The first three months of 2018 were dark for me. For the last several years, I’ve lived with my brother Sam. Before that, I’d always had some kind of living situation with other people. Now, I was returning after making my home on the road touring for the last four months; I was saying hello to the familiar little things around the house. But this time something was different; I was the only one in the house. 

For the first time in well over a decade, I was living alone. Not by design; in fact, I hadn’t really realized it would be the case till I stepped through the door that night. My brother had taken a new job as a group home parent at a ministry for mentally challenged adults, and though he technically still lived here, he was never home. But I hadn’t accounted for his absence, and it descended upon me palpably, suddenly. 

That season, I sank into a depression brought on by that unexpected isolation, the dreariness of Winter, what I came to understand as a natural post-tour crash, and a sense of aimlessness and fear. I started counting the days between seeing another live human. Two. Three days. Sometimes I’d go Sunday morning to Sunday morning without being physically in the presence of another living soul. It was incredibly lonely and I felt powerless to change it. Not to mention that one of the strange qualities of loneliness is that when you’re in it, what you know you need becomes the last thing you feel able to want or reach for.  

It’s not good for a human to be alone, Scripture reminds us. That’s not just about marriage; it’s a fundamental statement about how isolation withers a human soul. The image of God is Trinitarian, which means I can only locate myself within reality by means of relationship with others. That’s true even for the members of the Trinity; the Son’s identity is as one in relationship with the Father, and so on. But I was alone, and I didn’t know how to get out of it.  

Because I had become so isolated, my ability to locate myself in reality had begun to dissolve. I felt badly disoriented. I started thinking sadder and sadder things, and I couldn’t get out of that abysmal circuit of self-referential fear. And that scared me enough to force me out of the comfort of isolation, because, let’s be honest, it’s strangely comfortable to pretend we can do this all by ourselves. How embarrassing to have to ask for help. Shouldn’t I be able to do this? All the lies come flooding in that keep us from connecting. 

Finally, I reached out to a few friends and began asking for help. And it really did help, hard as it was to do. I knew I had friends who loved me, but they didn’t know where I was or what was really going on, so how could they help? What a gift they were once I finally reached out. They showed up. They pulled back the drapes and I remembered sunlight. Their faces and voices penetrated the dark, sad imaginings of my lonely mind so the lies began to grow pale in the light of their love.  

That was almost two years ago, and it was just the beginning of a lesson I’m still trying to learn. Our needs are a gift. Our limitations are a precious resource, because they drive us outward into relationship. If I could do everything myself, I would. Why? Because it would ostensibly eliminate the messiness of risk and the pain of failure. As soon as I involve other people in my life, it gets more complicated. Isolation is safe; isolation is deadly.

There are at least three occasions on which limitations and needs draw us out into the gift of loving connection. 

1. For starters we may not know how to do something, so we ask for help. 

I sheepishly asked the Inklings scholar Dr. Diana Glyer how to pronounce the name of the poem Tolkien wrote to Lewis, Mythopoeia. She told me, and I admitted I had felt ashamed to have to ask. She looked me in the eyes and said, “Never ever be ashamed of not knowing something. Always, always ask.” 

2. Secondly, you may discover you are firmly incapable of doing something.

I marvel at my friend Kevan Chandler who has spinal muscular atrophy and requires a wheelchair and 24/7 assistance. Kevan is a brilliant and prolific author and world traveler. Through his non-profit “We Carry Kevan” he’s created a line of backpacks that allow wheelchair-bound folks to be carried on the backs of their friends for previously unimaginable mobility.  

The thing about Kevan is that he has no qualms about involving other people in his life. He freely asks for help, and doesn’t seem daunted by the messiness that connection brings with it. Kevan knows just about everybody in his town, and they all know him. He has a wonderful gift for seeing people and making them feel seen and loved. His gifts have blossomed directly from his needs. Often our abilities, paradoxically, emanate from our disabilities. 

3. Lastly, there may be times when we do know how to do something and we are, in fact, capable of doing it ourselves, yet we choose to create a space for someone else to get involved in our life.

This seems to me, is what Jesus does. It’s hard to explain except in terms of love. Practically, the first two examples make sense: I ask for help because I need it. But what about learning to ask for help, just because we love sharing our lives with others? 

Jesus doesn’t need us. He has the know-how and the capability to get his work done without us. In fact, he could avoid a lot of hassle if he left us out of the equation. But God’s arithmetic doesn’t add up in terms of expediency; God’s way of life is love, which is bound to appear beautifully foolish. Jesus asks for help, because he knows life isn’t about doing things precisely perfect, it’s about living and working together. There’s a phrase that pops up again and again in the New Testament: “make my joy complete”. It seems that God’s joy isn’t quite complete until his children are in on it.  

The Lord intentionally leaves gaps for us to fill. When he sends out the 72 he doesn’t babysit them. He entrusts the work to them and let’s them truly respond as real collaborators. The primary language for the way God relates to us in the New Testament is familial. It makes sense to call us the Bride, co-heirs with Christ, children, and so on, since we are real participating family members. 

What the Lord began to teach me those lonely Winter months a couple of years ago, I’m still working to learn. I’m still learning how to see my needs and limitations as precious resources, as real gifts from God. My inadequacies can move me into relationship and teach me to love and be loved. My inabilities can create opportunities for creative collaboration. Choosing, like Christ, to be vulnerable, even weak, creates a surprising invitation to make room for others to be with us and for us to be with them. 

Special thanks to Susan Mulder for sharing her poem “What if?” with us this week. Follow the links below to find all of Susan’s stuff online, including the text of her poem as published over at The Cultivating Project. 

www.susanmulder.com

Instagram: @thatsmesusanmulder

Podcast: Poet Kind Podcast

“What if?” at The Cultivating Project