GOD CAN
I’m a feeler. Like, a hardcore feeler. For those of you who are familiar with The Enneagram, I’m a Four. So basically, I don’t only experience a lot of emotions, but every emotion is felt DEEPLY. If I’m excited about something, it’s oozing out of me. If I’m sad about something, I feel a physical ache in my chest and palms of my hands. And many times when I’m in prayer or acknowledging God, I feel tingles like sand running down my body.
I believe God created me this way on purpose. For one, to be able to be empathetic to the people in my life. Understanding what others are experiencing on an emotional level is powerful. But even more than that, I believe God made me a feeler to communicate with me. Some people hear God as a little voice in their head, some people see visions or have dreams, some hear Him through nature… I feel.
And because God has a sense of humor, He brought me a husband (well, almost husband #TMinus21Days) who DOES. NOT. FEEL. Not like that, anyway. Andrew and I are wired completely differently. Our strengths are different, our weaknesses are different, and the way God speaks to us is different. But one thing we both have in common is pride. Of course this pride manifests itself totally different in each of us, but still, it is pride.
A few months back, when we were newly engaged, we received an amazing piece of advice from a middle-aged married man. He told us that we can’t focus on whether or not we are getting what we need, but that we have to focus on if the other person is getting what they need. It’s my job to put his needs first, and his job to put mine first. If we are both taking care of the other, there is never a lack. But once the eyes shift to oneself and the thought turns into, “what about me?” is when the problems start.
I wish I could say that beautiful sliver of advice that I did (honestly!) take to heart was fully lived out in my life, but it wasn’t. I’m really good about remembering to consciously put Andrew first for a whole few hours before I’m lost in my own selfishness, pride, and stubborn opinions once again. And although he would be humble about it, he is much, much better at selflessness and love than I am.
Because we both have this pride, when we end up in an argument of sorts, we can also end up in a spinning cycle of frustration without any progress being made. He wants me to stop being over-emotional and hyper-sensitive. I want him to think before he speaks. Sound familiar? We can read all the self-help books, listen to all the marriage podcasts, and watch all the sappy Nicholas Sparks movies and still, without some kind of mediator, pride often wins the fight over love.
OUR MEDIATOR IS JESUS
About a week ago, we were in one of those arguments where neither one of us was willing to budge. To be completely honest, we don’t even remember what it was about. (So, obviously, it was important enough to be unkind toward one another, right…?)
Andrew was sitting up, still, completely silent. I was right behind him, also mute as a mouse, feeling awkward, bullheaded, and more interested in my desires and needs than his. That’s when the voice in my gut went, “Rub his back.” To which my own inner voice replied defiantly, “No.” Now, let me tell you, if there’s one way to calm down my man from almost any negative emotion and make him feel more loved than all those Nicholas Sparks movies coming to life at once, it’s through touch. All it takes is a few minutes of tender touch and he’s a whole new man. If it’s that easy, why wouldn’t I just rub his back for two minutes?
Because, dear readers, while I am a feeler, I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, touchy-feely. I have never been. I like my American bubble. It didn’t take me long to realize what God was doing in giving me Andrew as a husband. In order to love him in the way that he would best receive love, I had to go to the most self-sacrificial places in my heart to do it. I know that was on purpose. So here I am, feeling God telling me to reach out and touch him, to love him, to bridge the gap, to put the fire of pride out in an instant, and I was rolling my eyes and scoffing in my heart. I didn’t want to do the hard thing. I didn’t want to do the sacrificial thing. I wanted to do what was comfortable for me.
While this silent struggle was going on, Andrew later told me that in his silence, he was praying. He was given a vision of Jesus and all at once his pride was revealed to him. Slowly, as he set his gaze upon Christ, he felt the pride physically draining out of his body. This alone is a miracle to be shared, because as I mentioned earlier, Andrew is not a feeler. He is made of logic. This beautiful moment with God is alone reason for praise.
God was working. Our Mediator was meddling. While Andrew was praying, I was fighting my pride, not wanting to touch him in the way I knew he needed. I got as far as putting my hand in the air and holding it there. I didn’t budge it. I was trying to make myself do it, but it was so much more than rubbing in his back. It was bowing to my own sword. It was telling him that he meant more to me than me being right. In that moment, I wanted so badly to have the strength to do that, but I couldn’t. So God did it for me.
All of a sudden, my hand jerked forward and began rubbing Andrew’s back. It happened before I realized it did, almost as if someone had grabbed my hand and said, “Oh, come on!” And I believe that’s exactly what happened. Because in that exact moment, when my hand was jerked forward into loving my husband, he was given the vision of Christ that began to deplete his pride, steadily and slowly.
GOD CAN
Later, when we were recounting all of this, we were thinking about how hard relationships and arguments would be if we didn’t have Jesus there with us, doing for us what we can’t do on our own. We would just keep circling around and around in disagreements and disappointments. We would just have to “get over it” or sweep it under the rug, and move on. One person would have to win, and one person would have to lose. We would have to live with frustration and that hot, hot pride and bitterness. Without God, I wouldn’t have had the strength to put my own comforts down and do what I know Andrew needed, and he wouldn’t have been shown his pride and faults and been forgiven and released of them.
Without God, we basically have to be as strong as God in order for a sacrificially loving relationship to be successful. And guess what? That is impossible. But with God, I can grit my teeth, shake my head, and cry out, “I CAN’T!” when my sinful nature is roaring loudly, and God can take my hand, reach out and touch another person and say, “But I can.”