When Tapestries are Torn

When Tapestries are Torn

“I know that my Savior lives, and at the end he will stand on this earth.” Job 19:25

What happens when your assumptions about life are disrupted? We all have a certain vision for how we expect life to play out. Shaped by our family and upbringing, moved along by our temperament and gifts, we may have assumed our future would unfold with all the colors of this tapestry intact.

The problem is, we have no idea the barriers, setbacks or struggles we will confront along the way. I have a lifelong friend from High School. She is a comic genius. Her ability to inhabit a character and bring comedic idiosyncrasies to a performance always amazed me. She usually had me in stiches during rehearsals. What was worse, she also could, with a single sound or scrunched up face, make me giggle right before it was my cue to take the stage.

Jeannie and I lost touch after High School. But then came social media and around 2005 I re-met my witty friend. Her sense of humor was just as real. Her posts were sharp and funny, though in recent times have turned to political jabs. As she and I corresponded, she shared her story, and I realized her tapestry had become tattered and unwoven in places.

She has lived in New York City for several years and a little over a decade ago she was assaulted, robbed and beaten. Besides the horror of the attack itself, she lives with its trauma etched upon her memory and a brain injury that will never heal. Jeannie did not plan on living with Traumatic Brain Injury.

Those with TBI often suffer with immediate or delayed symptoms including confusion, blurry vision and difficulty concentrating. They may also experience blackout, dizziness and fatigue. Mood can be affected, ranging from anger and anxiety to apathy or depression. With a lifetime of effects, a “normal” life is often out of the question. My friend Jeannie has not only had to give up her dream of comic theater, but struggles to hold down any job. She lives paycheck to paycheck, while still having to spend precious income on medical bills.

Jeannie rarely complains, but her life hurts. I know it hurts. And, if you knew nothing about her, you might think, “What did she do to get herself into such dire circumstances?” I wonder how often it occurs to us that the homeless person we pass once had a tapestry in mind for their life. Do we consider the caravan of immigrants approaching our border as real-life men and women who wanted to raise families and live in peace, but now are fleeing oppression and violence? They are looking for some way to complete their own tapestries.

In the Bible Job had a masterpiece life. God called him “blameless”. He had a huge ranch, a loving wife, along with sons and daughters who actually remembered his birthday (Job 1:4). But, in a moment all of his livestock are destroyed, his buildings ruined, and his children die as a strong wind wrecks the home where they are all gathered.

Subsequently Job is also struck with terrible sores from the soles of his feet to the top of his head. He takes a piece of broken pottery to scratch the painful wounds.

Along come three friends who sit with him in silence for several days. They do well to show up, and they show restraint in not speaking too quickly. The suffering do not need our words, our advice, or even our wisdom: they need “us”.

But eventually they can’t take the silence anymore and decide they must find the mysterious reason behind Job’s suffering. They pontificate about everything, accusing Job of greed, lust, blasphemy, a lack of faith, and just, well, generally being sinful. Silly boys, if they had read the first chapter of the book, they would have known none of that is true.

Job, for his part, decries the day of his birth. Most of his speech is filled with agony as he calls on God to either show Himself or to leave him alone. But, in the tarpit of his pain, occasionally a bubble of hope rises to the top. He says, “I know that my Savior lives, and at the end he will stand on this earth.” (Job 19:25) He longs for God. He longs to present himself and say, “God, Why?”

But, he also simply longs for God. He says, “Yes, I will see him for myself, and I long for that moment.” (Job 19:27). If your tapestry is ragged, if the edges are frayed, if the color is faded or threads are unstrung, let the bubbles of hope rise to the surface. God will not judge you for your doubts during your pain.  He does not condemn His suffering children. Indeed, He comes. Christ came to “stand on this earth.” He became a person of dust just as you and I are dust.

Cry out to Him in your suffering. And, when you see a lump of thread on the side of the road, remember: that once was someone else’s tapestry. Be kind.