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Maybe Far Away or Maybe Real Nearby

Writer's picture: Jeanni RitchieJeanni Ritchie

Somehow in the midst of serving others, I lost Him. 

When Little Orphan Annie sang the opening song in the musical bearing her name, my heart broke for the little girl who didn’t know where her parents had gone. 


Forty years later my heart was breaking again, only this time for myself. It was my Heavenly Father I couldn’t seem to find although I knew He was out there somewhere…


My story isn’t unfamiliar but what may be surprising is that, at this point, I’d been a pastor’s wife for 23 years and was faithfully serving in full-ministry for the last ten of those. 


Somehow in the midst of serving others, I lost Him. 


In retrospect I know exactly what happened. New information about former trauma had made its way to my ears while I was on fire for the Lord and I spiraled spiritually. On the outside I kept going, throwing myself into works. 


I had a homeless ministry and was chairing a funding committee for the South Mississippi Homeless Coalition. I was organizing church potlucks and community fundraisers. I was visiting hospitals and holding the hands of the bereaved while helping make funeral arrangements. 


I was doing so many good things that I completely missed how fast I was running from God. I was blind to the reemerged fear and anger that had begun to separate me from Him. 

When illness began creeping in, I grabbed hold of it with full force. I was like a car that had been running on fumes for three years at that point and I was sputtering. Sickness and surgery allowed me to literally crawl into bed and pull the covers over my head. 


I numbed the pain with food and television and began believing the lies of the devil. I am just sick. I will be okay if I just rest more. God doesn’t care what I watch on television. It doesn’t matter that I open my tablet more than my Bible as long as I still show up on Sunday mornings. 


I began to dread that twenty-step walk from the parsonage to the front doors of the church. I relished doctor instructions that came with full bed rest. 


Lying in the hospital for the third time in as many months one spring morning, the Lord asked me if I wanted to live or die. I had to think about it. Weighing the pros and cons in my head for several minutes, I eventually told Him I wanted to live. He asked again a few minutes later and my answer was immediate. LIVE! The decision had been settled in my heart. 


"Well, hold on." He’d said. 


He wasn’t kidding. What followed next was almost an entire year of breaking bonds and shaking up my entire world. I felt like a caterpillar trying to emerge from a 50-year chrysalis. I had to revisit sexual trauma, relational pain, addiction, body dysmorphia, mental illness, and ptsd. I faced consequences for some of my actions and was given grace for others. I authentically but clumsily forged an identity in Christ not predicated on status or works. 


Finally I emerged a butterfly, beautiful and free. My life is now one of purpose and I run to Him instead of away in the good times, as well as the bad. 


So maybe now this prayer's the last one of its kind..."Won’t you please come get your baby?"


Stop trying to prove your worthiness to others. Don’t rely on works to prove yourself to God. Call on Him. Fall into His arms. Follow in His footsteps. Remember, for whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it (Matthew 16:25).

 

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