Resilience

“TIME TO STOP PLAYING GOD,” a very caring friend said to me recently. She was referring to my tendency to confuse resilience with invulnerability. “You need to let some balls drop, and quit being the strong one all the time.” 

Hard words for an oldest child. Hard words for a pastor. Sometimes friends who know us best say just the thing that we need to hear, just the thing that gets past our defenses, just the thing that smacks us in the gut. I was glad she said them to me.

Pharaoh’s heart was hardened. (Exodus 7:13) When we confuse a desire to be resilient with a desire to be invulnerable, we end up becoming hard-hearted, less human. Ironically, that makes us less resilient, because we are moving away from our essence, from who we are. That makes us icy, repressive, and ultimately oppressive to others.

Resilience grows up around pain. When we experience a trauma, or when we see our children suffering, we may think that pain must be avoided. We try to shelter ourselves and others from it. But denial of pain halts the process of developing true resilience.

You are an enclosed garden. (Song of Songs 4:12) Perhaps we are like a circle of grass, vulnerable yet hardy, as we grow up around our pain.

Help me to be resilient and vulnerable, growing around my deepest pain. Amen.