The Ache and The Truth...

Tonight I fly out of Perth and make my way back to London by way of Hong Kong. It is hard to believe that I have been in Fremantle for two weeks now, two weeks in paradise – sunshine, beaches, ocean, beer, wine and great coffee.

The thing is you can’t get out of your skin; there is no escape from what you are.
Contentment for me is so damn elusive and whether or not it exists is something that I question. Brutal honesty is what I want, even when I don’t particularly like what the honesty may mean. But, how can I hope to be honest and transparent if I do not afford others the same space to be honest - to be equally honest?

I have and still do live with so many delusions, contradictions, false selves and mutated identities. And even though I am much more aware of all this and the increasing self-reverential nature of my writing I find for some reason or for no reason that I continue to have a most difficult time of allowing myself to live life. I write and talk about living life and I am quite good at doing those two things but I fail at living life often and with ease. Are you still a hypocrite if you acknowledge your hypocrisy?

Nothing takes away what I have called the ache. The ache is whatever it is that haunts or breaks or fills you with guilt or shame, the demons of one’s life, everyone has an ache. The ache is common to all but the type of ache is specific to each.

The progressive realization that the ache increases and decrease from time to time and now and then but does not ever completely dissipate completely away – at least not in this life is part of the answer to life. The ache does not leave and those that say it has have been deceived or have deceived themselves either because of an oversimplification of life or delusion. Also, fear of doing the hard work of doing what the oracle at Delphi admonished, “To know thyself” or to live the examined life that Plato spoke about as, “The unexamined life” not being worth living, or Jesus who claimed, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

It is a bit frustrating to hear so many (well intentioned, I am sure) people say, “the Lord will do this or Lord will do that” or “Jesus will do this or that.” It is not that I do not believe that Jesus is perfectly capable of doing “this or that” but unfortunately I do not believe he is about being some sort of divine, metaphysical magician. Jesus is with us, in the midst of life, with each of us, with each of our aches.

He doesn’t remove the ache. He bears it with us and we come to trust and intimately know him by his presence within the ache. The grace of Christ then does become sufficient regardless of anything. The Apostle Paul asked three times for his ache to be taken and the answer he received was “no.”

Do we really believe that life would be all that different for any of us?
So, contentment as elusive as it is, it is not dependant of the elimination of the ache but acceptance of the truth that the ache is common to all and Jesus incarnates within our lives, within our aches.

In knowing this, there can be fleeting contentment and moments of joy. And, relationships and community with honesty and transparency as there hallmarks can bear “one another’s burdens” or aches as the more we love and share with each other the more we help and come more fully to know that indeed we are not alone with whatever our ache may be.