Having It Out With God

Alive, she was not a controversial figure, and when she died in 1997, people of all faiths, or no faith at all, mourned her passing.  But all that has changed in the past several weeks.  A new book has been published and it’s causing quite a stir. The book is entitled: Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light. A cache of her personal letters written over the last fifty years of her life makes up the book, letters that make public a crisis of faith that began in her soul in 1946 and lasted until her death fifty-one years later. 

The letters reveal that the Albanian-born, Nobel Peace Prize winner, who worked with the poorest of the poor in Calcutta, lived in permanent, perpetual silent misery and spiritual despair.  A sampling of her letters reveals just how troubled she was:

Are you startled to know that?  Are you surprised to discover that one who lived so close to the heartbeat of God, endured such a lengthy dark night of the soul, a darkness felt for the last fifty years of her life?

The debate has already started.  The professional atheists are crowing, for they see in this stark contrast between the public and private Mother Teresa a confirmation that all faiths and all religions, and notions of God are one big lie.  “See, this proves it,” they claim, “not even Mother Teresa believed in God.”  (By the way, what do you get when you cross an atheist with a Jehovah’s Witness?  Someone who knocks on your door for no apparent reason.)

I appreciate the other side of the argument as articulated by Dr. Susan Brooks, President of Chicago Theological Seminary who gave this caution:  “Religious leaders and indeed all of us need to quit pretending that faith is a cakewalk and all doubt is the enemy. Doubt isn’t the enemy of faith but its constant companion.”

Brian McLaren, a minister and thoughtful writer, offers this perceptive: “Doubt, in my experience, is like a spiritual drought that forces our roots to go deeper. Sometimes these low tides of faith are connected with events … the death of a loved one, a broken relationship, the loss of a job, a prolonged illness, questions raised by a book or professor. But sometimes they seem to come out of nowhere; it's sunny and bright outside, but inside you feel dark, cloudy, gray, empty.”

Knowing of Mother Teresa’s struggle, I don’t feel quite so alone on my own journey.  Perhaps you don’t have to feel quite so alone on yours. If this strikes a chord, you will also find a ready traveling companion in the prophet Jeremiah.

You never say such things to God, do you?  Even though Jeremiah did, and even though Mother Teresa had her long, we don’t, do we? Or maybe you do . . . You did all the right things, where did it get you?  Is it turning out like you expected? You nursed your children.  You brought them to church.  You sent them to college.  You took care of yourself.  Ate the right foods.  Never smoked a day in your life.  You paid your taxes.  You never got a speeding ticket. You know the Apostle’s Creed.  Your eye get moist when you sing “Amazing Grace.”  You toed the line.  You kept your nose clean.  You come to church instead of playing golf.  And now this weight, this load, this burden, this pain, this loss, this hellishness.

Some of us have every right to have it out with God.  Every right indeed.  Sometimes our anger can be a measure of our faith.  The Jeremiahs and Mother Teresas of this world argued with God; skeptics, on the other hand, argue with each other.  

But finally God speaks to the disgruntled, defeated prophet: “I will make you strong, as strong as a fortified wall of bronze.  Life shall not prevail or overtake you, for I am with you to save and to deliver you.” 

That’s not a promise that our lives won’t come to an end, or that we will never find ourselves on the receiving end of life’s adversities.  It is a promise from the One who searches for lost sheep and rejoices when they are found. It is a promise that “in our end is our beginning; in our time, infinity; in our doubt there is believing; in our life eternity.”

Sometimes when preachers get thirsty and their souls get dry, they turn to other preachers.  I know many in the preaching profession who often turn to Barbara Brown Taylor or Fred Craddock or a preaching professor named Tom Long.  Dr. Long wrote a book entitled Testimony.  In it he tells a remarkable story about Mary Ann Bird.  Mary Ann Bird was born with multiple birth defects: a cleft palate, disfigured face, crooked nose, lopsided feet, and deafness in one ear.  You can imagine the emotional pain.
           

When growing up she dreaded that day at school when the annual hearing test was given.  Each child was called forward, told to cover one ear, and the teacher would whisper a simple phrase: “The sky is blue,”  “You have new shoes.”  And the child was expected to repeat it. Mary Ann hated the whisper test.
           

One year her teacher was Miss Leonard, whom every child loved. The day came for the dreaded hearing test. Mary Ann Bird cupped her ear. Miss Leonard leaned forward. Mary Ann recalls: “I waited for those words which God must have put in her mouth, those seven words that changed my life. Miss Leonard did not say “the sky is blue” or “you have new shoes.” What she whispered was, “I wish you were my little girl.”