By Kat Silverglate Copyright 2023

Sometimes the truth comes at us in 3D. Whatever it is we need in a particular season; it just seems to come from every angle – in song lyrics, through strangers, scripture, stories, memories, billboards, random comments. It is as if God is palpably going ahead of us to make sure we don’t miss His fingerprints on our one ridiculous life. His relational push into our malaise, grief, questions, fear, anxiety, depression, even our joy makes us seize and note. Sometimes it seems as if the Lord is intent on simply letting us know that He knows. Knows what’s hidden in our hearts. Knows what’s happening in our macro world. Knows the dark night of our soul. Knows what we can’t articulate - yet. Fully knows us. The winter of 2019 was one of those sometimes for me. 

“Do you know why it’s so hard to lose a parent Kat?”

She was my mother’s hospice nurse. Gwen Hussie. A north Philly girl who’d seen more loss than most of us could possibly fathom. She was Mom’s private nurse, but really, she was ours as well. Mine for sure. She tended to my emotional wounds as if her dying patient came as a package- assignment from above – “go care for the Irish girls Gwen.” 

“Why Gwen? Tell me why this is so difficult.”

I’d experienced my fair share of loss at this point. My father to suicide, my stepdad, seven grandparents (three by remarriage), two first cousins, my beloved high school drama coach, some of my husband’s close family, my Godmother, and far too many close friends. During an all-nighter with nurse Gwen, I’d learned enough about her life and faith that whatever she planned to share, I trusted it would come from a deep well; not just as a servant to the dying but as a daughter-sister-friend who’d lost nine people between April and August of 2005. Nine deaths in five months. Nine.

She can’t recall the tragic order of it now, but the closest of those losses are rivetingly clear. Her mom’s death (just before Mother’s Day) was followed one month later by her brother’s. She found him in his apartment. Cause of death, unknown. “I’m one of three kids, so I lost half my family in a matter of weeks. So much old love disappeared in a flash.”

“What do you mean by old love?”

Her response was deeply moving.

Tim Keller says that this kind of love is about as close to God’s as one can describe. 

“To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us.”

Tim Keller, The Meaning of Marriage, p.101.

So much of our relational life is dedicated to managing how others perceive us. We share our victories largely to the exclusion of our struggles often out of that “greatest fear” – to be known and not loved. Or worse, to be known and outright rejected. We may not be able to articulate this common-to-mankind phenomenon with the same eloquence as Keller, but our tendency toward image management gives the interior language of our heart a megaphone: “if you really knew me, you wouldn’t love me as much or even at all. Heck, you might not even like me.”

When I met my husband in college, I so wanted to impress him. Walking to class one day after we’d been dating a while, I made some ridiculous statement to manipulate his good impression of me. I can’t remember now what it was, but I’ll never be able to unremember his response. “That’s not true,” he insisted. “Admit you lied.” He saw straight through me, which was unnerving in and of itself, but his insistence on getting to the bottom of it right then and there was terrifying. I felt completely exposed and ashamed. “You can’t admit that you lied, can you?” 

I was physically running before I realized that the flight reaction had kicked in. I didn’t know how to be fully seen and still loved, so I ran. I ran toward the closest building, the library. He chased me repeating these words again and again as he stayed hot on my heels: “Admit you lied.” I ran through the front doors, up the stairs and to the furthest corner of the highest floor. You’ve heard what animals do when you give them no way of escape? That was me in that moment. Without forethought, I turned around and slapped him across the face. It shocked us both quite frankly. But his next move shocked me more. He hugged me.

The reason Gwen’s “old love” phrase and Keller’s “fully known and truly loved” ideal and Spencer’s not-of-this-world response to my slap is so penetrating is that knowing and loving someone deeply requires enormous amounts of sacrificial patience and kindness. The kind that comes from the Ancient of Days – the oldest love, God. The kind of patience a parent shows a child who rejects them out of frustration is old love. When a spouse takes the time to deeply understand our struggle and is patient as we fight to release it, we are wrecked by the kindness of old love. And when a best friend (future spouse) shows us that they love us despite a lie, they aren’t doing it so we can rest secure in our deception, they are doing it so we can feel safe as we turn to the oldest of loves – the Truth. Old love is remarkable because it transforms.   

But, the scriptures warn, we are to be on alert for the human temptation to use patience and kindness as a justification to rest in unhealthy behavior. We must guard against the type of image management that justifies staying where we are by pointing to the greater sins of others. By pointing to God’s patience with them as an excuse to stay stuck. 

As Eugene Peterson paraphrases in The Message, God is kind and He is patient but don’t be so presumptuous to think that His patience comes without a purpose.

His kindness and patience are intended to make us turn toward the lover of our soul, not provide a soft landing for darkness. Kindness and patience bring us to a place where we can live radically changed lives as hope filled vessels for the sake of the hurting world. Titus 3:4-7.

Our July Mobile Mission:

In your mission pack you have three stickers that say Thank You Sooooo Much for Your Patience. If you don’t have a physical mission pack and would like to receive one [always free while supplies last] go to our mission page and click “Request Materials” or look for the link at the top right of this blog post.

1. Consider using the first sticker to list some of the ways God has shown patience and kindness to you. Did it come through a person? A circumstance? How did it come? He is patient and kind!

• Use the second sticker to meditate on whether those acts of kindness and patience led you to feel safe turning toward Him. Are there times when you’re tempted to use God’s patience and kindness as a justification to stay where you are spiritually? Emotionally? Physically?

• Consider using the third sticker as a prayer. Thank Him for His kindness and patience. Ask Him where He’s calling you to turn, take His hand and walk away from dark places into His glorious light.

Amen? Amen!