Events That Shape Your Life

I'm beginning to wonder if our expectations of life aren't misguided. Wondering if our society has duped us into assuming that the easy way is the best way. Wondering if our aversion to adversity is actually our enemy. Wondering if we're missing our real destiny by denying our misery. Wondering if we've been set up for disappointment because we assume that life must be good in order to be great..."good" by our standards, that is. And just maybe God is actually after something else? And perhaps the events in your life that shape your life can actually help to reveal this truth? 

How many sixteen-year-olds have their life formed at the feet of heroes? How many can say that their future was shaped by the observation of uncommon courage in the face of the worst this world has to offer? Perhaps not many. But I can. In my most formative years, my view of life was moulded by a decade of learning from those who know what it truly means to lose freedom, to face death, to embrace wounds, and to battle soul-scars likely known only to God and yourself. 

As a teenager, I watched as a Marine Corps unit brought their best friend home with them...in a box.  Dead. Gone. Not even a coffin-box but an 8"x8" box - the remains coming home little bit by little bit as they were found. Hugs exchanged with the fallen hero's mother as loss weighed heavy on the room. I saw a little girl of no more than five rub chalk across a name etched in stone as she said her own goodbye to most likely a parent she'd never get to know. I recall seeing the scars as survivors told me they were proud of their wounds because they showed a story worth telling: that they'd defended the country's freedom. I can still hear the names being read off of selfless human beings who gave their last breath for a cause greater than themselves, thus leaving an empty chair at the family table. An empty space in many hearts. I can recall holding the Sunday paper between trembling hands as my own tear-drops stained the page, and I realized the picture in the top headline was of someone I knew who wouldn't be coming back. I can see the broken faces as the ones who made it back tried to find meaning in the midst of their own darkness - tried to find a way home when home didn't feel like any abode anymore. Conversations over coffee, on the phone, over email, and so much more showed a young me that life is precious. That real friends are few. That loyalty matters. That giving your one life away is always the best way. That the world isn't always pretty and, sometimes, love hurts. Lessons that can only be learned in the crucible of life. Lessons no classroom can teach you because they simply must be lived in order to be understood and owned.

At the time, I knew that these experiences were rare and impressionable. I tried my best to savor them. To ask questions. To create space for stories to emerge. But not until just recently have I seen just how formative and hugely influential these snapshots in time actually were. The decade I lived through the reality of war shaped who I would eventually become. And now I'm old enough to appreciate this fact. 

It may seem odd to some that I'm so thankful for experiencing the horrors of war and the worst of humanity, especially at a young age. But these are the events that shaped my life. And I realize that coming face to face with the reality of the earnestness of life was actually a good thing for me. So often, as we try to protect our young people from the hurts of life, we actually end up setting them up for disappointment as they end up assuming that life is meant to be easy, fun, and successful. We hope to keep them from the harshness of life until at least after college. Because you're only young once, right? But just maybe we're letting them down by not allowing them to experience at least a few hardships that can help them see that the world is fallen, flawed, and fatal. That people aren't as they were created to be and thus will disappoint you, fail you, and hurt you. That you'll lose in life more often than you gain. 

Studies have actually proven that the earlier a child or young person is exposed to some level of adversity in their life, the greater their resilience. So, if this is true, then why are we so afraid to let suffering grow us? To let the hard events as well as the happy ones form us into a person of strength and character? But somehow, the expectation that the good life is one in which everything works out for you, you always get what you want, everybody is always kind to you and supportive, and you never have to fail or lose anything - this expectation has prevented us from looking at life realistically. And then life itself has to teach us otherwise. 

Because isn't God's way often through the hard way?

When we look back on the events that have shaped us, I think we'll all often agree that the ones we truly can say were the most impressionable were the hard ones. The times we had to choose between faith and fear. The times we had to lose in order to gain. The times we had to fail in order to succeed. The times we had to absorb great sorrow and darkness into our lives. The times we had to come to the end of ourselves in order to discover the beginning of God. 

Somebody please shout it from the rooftops: all of this is merely set-up for the perfect world God one day will usher His children into. Life may not be always good here. But it will one day be perfectly and finally good there. 

It took a recent lunch with one of the wounded veterans I wrote to in the hospital over thirteen years ago to help me see the value of being met with the soberness of life at such a young age. Deep down, I know that I love differently and live differently because I was able to observe the courage of those whose personal destinies were altered by what they saw and did...because they made the choice to serve. After all, how can it not affect how you view life when you've spent a week with injured service members as they compete in an adaptive sports event! As you've seen smiles in the face of lost limbs, paralysis, or lost personal independence. As you've been shown the way out by those who have embraced the way through. How could I not be grateful!

Just maybe the hard way is actually the best way after all. Just maybe yesterday's misery can reveal today's ministry. Just maybe it's not so bad to discover these truths early on, either. Perhaps this can enable you to later on enter the hard places others try to avoid. Perhaps the events in your life that shape your life reveal the hand of God, thus equipping you to one day fulfill a place in this world that only you can.