,when a speaker came out and gave a talk that I had heard him give before... I had even used his talk to craft a talk of my own, using much of what I had learned from him... but that night, it sounded so different - this message of the healing under the wing of Messiah.  I ran to God and confessed my need for Him... and that my need for Him was far greater than my need for the high I received from being the rock star to my students.  I cried out for deliverance, and I received it - right then, right there.
  
  When we returned from Nashville, I was asked to resign because certain individuals had lost trust in my leadership abilities because of the "strung out" state I had been in (these are my words, not theirs, as theirs weren't so encouraging nor enlightening).  Just as my healing was immediate, so was my opportunity to get off my drug.  I went through several months of counseling, which ended with my counselor saying that my healing must have been real, because he hadn't seen any evidence of depression (or any of the issues of which I had been improperly diagnosed by the Water-cooler Psychologists*) in any of our sessions.  I told him what I tell you today, God healed me.  There is no other answer.
  
  The adversity didn't end there.  As one might expect, when you're out of work for an extended length of time, you start to have issues.  We had to declare bankruptcy (but God saw to it our needs were met).  We had our car repossessed (but God provided the money to get it back, paid in full).  The best job I could find was as a Teacher's Aid working with 9th grade special needs students for $50 a day (and it stands today as one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had).  How did I overcome all this added adversity?  My friends, my God had shown me that He loved me just because I'm me.  I didn't have to be a rock star, and He doesn't love me for my results.  He loves me because I am.  And since He loved me enough to forgive my putting students and ministry ahead of Him, and He cared about me enough to heal me completely, I figured I could pretty much trust Him with whatever is happening Now... and tomorrow.
  
  
  * more commonly known as "Gossips"
  

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