the gift of hard things by mark yaconelli - excerpt

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THE

G I F T O F

H A R D T H I N G S

F I N D I N G G R A C E I N

U N E X P E C T E D

P L A C E S

M A R K Y A C O N E L L I

Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions



InterVarsity Press P.O. Box , Downers Grove, IL -

[email protected]

© by Mark Monroe Yaconelli

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from InterVarsity Press.

InterVarsity Press ® is the book-publishing division of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA ® , amovement of students and faculty active on campus at hundreds of universities, colleges and schoolsof nursing in the United States of America, and a member movement of the International Fellowshipof Evangelical Students. For information about local and regional activities, visit intervarsity.org.

Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are from the New Revised Standard Version of the

Bible, copyright by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of theChurches of Christ in the USA. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Chapter , “Prayer Service Disaster, ” rst appeared as “Te Gift of Spiritual Poverty,” PremierYouthwork , September .

Sections of chapter , “Idiots,” rst appeared in “Lessons from a Holy Man, ”Premier Youthwork , July .

Chapter , “Initiation,” rst appeared in “Initiation,” Immerse Journal , November-December .

Sections of chapter , “Te Ungrieved Grief, ” rst appeared as “Te Ministry of Grief,” PremierYouthwork , November .

Sections of chapter , “Te Dark Night, ” rst appeared in “Ministry Trough the Dark Night,”Premier Christianity , June .

While any stories in this book are true, some names and identifying information may have beenchanged to protect the privacy of individuals.

Cover design: faceoutstudio Interior design: Beth McGill Images: faceoutstudio

ISBN - - - - (print) ISBN - - - - (digital)

Printed in the United States of America ♾

As a member of the Green Press Initiative, InterVarsity Press is committed to protecting the environment and to the responsible use of natural resources. o learnmore, visit greenpressinitiative.org.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Yaconelli, Mark, author.

itle: Te gift of hard things : nding grace in unexpected places / MarkYaconelli.

Description: Downers Grove, IL : InterVarsity Press, [ ] | Includesbibliographical references.

Identiers: LCCN (print) | LCCN (ebook) | ISBN (pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN (digital) | ISBN (eBook)

Subjects: LCSH: Grace (Teology)

Classication: LCC B . .Y (print) | LCC B . (ebook) | DDC. —dc LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/

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Introduction: Te Alchemy of Grace . . . . . . . . .

Maddalena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Burnout

Prayer Service Disaster . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

he Gift of Disappointment Idiots . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

he Gift of Difficult People

Graduation Day . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Brokenness

Women in Black . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Anger

Initiation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Powerlessness

Te Ungrieved Grief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Loss

Te Accident . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Suffering

Te Dark Night . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Darkness

Butteries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he Gift of Death

Epilogue: Te Art of Living . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .




Introduction

T A G

I love the thing that I mostwish had not happened.

S C

O A I sat in the backyard of a nineteenth-century farm house with my friend Eric watching our twoten-year-old daughters run and play across a green meadowdotted with wildowers. Enjoying the smell of apple

blossoms, the late afternoon light and cold iced tea, webecame engaged in conversation and lost track of ourdaughters. Tirty minutes went by until Eric’s wife calledfrom the house, “Where are the girls?”

Chagrined, we stood suddenly and scanned the eld. oour surprise we spotted the girls atop two horses, riding

along the far perimeter of the meadow. Eric did not ownhorses. Our daughters had no equine experience. Quickly,and without a word to Eric’s wife, we ran across the eldwhere we spotted a woman in Wranglers and a straw cowboy




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hat standing in the shadow of an oak grove, shouting in-

structions to our daughters.Her name was Jane and she worked a ranch up in theGreen Springs Mountain area above our valley. She hadrights to bring her horses down to the hundred-acremeadow for fresh grass, water and “to stimulate their mindsand hearts.” Jane called herself a “horse shrink”—a therapistfor horses. She took in abandoned and abused animals,brought them back to their natural selves and then soldthem to caring owners. We stood in the shade of the blackoaks as Jane told us about her work. “Sometimes I get horseswho have spent their whole lives cooped up in a barn. Sincebirth they have lived in darkness, eating from an oat bucket,drinking from a trough. Tey’ve never seen the world, neverhad fresh water from a creek or eaten grass in a eld or hadspace to run in the open. When I’m given one of thesehorses I bring it down here to this meadow for a week or so.I set up a camping trailer and just let it go free.”

“What happens?” I asked.“Well, the rst day and night it stays next to my trailer

whining for oats and water. Here it has over a hundredacres of green grass, and it stares at me like it’s starving,begging for food.”

“Do you feed it?”“No. I walk it to the creek or take it out to the middle of

the meadow, and still it whines and begs. Sometimes it

stands in the creek, with water running over its hooves,crying with thirst! It is so routinized to buckets and troughsthat it doesn't recognize anything, even when its nosesmells water.




he Alchemy of Grace

“And then, out of sheer desperation, the horse will bow

its head and brush its lips along the creek and stick out itstongue, and then suddenly drink and toss its head andwhinny with happiness. And a day later, because it’s half-starved, it will reach down into the meadow and tear up aclump of grass and eat. Ten, all of a sudden, it knows. I am surrounded by food! ”

Jane laughed.“What happens when the realization hits?” I wondered.“It runs. Te horse will take off and gallop and kick and

run. Tat’s the moment I love most. Tat’s why I do thiswork. o see that moment when a creature realizes it’s freewithin a big beautiful world. Tat’s pure joy.”

Standing at the edge of the meadow I felt I was hearinga parable for my own life. Te horse’s experience was all toofamiliar: Te safe, restricted, unending life of routine andpredictability. Te unexpected (and unwanted) disruptionand accompanying fear. Te overwhelming despair andgrief at the loss of the familiar. Te xating on the past. Tedistress that blinds one to surrounding possibilities. Teshock of joy when you realize that beneath the sufferinglies verdant elds of life and freedom.

Watching my daughter atop that black horse stridingcalmly through the green grass, I had a deep awarenessthat one of the invitations in this life is to hold confusion,frustration and suffering as possibility. If only I could

loosen my own expectations (of self, others, God) and em-brace moments of disappointment and doubt, I might dis-cover a eld of green. It’s not that we ought to look forsuffering, but if it should nd us there is a truth that life’s




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hardships, if we’re able to accept them, often contain un-

expected gifts.Of course, this is a recurring insight that I struggle toembrace. As a white, middle-class Westerner, I have beentaught that the pursuit and realization of my individual de-sires and appetites are my birthright. I have been taughtthat with discipline, planning and hard work, life willconform to my expectations. Our society doesn’t toleratethe idea that we (individually and collectively) lack control.Even in our spiritual lives we hold up teachers, books andspiritual practices that promise happiness, peace andhealth. And yet is there anything more destructive thanhuman beings who believe they have life under control?Under this illusion we assume our every fortune is earnedand every suffering deserved. How isolating.

We need to cultivate an ongoing awareness that we aresmall, sensitive creatures with short lifespans in a worldthat is often chaotic, capricious, mysterious, terrible andwonderful all at the same time. Failure, disappointment,loss and other difficult experiences call us to accept ourhumanity, feel grateful for what has been given, receive thecare of others and seek guidance from the Holy Spirit.

o help us along, Christianity (with its stories, teachings,prayers and rituals) offers a kind of alchemy, a process bywhich the despairing heart, the anxious mind, the downcastspirit might be brought into the loving Presence and trans-

formed. In this new place we nd ourselves slowly madeinto the loving and creative people we have longed to be.

From Jesus’ perspective our sufferings provide an op-portunity for awareness, insight and enlightenment. In the




he Alchemy of Grace

Beatitudes we hear Jesus claim that our disrupted plans,

our broken faith, our poverty and sufferings, our grief andunmet longings can be held as gifts that make us morecompassionate toward others and more open and availableto God’s love.

Looking back on nearly ve decades of life, it is stillsometimes difficult for me to admit that my struggles, dis-appointments, doubts and failures in life and ministry haveopened me to the very love, acceptance and peace that allmy controlling behaviors sought to attain. Ultimately, gracecan never be earned. Like all gifts it can only be received,requiring that I simply open my hands and trust. Te moreI accept difficulty as a natural part of the spiritual life, themore I nd myself available to the deep gifts of the Spirit—compassion, trust, gratitude, humility, wonder, joy.

Te question is how? How do we move toward trustwhen things fall apart? How do we receive the gifts of theSpirit when love fails us? How do we keep from sinkinginto despair, cynicism and apathy when injustice persists?What do we do when our faith dissipates, our friends turnto enemies, our self-worth transgures into self-hatred?What do we do when we nd ourselves enmeshed in shame,grief and judgment? How do we nd God’s comfort andpeace when our bodies churn with frustration and anxiety?

It’s interesting that Jesus had no system for helping movepeople from despair to hope, from fear to trust. Jesus used

a number of tactics—he told stories, he confronted, he ledpeople into nature, he put his ngers in ears and smearedmud in eyes, he stayed silent, he asked questions, he chal-lenged preconceptions. In all that he did he sought to shift




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perspective. His words and actions disoriented those

around him, inviting listeners to step away from their fear-fulness and suffering (sometimes just for a moment), re-member their humanity, and become aware of God’s eldof grace.

Jesus moves us to behold with compassion our suffering,the suffering of others and the suffering of the world. o dothis a change of perception is required. We need some dis-tance, some space, some practice to help us step out from ourhurt and see ourselves and others through the eyes of love.

A woman is caught in adultery. She is humiliated, lledwith shame. Te men around her are burning with self-righteousness—and most likely, for some, fear that shemight expose them as coadulterers. What does Jesus do?

He writes in the sand.Such a strange act, so out of sync with the typical violent,

shaming tension between victim and accusers. Jesus writesin the sand, and this creative act disorients. It draws peo-ple’s attention away from the hurt and anger and onto thisunusual teacher. When they are knocked off balance, Jesusis able to speak a word of recognition that diffuses the hos-tility, empowers the shamed woman and humbles thecrowd, allowing everyone to become more available toGod’s grace. Trough a change in perspective the wholeunfortunate incident moves from tragedy to blessing.

We all need holding spaces where our perspective can

deepen—a friend, a community, a prayer, a chapel, a story,a forest or a book to hold us until the rage calms, untilthe despair is comforted, until the voice of self-hatredquiets. Tis is what the Christian faith offers. It provides us




he Alchemy of Grace

with stories, rituals, people, imagination, sacred places and

practices that move us out of conning barns with dustyoats and tepid water so we might hear and see the widerlandscape of our being and receive the love of God.

We fall in holes. Plans fall apart. Dreams die. Faith disap-pears. Suffering is real. We need help to recalibrate ourlives back to our compassionate, God-trusting selves.Often we need safe, creative space and trusted companionsin order to move through hard and disorienting experi-ences. My hope is that the chapters in this book mightprovide that same creative companionship. Like life itself,this book does not present a formula for transforming dif-culty into spiritual freedom (only God can bring aboutthat mysterious conversion). What I am offering is aholding space: stories, personal experiences, honest reec-tions and, at the end of each chapter, practices that mighthelp you move out of the hurt and disappointment for amoment and remember your deeper capacities for love andgenerosity. Tese same stories and practices have helpedme to receive my own failings and sufferings as spiritualgifts. My ultimate hope is that you might be stirred to trust

your own story as revelation, that you might begin to widen your perspective and discover that within your ownstruggles there awaits a (sometimes difficult and hard-won) blessing.

One caveat. Tere are some injustices and some losses in

this life that simply feel too difficult to bear. Although thereare chapters that explore grief and other deep sufferings,for the most part the chapters in this book deal with theoften neglected “middle sufferings” of life—burnout,




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shame, vocational failure—the frustration, self-doubt and

emptiness that can slowly corrupt our ability to access ourdeeper spiritual capacities. Tis book does not explore ex-periences in which life is not only disrupted but irrepa-rably shattered. I do not want to suggest that all experi-ences can be easily held or healed, some experiences inthis life can’t—without time, wise and loving companions,and God’s grace. My hope in those cases is that we mightnd a way to trust our own need for distance and safetywith self-compassion, knowing that God holds thedarkness we have lived through with deep sorrow andgentleness, regardless of whether we ourselves can do thesame.

I often travel for work. When I return home, whetherI’ve been away for one day or seven, whether it is late atnight or early in the afternoon, whether I am confused andtired or joyful and energized, my daughter will comerunning. She will hear me walk across the front porch andimmediately sprint for the door. As soon as she gets withinfour feet of me, without slowing, she will jump. She willopen her arms wide and she will jump, fully trusting that Iwill catch her and embrace her. She does this spontane-ously. I don’t need to get my affairs in order. I don’t need tomake myself presentable. No devotional practice is neededto earn her affection. All that is required is that I comehome. Disheartened or jubilant, successful or lost, whatever

my state, I come home. I open the door and receive the onewho loves me. And little by little my daughter’s embracebrings me back to my senses, reminds me of what matters,of who matters. And when I remember, when I come home




he Alchemy of Grace

to myself, come home to God, suddenly kindness, gener-

osity, patience and all the fruits of the Spirit becomeavailable to me.And I can begin again.




M

The Gift of Burnout

Someone's boring me. I think it's me.D T

I . B . My activities both at work andhome had become routine, predictable. My thought pat-terns looped and looped over the same tired ideas. I hadbeen overworking, overcaring, overserving until one

morning I woke up hollowed out, numb—empty of allfeeling, desire, imagination. I found myself spending moreand more time eating ice cream in front of the televisionor drinking beer on the back deck. I was tired of myself.My speaking and teaching was at. Life had lost its mystery.God had become a chore.

“What do you need?” my wife asked me one night.“Not to be asked questions,” I told her.For ten years I was driven. Driven to prove my worth to

God and myself. Driven to attract my father’s attention.




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Driven to heal my childhood wounds. Driven by an am-

bition that often burns within young adults.I wanted to accomplish something, to succeed. I workedhard to design and manage a new approach to spiritualformation with youth and families at our church. I de-

veloped a national research project grounded in contem-plative prayer. I began coteaching spiritual formationclasses at San Francisco Teological Seminary. And byworking eighty to ninety hours a week, eventually I foundthe success I was seeking. I won grants, was featured in theWall Street Journal , watched my face on ABC News, lis-tened to my voice on national radio programs and read mywords in various magazines. I was offered book contractsand speaking invitations, secured a job at the seminary, re-ceived respect and admiration from my peers as a ministerand spiritual teacher. And yet inside myself I was uncaring,uninterested and lethargic. What was particularly ironicwas that most of my activities involved teaching otherssabbath practices of rest, silence, solitude and retreat. I wasteaching and writing about what I yearned for most.

During this time my poet friend Kirk called me. We grewup together and had maintained our friendship despiteliving on opposite coasts. “I talked to your wife. She says

you seem distant. What’s going on?”“I don’t know. I guess I’m just tired.”“You sound depressed. Listen, take some time off work.

I’m coming out.” wo weeks later Kirk was on a planeheaded west.

Te night he arrived we took out maps and read guide-books about the California coast. As we talked, it wasn’t




Maddalena

long before he noticed I was uninterested. “I actually don’t

care what we do.”Kirk looked at me a moment and then shrugged hisshoulders, “All right, no plan. omorrow we drive.” Tenext morning we loaded the car. “Let’s head north, backtoward the Siskiyous,” Kirk said, referring to the mountainswhere we grew up. I had no opinion.

I drove as Kirk took out a CD. “Listen to this,” he in-structed. He put in the Basement apes , Bob Dylan andthe Band working with classic American folk tunes. Herolled down the windows and turned up the music. “Listento this stuff—murderers, lovers, hobos, moonshiners—they’re singing about the other America. Te one we don’ttalk about.”

I listened as we drove past the dry farm elds of theCentral Valley. Te day was heating up. “We need beer andtacos.” Kirk directed me to a stand he knew just outside ofthe University of California Davis, his alma mater. Terewere coyotes painted on the windows, and a long line ofstudents, homeless men and suburban moms. “Go getsome of that salsa,” he told me. “Te orange stuff.” I did asI was told, found a table and sat down. Kirk returned withgrilled shrimp, carnitas and a plate of corn tortillas. “I’mgoing to get beer. You want one?”

“I’m driving.”“So what? We’ll wait it out. Tis is medicine.”

Kirk returned and stuffed sliced limes down the goldenbottlenecks. “ ry the habaneras. Tey’re hot as hell. Youknow that peppers release endorphins in your brain? It’sthe same thing as runner’s high. Here, get some more of




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this on your shrimp, but don’t touch it or you’ll burn your

ngers.” He smiled and drank half his beer in one lift. I ateand drank mechanically, my mind empty, my mouthburning. We went out and dozed beside a patio table, ourfaces toward the sun. After some time, we headed northinto the mountains.

Kirk lowered the window to breathe the air ripe withpine sap, forest loam and lake water. “Listen to this music!”Te vocals muffled, the microphone far from Dylan’s mouth,the drums heavy and slow. “You hear that tempo?” Kirk

yelled to the trees, the passing cars. “It goes right to thehips. Tat’s hip tempo, brother. Hip tempo!”

We saw signs to the rinity Wilderness. “ urn here.”Kirk pointed. We left the interstate and followed thehighway along the Salmon River. Te mountains weresteep and soon the sun was buried by the trees, leaving thesky propane blue. We wound along the river until a yellowlight bulb appeared, screwed to a wooden sign that read“Carl’s Fishing Cabins.” We woke the manager and paid forone night.

“Any place we can get some food?” I asked.“Nope,” the manager said, half-turned toward bed. “I can

sell you a bag of pretzels.”We paid two bucks for the pretzels, and Kirk found an

orange in his backpack and quartered it. We set kitchenchairs in a clearing behind the cabins and looked up at the

black, moonless sky.“I’m going to read something to you. Wait here.” Kirk

went indoors and came out with a nightstand. He thenrummaged inside the kitchen and returned with a handful




Maddalena

of candles, which he placed in some coffee cups and juice

glasses. He lit the tilting candles, pulled a chair into theirglow and opened a book. “Tis is Whitman. Now listen.Just feel the grief in these words.”

We had no food for dinner, no plan for the next day, notelevision, no cell phone connection—no distraction what-soever. So I sat outside and watched the stars spin and lis-

tened to Whitman mourn in “When Lilacs Last in theDooryard Bloom’d”:

Sing on, sing on you gray-brown bird,Sing from the swamps, the recesses, pour your chant

from the bushes,Limitless out of the dusk, out of the cedars and pines.

Sing on dearest brother, warble your reedy song,Loud human song, with the voice of uttermost woe.

O liquid and free and tender!O wild and loose to my soul—O wondrous singer!

I listened to Whitman’s song, felt his grief rhythms,breathed in the forest air and quietly fell asleep.

Te next morning we discovered the manager rented in-atable kayaks. We put on shorts and sunscreen, found twosmashed peanut butter granola bars in the trunk forbreakfast, lled water bottles, rented boats, life jackets andpaddles, and had the manager shuttle us upriver.

Te day was bright and the river refreshingly cool. Forthe morning hours we stayed quiet, each of us navigatingthe rapids beneath the August sun. But toward the earlyafternoon the river skirt spread wide and heavy, and even-




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tually we found our kayaks gently spinning in an eddy

shaded by willow trees. Our skin turning red, our bodiestired from paddling, our stomachs empty, we each lay backin our kayaks and fell asleep. It was half an hour, maybelonger, before we awoke and paddled the nal half mile tothe shing cabins. We pulled our kayaks up the riverbank,returned them to the manager and headed out on thehighway mad with hunger.

As we drove I remembered a restaurant where my sisterhad once worked. It was run by an Italian woman, Maddalena,from the island of Sardinia. Te story was that Maddalenahad been a celebrated ve-star chef in San Francisco—butafter marrying a wealthy stockbroker and weekend sh-erman, she’d moved to the beautiful, tiny mountain town ofDunsmuir, located along the headwaters of the SacramentoRiver. Maddalena had refurbished the local train depot andturned it into a restaurant. From September through May sheserved dinner two nights a week, Friday and Saturday.

“Tat’s where we’re going,” Kirk announced. Once we gotin cell phone range I called information, and they put methrough to Maddalena’s.

“We have one table at : p.m.”“We’ll take it,” I told them.We drove north through the winding Siskiyous and came

into Dunsmuir around : p.m. We booked a room at theSuper Motel, found the small depot and waited outside. Te

building was freshly painted yellow marigold with darkcrimson trim. Alongside the building was a large herb gardenthat smelled of oregano and rosemary. We waited, famishedand dehydrated. Finally, our hour came and we took our seats.




Maddalena

Maddalena cooked in the middle of the room, in an open

kitchen surrounded by a wooden countertop that came to just below her shoulders. She wore a white summer dresswith a white apron, her black hair pulled back with a brightred bandana. She was in her midfties, startlingly beautiful,like a middle-aged Sophia Loren—dark hair, eyes large anderce, skin browned by the sun. She worked condentlyamong the fry pans and steaming pots, barking quickorders to her sous-chef. She plated the food, then slammedher hand on the counter—causing the wait staff to leavetheir tasks to deliver the food fresh from the re.

We were the last to be seated, and as we perused themenu the restaurant began to empty out. Te sight andsmell of food made me delirious, and I found myselfbreaking out in lust as I read descriptions of sliced heirloomtomatoes, roasted artichoke, grilled salmon and pan-searedsea bass. We made our selections, ordered a bottle ofChianti and waited. Te appetizers arrived rst. wo tenderhalf-moons of avocado lled with tiny squares of mozza-rella, fresh basil leaves, cherry tomatoes, all dressed in abalsamic vinaigrette. Exquisite. Soft and rich, the foodmelted in our mouths. I looked at Kirk and watched hiseyes ll with tears.

Te waiter brought warm slices of Pugliese bread and littleplates of Sicilian olives surrounded by olive oil and sea salt.We dipped the warm, crusted bread, ate the dark olives, drank

our Chianti and began to laugh with a childlike pleasure atthe taste of good food, the pleasure of hunger answered.

Te salads arrived, crisp leaves of endive covered inribbons of parmesan cheese. Ten plates of fresh green




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beans, bright and sweet, pan-red with toasted walnuts.

Slowly, sacramentally, we ate the green beans—both of usnow silent, reverent. Te smoky walnuts, the sweet greenstems—it was like eating summer itself.

Ten came the main course: grilled halibut covered intoasted fennel seeds, rib-eye steak seared in peppercorns,a side dish of buttered crookneck squash and zucchini. Iremember my rst taste of the sh Maddalena had pre-pared. It was like eating love. Trough tears I said to myfriend, “Tis is communion.”

Te restaurant almost empty, Kirk and I, emboldened bythe wine, began to cry out, “Maddalena, we worship you!”“Maddalena, you are breaking our hearts!” “Maddalena, youmust come home with us!” We motherless men ate anddrank and called to Maddalena, our host, our lover, ourmother, the divine feminine incarnate. But Maddalena, notunaware of her powers and the effect they had on men,ignored our cries of praise. She didn’t acknowledge us, northe three or four men who lingered at her counter. Insteadshe stayed busy at her art, her large eyes attentive to herhandiwork, her red lips even, without expression.

We ate and laughed and cried and shared our plates untilKirk pushed himself back from the table and looked at me.I returned his smile, my senses awake, my heart alive, myhead full of wonder. Kirk looked at me, smiled, then calledout into the half-empty room, “More wine! More wine! My

friend is himself again. My friend has returned!”I laughed, suddenly hearing the truth in his words. I

had been lost, disconnected, trapped someplace withinmyself, outside of myself. Overworking, overthinking,




Maddalena

overstressing, I had become stuck. But the movement of

the river, the sun warm on my skin, the fasting from food,the smell of the woods, the throbbing music, the poetryof grief, the woman with ancient beauty, the culinary de-lights and the care of a good friend had brought me hometo myself.

Without thought, I stood upon my chair and called toMaddalena. “Maddalena, you have healed me!” I raised myglass to her, and she gave me a small smile and motionedfor me to sit down.

Te waiter returned with our check. We were now theonly patrons left in the room. “But we’re still hungry,” Iprotested. “We’ve traveled far, the night is young. We’re notready to leave.”

“I’m sorry,” he replied, “but the kitchen is closed.”“Tat’s not possible,” I protested.“Don’t you see,” Kirk interrupted, “that we are two pilgrim

souls? We alone can appreciate her gifts.”Te young waiter looked confused and embarrassed.

“Let me talk to her.” We clinked our glasses and waited infull condence that she could not turn away such devotion.

Te waiter returned, “She wants to know what you wantfrom her.”

“What we want?” I shouted, my heart now burningwithin. “We want her to feed us. We want everything! Allof it! Until we are satised.” I stood and looked past the

waiter; I looked at Maddalena standing at the center of theroom. “We want everything, the whole meal, repeated. Teappetizers, the bread, the salads, the vegetables, the maincourses, everything, everything, everything, all over again.”




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At this my friend rose immediately to his feet. “Yes, yes!

Exactly! Whatever the price! All of it!” We stood andwatched and waited while Maddalena studied us withoutexpression. It was nearing eleven at night, the front doorwas locked, the tables had been cleared and set for the nextday. We waited with hope, with full hearts, with my desiresreturned and intact, we waited.

Ten slowly, her face broke open. She looked at us, sawinto our hearts, smiled and said, “Sit down.”“Hurray!” we shouted, like boys on a playground. We sat.

Our table was wiped clean. Fresh napkins and silverwarewere placed in front of us. A new candle was lit and broughtto our table, new glasses and a fresh bottle of wine set

before us. We sat and we ate—slowly, gratefully, until longafter midnight. We ate and laughed and cried at the avorsand talked of love, broken dreams and sorrows. We ate,and Kirk quoted poetry to Maddalena. We drank and sangsongs to Maddalena. And later, as she ushered us out thefront door, she kissed our cheeks goodnight. We walked

across the street, collapsed in our room, and slept the deepsleep of full-hearted men.

Returning to Your Senses

Reection• “I had been lost, disconnected, trapped someplace within

myself, outside of myself. Overworking, overthinking,Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions



Maddalena

overstressing, I had become stuck. But the movement of

the river, the sun warm on my skin, the fasting fromfood, the smell of the woods, the throbbing music, thepoetry of grief, the woman with ancient beauty, the cu-linary delights and the care of a good friend had broughtme home to myself.” Tink of a time of disconnection—a time when you felt estranged from your own passionsand desires, a time when you felt distant from others.What was taking place in your life at that time? Whatallowed you to reconnect?

• In Writer’s Workshop in a Book contributor Janet Finchdeclares that we in affluent societies have become griev-ously “de-natured,” living lives in which the ve senses

have been displaced. Finch writes,We know something is missing. And yet we atterourselves to believe that we are the advantagedsouls, compared to those who walk in the out-of-doors, who cook over the smoke of a wood re,who make their own music, who dig in the dirt,

who lift and carry, who sweat in the heat of the sun,and who in the cold wrap themselves in quilts andskins. People who grow or kill their own food orshop for it in bazaars full of completely unlteredsounds and smells and sights. We consider themdisadvantaged and ourselves rich. Yet who, in this

most fundamental way, is starving? I was twenty years old before I saw the moonrise for myself.

When was the last time you felt fully (as you were as achild) awake to your senses? What are you like, what is life




G H

like, when you’re aware of the sights, sounds, touch and

smell of the world around you? Action

• Christians have often needed sacred places and timesto retreat from work and indulge their senses. EvenJesus regularly withdrew to mountains, the sea andother deserted places in order to be in the midst of

crea tion, in the presence of beauty. Give yourself per-mission to go someplace beautiful and let yourself praythrough your senses. Sit somewhere outside and focuson the smell of the trees, the grass, the earth. Find aplace in the sun or sit before a real re or pour yourselfa hot bath and feel the warmth on your skin. Allow the

sunlight, relight or warm water to be a symbol of love.Spend an afternoon cooking a particularly deliciousmeal and experience the preparation and eating as agift from God. Without words or reections, allow yourself to be loved. Notice what you are like when youallow yourself to enjoy your senses.

• My burnout was a cry for help. Tink of a recent timewhen you felt apathetic, depressed, disconnected? Howwas this a cry for help? If you could be a friend to yourdisconnected self, what would you do, what might yousay? What activity might you prescribe for yourself? Writea letter to your disconnected self as if that person were a

distant friend who needed a word of comfort. Set theletter aside and then, after some time, read it to yourself.




http://www.christianbook.com/hard-things-finding-grace-unexpected-places/mark-yaconelli/9780830846085/pd/846085?product_redirect=1&Ntt=846085&item_code=&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP

https://www.amazon.com/Gift-Hard-Things-Finding-Unexpected/dp/0830846085/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1464807845&sr=1-1&keywords=the+gift+of+hard+things

http://www.ivpress.com/cgi-ivpress/book.pl/code=4608

the gift of hard things by mark yaconelli - excerpt

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