Note: You can watch this teaching on CrossWalk’s YouTube channel.
In light of the first anniversary of COVID’s intrusion into our lives, I asked CrossWalkers to share with me their reflections on the past year. Andrea Langley wrote the following (shared with permission):
Here's my experience of the last year. The most precious thing that COVID stole from me last year was the last 4 months of [my husband] Roger's life. It was gut-wrenching not being able to hug and kiss him and getting in only when he was in a coma. Grateful though for being with him for the last few days of his life here on earth. COVID also stole my family from me when Roger died and is still doing that as we can't be together yet for his burial. I lost my freedom – no shopping, no socialization, no helping my neighbors. I was heart-broken with people losing loved ones, people dying alone, job losses, businesses closing, children losing their school community, the fraud in our systems – and then there was the political scene and the insurrection. I think one of the hardest things for me personally was losing the hugs. We all need human touch so that was rough. The stuffed bears are just not doing it for me!
What have I gained during the last year? I learned that I am a strong woman and that I am capable of living in isolation. I am learning how to deal with all that goes with death and grief. We are all grieving our losses and we have all had losses this past year. I was able to handle issues that I knew little about. One of the positives was learning more technology and finding I needed to update some systems. Zoom was a lifesaver for me in connecting with people... COVID gave me quiet time as I have never had before. I got much needed rest and restoration to grieve, to reflect, to question. I was given a sound guide for health from a Dr. I had the privilege of working with for 6 months. Brilliant man! My faith grew in having the time to do more in depth Bible study and discussion on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. My faith also grew through the people that I came in contact with that I have never met. I was able to make new friends and connect with old ones via phone calls and correspondence. Coming out of COVID I will have more appreciation for community, I will be looking to find adventures other than those that find me, I will continue to strive to be the woman that God created me to be wherever God chooses to put me. In some ways the last year has given me more than what it has taken away. I will move forward with optimism. Hope, Healing and Patience are my words for this year.
Aren’t you grateful that Andrea took time to reflect on her year, and also share it with us? The details of Andrea’s story are unique to her, of course, yet we all have our own story to tell. There is a remarkable story in the Bible’s book of beginnings – Genesis – which has a lot to offer us as we think about our own stories. The context: Abram sensed God calling him to begin a new chapter on his own in order to create a new people, a new way of thinking about life, a new way of interacting with God that was unique in the world. He gathered his possessions and he, his wife, and all of his servants ventured out together. He was seventy-five years old (maybe – this is one of those instances where we need to appreciate the fact that the author is wanting us to see that he was older – a sign that God had already blessed him greatly). He and Sarai struggled with infertility, which is where we enter the story:
Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had not been able to bear children for him. But she had an Egyptian servant named Hagar. So Sarai said to Abram, “The LORD has prevented me from having children. Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her.” And Abram agreed with Sarai’s proposal. So Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian servant and gave her to Abram as a wife. (This happened ten years after Abram had settled in the land of Canaan.)
So Abram had sexual relations with Hagar, and she became pregnant. But when Hagar knew she was pregnant, she began to treat her mistress, Sarai, with contempt. Then Sarai said to Abram, “This is all your fault! I put my servant into your arms, but now that she’s pregnant she treats me with contempt. The LORD will show who’s wrong—you or me!”
Abram replied, “Look, she is your servant, so deal with her as you see fit.” Then Sarai treated Hagar so harshly that she finally ran away.
The angel of the LORD found Hagar beside a spring of water in the wilderness, along the road to Shur. The angel said to her, “Hagar, Sarai’s servant, where have you come from, and where are you going?”
“I’m running away from my mistress, Sarai,” she replied.
The angel of the LORD said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit to her authority.” Then he added, “I will give you more descendants than you can count.”
And the angel also said, “You are now pregnant and will give birth to a son. You are to name him Ishmael (which means ‘God hears’), for the LORD has heard your cry of distress. This son of yours will be a wild man, as untamed as a wild donkey! He will raise his fist against everyone, and everyone will be against him. Yes, he will live in open hostility against all his relatives.”
Thereafter, Hagar used another name to refer to the LORD, who had spoken to her. She said, “You are the God who sees me.” She also said, “Have I truly seen the One who sees me?” So that well was named Beer-lahai-roi (which means “well of the Living One who sees me”). It can still be found between Kadesh and Bered.
So Hagar gave Abram a son, and Abram named him Ishmael. Abram was eighty-six years old when Ishmael was born. – Genesis 16 (NLT)
Questions. What is going on here? What are the obvious conflict issues that present themselves in this story? What might be among some undercurrent issues beneath the surface of simple tension between Sarai and Hagar? What might be under the undercurrent?
I am seeing the obvious thing here: some attitude exchanged between the authority figure Sarai and the surrogate-servant Hagar who might not be acting much like a servant anymore. Deeper than than that there is Sarai’s pain associated with infertility, exacerbated by Hagar’s fertility. Hagar may have been quite young – a teenager? – and likely not thrilled at the prospect of creating a child with Abram (now 85). How many times did she feel abused before she became pregnant? Getting pregnant may have ended having to endure Abram’s visits, but also meant that her own dreams would not come true. This was not what she wanted. She didn’t have a choice. This was not Sarai’s dream, either, adding salt to her wound. There are power issues at play here. There are age issues at work. There are injustices. There is pain and grief – because there are multiple losses for each of them. Lots of losses intersecting each other, feeding each other, making the whole thing very complex.
COVID-19 has brought great loss to us all on many levels, making our grief complex. Can you articulate what you’ve been through? Can you answer the holy question God posed to Hagar, “Where have you come from?” God knew the answer – the question was for Hagar. She could have simply answered, “from Sarai’s tent – we just had an argument – weren’t you paying attention?” But that really wasn’t the intent of the question. Where have you come from – where have you been – begs for deeper reflection that will help us heal, grow, and eventually move forward.
Part of the answer to the question for us is to recognize the stages of grief that we have already traversed. My friend, Rev. Jim Warnock, who retired a few years ago after serving as Chaplain at Queen of the Valley Hospital in Napa, encourages us not to think of “stages” of grief but rather “faces” or “facets” of grief. Shock, denial, bargaining, confusion, anger, guilt, depression, and acceptance don’t necessarily flow in linear fashion. Rather, we process these things in different ways over time, sometimes revisiting a facet or two, all of which is normal. Processing our journey is part of answering the question, “Where have you come from?”
Identifying and appreciating where we have come from will make a massive difference on how fully we are able to answer the second question, “Where are you going?” Hagar knew the literal answer to the question – she was going to end up back at Abram’s massive compound. Time and attention may have shaped her path a bit as she recognized the depths of her own pain and how it affected her capacity to respond. I wonder if she – for survival if nothing less – held her tongue around Sarai? I wonder how powerful it was for her to realize that God showed up to meet with her, and Egyptian servant girl, in the middle of nowhere. She knew she was seen – and cared for – by God. How would that encourage her moving forward?
Earlier in my interview with Jim, he said something quite profound along these lines: to the extent that we deal with our grief we will experience healing and renewal. I would suggest that to the extent we answer the question, “Where have you come from?”, the greater the possibilities we will have to answer the other question, “Where are you going?”
May you know where you’ve come from so that you will have a healthier journey ahead.