Nights were complex. Harder. Darker. Memories. Worries. Regrets. Yesterday was another day that lasted too long. He almost lost it. It was close to being completely over. A most awful realization plagued his heart and mind. He was lying. About what he wanted out of life. Well, at least it was changing. In one respect he wanted to rule a kingdom. In another respect he wanted to give it all up and pursue art and leisure. He wanted to dominate every woman that he’s ever desired. And yet he wanted to be a righteous strong man, swayed by none. 

Last night, Hank had the most terrifying vision. He was sitting at his desk, covered in files and messages and documents. His well-ordered days were chaotically spread before him. Too many words that he couldn’t control spilling out from every direction. Hank was not a control freak, but it bothered him deeply to see all of his work laid out, confounded, misunderstood, in a messy pile. In real life, most everything was lost in some invisible iCloud, searchable of course, but he didn’t have to directly confront the layers of unintelligible disorganization. Like last night.

He couldn’t remember if he had worked late again, or if it was some sort of hazy vision from the gods, or a recessed memory of his early days training back in that small cubicle back in South Carolina. But he could still hear the papers shift under his frantic fingers. He could smell the crisp manilla fresh out of the box. The stale-vacuumed taste sat on the back of his tongue, which he would rather not have tasted at all. He always hated that about the office.

Sitting there in the familiar chair that he formerly thought of as his throne, his heart beat, louder and faster. Thumping in his brain, behind his eyes and ears. He could have ignored it if the pulse was anywhere else, his leg, his neck, his arm. But it was the painful drum beat of his racing brain and his panic colliding into a single rhythm. He felt his neck tighten, jaw tension, unreleased and unrealized wonderings overtook his breathing. Caught like a fish drowning in oxygen. So much to breathe all around him, but his lungs would not access the air. Just beating and gulping and squeezing and cement.

Thats what it felt like, inhaling gravel. Dulling his senses. Brick and mortar pressing too hard inside his chest. All the while his heart beat sped up to an insane pace. The heavy dark feeling restricted the air so much that he was feeling dizzy, gasping, tingling on the edge of hysteria.

I’m going to die. Hank thought. My heart can’t keep this up. I feel like my insides are going to explode. Or I will suffocate. Which made him panic all the more.

It didn’t hurt, not really. That he couldn’t breathe. It made him feel blank. As if his life was being erased by a great creative director. Snuffing out his work, his today, his legacy, his vitality, his vision, his mental awareness. He was being scraped off into the abyss.

Everything he had poured into this life, every hopeful seed, every minute, was choking out into the nothing. It didn’t matter that he had spent his whole life working for what had been sprawled out onto his desk. And what was this? Nothing more than a mass of fire kindling. Papers memos, meaningless words. A career that held him hostage to want more, to do more, it was never going to end. He felt the flimsy dead paper between his flesh and blood fingers. Hank was feeling it. None of this would endure.

Suffocating chest pains melted into a subtle ache. In his chest. In his throat. Death didn’t scare him, if this was life. But even so, Hank wasn’t ready to die.

And this vision, or nightmare, or whatever it was, inspired a forgotten regret. That he hadn’t given himself time to explore during the busy breath filled moments of the everyday paper work. This was not where he wanted to stop everything. Giving his last minutes to perfectly typed briefs, worrying over declarative words about people he never touched, or saw, or even knew their name. How did he get here? Was this life’s work worth the immanent death he was about to die?

So, it was revealed. He was lying to himself. And maybe to everyone around him. That this was enough. That this was a fulfilling and meaningful way to tend a life. And it sunk. Down. Under his belly. Down beneath the parts that he thought he used to know. And it was revealed. That he longed for a ridiculous passion. For connection. For success. For domination, for vulnerable submission. For a garden to grow. And it was revealed. That the papers and folders and meetings and appointments, they were just putting it all off. Until tomorrow. Unsuccessfully soothing the searing pain. Staying the full surrender. Binding up his leap towards salvation.

Hank saw his death. Heart failure. Tired life. Quiet end. Would anyone even cry. Maybe his wife would. Or maybe she would be happy to be rid of him. 

Hank saw it. And it was not a question of if. It was when. How long? Would it take to die by unfulfilled monotony. How long? Would it take to play out all the righteousness of should and would and could. And was any of that even worth it? Could he change the course of good and evil for the sake of an unfulfilled desire? 

Hank saw it. He had planted and tended a garden of nothing. Immediately, he wanted to run away from it all. There was so much more to life that he was missing, that he couldn’t just give up on. Not now. The quest before him. What was meaningful? What was his ultimate purpose? What was important, really, in this life? 

Planning and putting in the long hours for the last 25 years. It turned our just as fruitful as the lost years of college, getting drunk behind the corner liquor store. Dreams of passion, work, productivity, getting ahead. Making ends meet. Being famous. Saying the truth. Creating a masterpiece. But there was nothing new. And time was always too short. 

It’s not enough to know that he did his best. It’s not helpful to hear where he did his worst. He was tending the tasks at hand as meaningful as he knew how. He had to make decisions. And they didn’t work. Good or bad, the seeds he had sewn refused and rejected to grow. His vocations withered into silence. He lived among sinners, choked out by the weeds, overwhelmed, and unable to anything to change the course of the world. Yet, he will be held accountable to repent of the consequences.

The time, energy and years he put into the growth of meaning and purpose, only yielded sour grapes. What is the point? He wanted to scream it from the rooftops, but who would listen? And should anyone listen to the unhinged whining from a beaten, unsuccessful man.

The curse that haunts mankind. Decay, destruction, unending labor, and a struggle with meaningless work. Positive thoughts and endless attempts do not relieve the angst. Dreams and high ambitions haunt and tease. The well-plotted future does not always materialize. And then, sometimes it’s bright. The path through life teeters on the edge of excitement and unfairness. Often there is no rhyme or reason to why our good intentions may just fail and die.

But when something finally crumbles, be it a person, a life, a job, a relationship, we have the chance to see our internal lack of power to bring it back, to resurrect, to make it grow again. Cursed from the Garden of Eden, the world, the creation, our efforts will eventually prove to be unfruitful. This is a piece of the curse from the very beginning of the story. Man and woman were forewarned that their hard work would yield dead thorns and thistles from their endless labor.

“Cursed is the ground because of you. By the sweat of your brow you will work for bread, and throws and thistles you shall reap.” (Genesis 3:17)

Cursed is the ground and to dust you shall return. It all is an empire of dirt. Build it, play with it for awhile, but then it will blow away. Fail. Disappoint. Important things that we will spend half of our lives cultivating, will not yield what we want.

But, in times like this, we are overwhelmed with the curses. Because when dealing with the world outside of us, it is outside of our ability to change or heal the greater reality around us. We learn we are not God, rather we are His creatures. We learn that we are subject to wind and waves, earthquakes and death. But in the face of this uncontrolled cursed reality, God wants us to pray, scream, yell, and complain about these things to him.

How Long, Oh Lord?

Our prayer of “how long” confesses the depths of faith. First of all truth, that the world and our lives are messed up, beyond repair. Second it is a cry to the only one who can save us, who could possibly fix it, a complete dependence on the Almighty. Third a lament is an expectation, it is a hope, that the world and this pain will not be the end. There is more to come. How Long? Is truthful, and expectant, and painfully trusting.

And this lament to God is a freeing prayer. When you admit that you have a salvation that is outside of your own actions, outside of your own will, outside of your own heart, it sets you free from the rules. The love of God is shown by the sacrifice of His Son, not the sacrifice of your life. Because you can’t save yourself. You can’t get rid of the terrible things in this world that threaten. You can’t destroy the terrible things in themselves that hurt and hinder. You can’t purify the hearts of our own growing and wayward children. You can’t save the world. And how could you be honest enough to rejoice in another salvation. Unless you prayed like this. That your action, love, intellect, will not make everything alright. You cannot do it. You will fail. You are not enough. That sin really hurts, death really kills, and this world isn’t getting any better. You can happily admit it all. You can in full confidence, lament.

Thorns and thistles are not the end of the story, of our story. We faithfully lament and complain, both honest to our circumstance and honest about the enduring promise of God. Caught in a cursed existence, we are at the same time caught up in Christ. His bountiful blessings of life and salvation will outlive every sin, every tear, every challenge, and death itself. All will finally be bountiful, fruitful, and productive, as it was promised. As it should be. 

– An Excerpt from “Once Upon a Curse”. Get your copy here.