Healed Enough to Keep on Healing

U2 wrote the song “40” inspired by Psalm 40 in the Bible.  The Psalm goes like this, “Surely, I wait for the LORD; who bends down to me and hears my cry/ Draws me up from the pit of destruction, out of the muddy clay, sets my feet upon rock, steadies my steps/ And puts a new song in my mouth, a hymn to our God . . .”  U2 adds, “How long to sing this song.”  To listen, click here.

   

How long to sing this song?  In my search for perfectionism, “40” is the theme song.  How long until I am healed?  Until I feel this drawing out of the muddy clay?  Until I feel the firmness of the rock under my feet?  Until I have that new song in my mouth?  This is the last week of Lent – 40 days of spiritual cleansing.  40 days Jesus was tempted in the desert.  40 years the Israelites wandered in the desert working their way towards the Promised Land (40 years that should have only taken a few weeks at best.)  My impatience says I should take my “forty days” and reach my healing destination.  I should arrive and sing this new song for good. 

I heard someone say, “I have healed enough to continue healing.”  This resonated within me.  A couple of weeks ago, I read through some old journals from 17 years ago.  The journals I read covered the space of me leaving the youth pastor job at my home church (also my place of refuge) to moving to southeast Asia and my first several months living there.  There were themes throughout the journals – anger at God, impatience and harsh criticism with myself, passively looking for a savior and simultaneously hiding from anyone seeking to rescue me.  Much of the same themes penetrate my journal entries today.  And I ask, how long must I sing this same song?  How long until I reach that perfect healing destination?

What I have concluded, I heal enough to continue healing.  There is not a “You have reached your healed destination” sign at the end of the road, at least not here wandering around earth.  I peel back and heal one layer of brokenness only to find another layer exposed and in need of healing.  There are definite themes that run through each layer – those same brick walls of stubbornness I keep hitting my head on.  There is also growth.  I am do not occupy the same space I did 18 years ago.  While I revisit similar themes, I have healed enough to continue healing.  I am not stagnant.  As a new layer is peeled back and brought into the light, new insights are exposed and attained.

It may take me a full 40 years wandering through the desert until I reach the Promise Land.  I figure I have been intentionally wandering for 20ish years.  My impatient self wants to get there.   I recognize my impatience is fueled by my perfectionism.  I want to be right, good, and pure . . . all the time . . . by my own doing.  Because if I am right, good, and pure then I will not feel shame.  And if I do it by myself, then I will not feel vulnerable and exposed.  Healing only happens in the space of vulnerability and exposure.  I cannot hide in silent shame and expect to be found. 

40 (whether it be years in the desert or days of Lent) is a number representing healing and purification.  One thing I love about the Catholic Church is the Liturgical calendar.  Every year we enter the intentional healing space of Lent.  In this space I acknowledge I have healed enough to keep on healing.  I acknowledge I am still not where I want to be.  I have healed enough to pull back another layer needing exposed.  Healed enough to recognize I still need to be saved from myself and not by own self doing.    

Easter is right around the corner.  The season of singing the Alleluia – the healing and triumph has come!  A reminder that the Promise Land is indeed a real destination.  I have section hiked parts of the Appalachian Trail.  I love those moments coming out of the woods and ascending a bald spot on the mountain.  Up top on the balds, I have a clear view of where I came and to where I am going.  I need those views from on top of the balds – those moments of knowing I have healed enough.  But I cannot stay on the bald.  While beautiful, inspiring, and refreshing, not much growth happens there.  It is a place to rest and take it all in, but the journey must continue.