Thirteen years ago now, I lived on a missions ship that was sailing around South East Asia. Each member of the crew had a full-time job that kept the ship running smoothly - I cleaned the bathrooms and washed everyone’s clothes. Unfortunately our department kept encountering a problem that would drive people crazy. We kept losing their socks. Now you may laugh, and I may join you, but to some of those crew members this was serious business. There were regular visits to the laundry by frustrated people demanding that we return their socks. How hard could it be for us to accomplish the simple task of washing, drying and returning their clothes? How incompetent were we? Very, obviously.
Now, don’t get me wrong. We took the complaints seriously and made every effort to keep track of every item, searching high and low. We analysed and re-analysed every system, tweaked and refined our processes, trained and retrained our staff, informed and educated our users...but at the end of the day we kept losing socks. Still to this day I have no idea where they ended up. But in the process I discovered a truth that would change my attitude towards life’s frustrations.See, I wrestled with God about this conundrum. I kept saying to Him, “Jesus, it would be very easy for You to solve this problem and put a stop to all the frustrations and negative exchanges that occur because of it - show us the socks!” But He did not. Instead He transformed my frustrations into a deep sense of empathy and comradery with all those involved and we saw the lighter side once more.
This past year of life has been my toughest so far. Developing an anxiety/depressive disorder has shaken every part of my world and taken me to the extremes of human emotions. All along I have wrestled with God. “You could very easily solve what’s going on and the pain can stop.” But He did not. Instead those extreme emotions resounded inside of me and resonated with those around me.
And I realised that God is comfortable with emotions. He’s comfortable with His emotions and He’s comfortable with ours. In fact they are like treasured possessions that bleed from us. Psalms 56:8 mentions God collecting our tears in a bottle. I’m sure I have filled a warehouse over the past year. But there was a point when the pain stopped. The anxiety stopped. The depression stopped. And a strange sense came over me that not one emotion had been wasted. The warehouse was full and nothing would go unaccounted for.
