The Good Shepherd

I’m planning a trip to the town where I grew up and I’ve been having some very strong emotional reactions to it. I haven’t been back there since right after I was born again, and that time was such a topsy turvy time in my life that it was not really a good time at all. There was all kinds of stuff going on in my life that was really throwing me way out of whack, and when I came back to New York I had to move right away out of the house I had been living in into an apartment in Brooklyn with a woman who changed her mind about having a roommate the day after I moved in, so I had to leave there as soon as I could find another place. So much has changed since that time, and so much for the better, but there are things in some of our lives that can throw us off balance, and traveling back to where I grew up is like that. Thomas Wolfe wrote a novel called, “You Can’t Go Home Again,” and though I never read it, I think it’s a great title that kind of says it all for me. But though I can’t go home again, I’m going in July, and it’s going to take all my faith and all my trust in God to get me there and back again.

When I was talking to the Lord about it yesterday, He started to tell me that it was a really good thing for me to do. There are times in our lives when we have to face those giants from our past and recognize that they are only giants in our mind. But I feel like I’m walking straight into a lion’s den, and I’d rather not do it, though I know that He’ll be with me every step of the way.

There are some good things I remember from my childhood, but there were also some really tough things too. And somehow thinking about going back to that house where it all began brings back the memories that I’d rather not remember. As I write this I’m thinking that maybe that’s what the Lord wants me get past and move beyond – those memories that have lived on in my bad dreams for too many years. The past is gone, and maybe going to that house and being there with those ghosts will help me finally lay them to rest.

My mother is going to be 85, and that’s really tough too. She’s worried that I’ll be disappointed because she won’t be able to do much when I’m there because she’s not as active as she once was, but that’s not what’s going to be tough for me. I know that it’s tough for her not to feel the way she did when she was younger, but for me the toughest thing is that we’re both not younger. I wish I could go back 20 years and do it all over again, and do it much better this time. I made a mess of my life for a long part of it, and sometimes when I look back it seems like so much was wasted.

There was a time in my life when I was very young that I was so close to my mother. People who knew her when she was young see me now and say that I’m just like her. We’re very different in some ways but we are very similar in others. I’ve always understood her in a way that no one else in the family ever did. People always said I was her favorite, but I don’t know if that’s really true. We just have a way of understanding each other that goes beyond what anyone else has.

It’s strange too because I was a child that she didn’t really want. I was an accident that came along at a time when our family was really falling apart. But I know that with God there are no accidents, and at that time when everything was falling apart, He used my birth to bring things back together, at least for a time. I came into the world without knowing that He’d called me to be a peace maker, but that’s what He had me do all the time. Now that I know that’s what He wants me to do, I do it however and whenever He asks me to. If I’m doing my job the right way, no one even knows I’m doing it, which can be tough if you don’t know the Lord. Before I knew Him it used to get me really annoyed because no one ever gave me credit for bringing things together and calming people down, and sometimes I wouldn’t feel like doing it and I’d get into the mess with everybody else, but now that I know Him and I can hear His voice when I listen for it, things go much more smoothly and I can go about my Father’s business without feeling let down when no one says thank you. Of course I have to listen for His voice, though. If I don’t I can fall right back into the same old chaos that I used to live in. That’s what’s stirring up my emotions now I think. I don’t know if I’m strong enough to be in that place where I used to feel completely out of control.

As I write this I am thinking about Psalm 23, “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all of the days of my life; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

There are times in our lives when we must face our giants, the giants that have grown so large because they are only giants in our minds. They have taken on a life of their own and they threaten to hold us back from the new life that God has for us. I had thought that the giants had gone away because I had left them behind me, but they are going to stay right where they are and loom larger and larger until I go back to face them and turn them to dust. I am not looking forward to facing them, and I’d much rather not, but I know that when I do, as with everything else the Lord has brought me through, I’ll realize that they never had power over me to begin with and they never will again.

Psalm 23 is one of the most beloved of Psalms for good reason. Each line can be read in so many ways and can apply to so many of the myriad of things we go through in our lives. An artist I know once gave me a word from Psalm 23. He was telling me that it is only when we are in the presence of our enemies, when we are facing our giants, that the anointing comes. It is in that place of fear, when we recognize that God is walking with us, that we understand that the valley is only a valley of the shadow of death, not death itself. It is a place where we may feel fear, it may be a place full of dark shadows, but when we walk through it with our Good Shepherd, He shows us that only goodness and mercy are following us, and there is nothing to be afraid of because He is there with His light.

Blessings,

Jannie Susan