Buried Alive

"Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go."
Joshua 1:9

No, it isn't David Blaine again.

OK raise your hands. Who likes negative emotions? Who enjoys melancholy more than mirth? values dourness above delight? likes to =[ rather than to =] ? A rhetorical question if there ever was one. Masochists please refrain from raising your hand.

So much so, we just want to be rid of it as soon as possible, by all means and any means.

Habakkuk asks repeatedly why bad things happen to good people and vice versa. Yes, every good and perfect gift is from above (James 1:17), but that doesn't mean we can just take the good and accept nothing else from God. Faith would be a piece of cake if you received only good things wouldn't it?

I urge not to be remiss and dismiss discomfort and hardship offhand.

We are guilty of two types of dismissal: Suppression and Repression, very much like the fleeing and forgetting I touched on yesterday. These also result in Depression and Regression, and a Compression of your spirit, because your Transgression is not acknowledged. OK enough digression.

Suppression basically means moving the negative emotion to the KIV tray, pushing it to the side of your plate, or stashing it away in your drawer. But when your IN tray is cleared, when you've eaten everything else that you liked from the buffet, when your mom nags you to clean your room, There! The emotion hasn't disappeared; it's still there, and it has to be dealt with.

Repression takes it a a step further, or should I say deeper.

You burn it, shred it, run the anti-virus software, delete it, empty the Recycle Bin (sorry Mac users, all two of you), format your hard drive, all so you NEVER have to deal with it EVER again.

But these methods are still only temporary, and the root problem remains unsolved, and insoluble in the solutions you use.

And as it festers in the Keep-Out-of-View tray, conspicuously untouched on your dinner plate, or buried in the dark recesses of your drawer, it will undoubtedly remanifest itself.

Because God loves you and considers the lesson you have to learn essential to your development, He'll want you to learn it, no matter how many times you've skipped lecture. Please realise we just have to learn it well once, and with Christ our teacher beside us, we can do all things.

I reiterate: any emotion you harbour, hoard, hide, hold or hush up will return to haunt and harangue you like a thorn in the flesh. Any emotion buried within us is never buried dead - but buried alive.



"When I kept silent,
my bones wasted away
through my groaning all day long.
For day and night
your hand was heavy upon me;
my strength was sapped
as in the heat of summer.
Then I acknowledged my sin to you
and did not cover up my iniquity.
I said, "I will confess
my transgressions to the LORD "-
and you forgave
the guilt of my sin."
Psalm 32:3-5

Once again when I least expect it, God speaks to me, this time through Paul Baloche's No Eye Has Seen (Track 11) and Spontaneous Worship (13), from his album Open the Eyes of My Heart. The spontaneous worship gave me the opportunity to meditate on God in His presence, but No Eye Has Seen really spoke to me:


No eye has seen, no ear has heard
No mind has conceived what the Lord has prepared
But by His spirit He has revealed His plan
To those who love Him

We've been held by His everlasting love
Led with lovingkindness by His hand
We have hope for the future yet to come
In time we'll understand the mystery of His plan


That is almost verbatim what God is speaking to me, and I'm really overwhelmed. Amen.