Break my heart.
I haven’t prayed that prayer in a long time. But lately, it seems like my only hope.
While I was sick with the flu, I didn’t get to a single recovery meeting for almost two weeks, a new record for me.
When it was time to pick my life back up—meetings and friends and caring and coffee and crying and talking—I was surprised by my own resistance. I understood for the first time how people who miss too many meetings begin not to miss them at all…
It’s a human thing, I suppose. Stay home long enough and pretty soon you’re curled in on yourself, like a worm in the sun, gone brittle and dead. Before you know it, isolation seems appealing and people seem like work.
So I prayed, God break my heart.
On Friday, I posted about Justin’s Lee’s book, Torn. I got a flood of positive feedback, as well as some hurt reactions and hard questions in my email box.
Despite my early determination not to, I took the kind but critical comments to heart and took the supportive ones for granted. I ached all afternoon, wondering if I’d made a mistake. Confusion replaced compassion as I fretted about what people thought.
This wasn’t quite what I had in my mind when I prayed for God to break my heart.
And then I realized something. I had a bunch of emails in my box that weren’t about Justin’s book. They were people crying out for help—women who didn’t give a rip about whether my church welcomes gays or if my theology on sin is off.
One woman wrote, “I drank today after 14 years of sobriety. …How will I tell my husband the truth?”
A single mom wrote, “I’m a Christian woman in ministry and last week I got a DUI. I can’t go to jail. I’ve got two kids who need me…”
A secret alcoholic wrote, “I’m just like you. No one suspects the truth. I can’t make it through a single night without a drink. …How did you ever stop?”
Reading these emails did for me what meetings often do. The pain in their voices broke through my self-centered numbness so that I could feel compassion again—and want to.
They reminded me that this is why I blog—because people hurt and I want to help. I felt my heart break open all over again.
And I think I’m going to leave it that way for a while.
I’m realizing I made a mistake in how I thought about the Rooms once I was properly sober. I always said that I didn’t want to be one of those people who was still going to meetings 20 years into their sobriety. Wasn’t the goal to get to a point where you could actually live life to the full? How are you doing that if you’re still stuck in the rooms? Of course I knew all about helping another drunk. I guess I somehow stayed self absorbed in spite of that. Or I was trying so hard to be sober all I could see was my own sobriety. That stopped working for me and I drank after many years sober. Doing it differently this time! Thanks heather. Vanda
Vanda, this is such a wonderful note! I can’t tell how you glad it makes my heart. I love your come to realize here so much. For me, yes it’s about staying sober, but as you noted, it’s so much too about giving back and being part of a community. I have my church, but it’s just not quite the same. And yet, it took a long time even in AA to feel not just welcome–but like I BELONGED. Like I could count on these people to love me and like I was known by them. I am praying this will be your experience. Keep me posted! Heather
On Tue, Jan 22, 2013 at 8:10 AM, HEATHER KOPP
The grace and love you demonstrate by being willing to have your heart broken for others is inspiring. Talk about sharing in the sufferings of Jesus.
In another context, I am thankful for the healing I’ve experienced resulting in a “whole” heart (as in the centre of my being, my spiritual essence, where-in the three persons of the Godhead have taken up residence through the Holy Spirit). I simply find myself asking that God keep my heart soft, beacause hardening can occur when I get self centered/focused.
I’m sure you cast the cares of your heart, as relates to all those that are free to access you, on God, for He cares for you, and each one of them.
What a beautiful comment, Tom! I agree with you “whole-heartedly!”
It happened to me and it lasted 8 years. By the grace of my Higher Power I didn not drink. Bu t I was walking down the street in the *crunchy* section of Pittsburgh where there were all these new bars (and many other attractions) and I found myself thinking, *maybe I got sober too young. I never got to have a blue drink!* Stopped me dead in my tracks that did! I caluculated – right there on the sidewalk – blocking foot traffic – just exactly how long I had sober. 16 years. I decided I didn’t want to throw all that away. So I went to a meeting. It also gives me something to say when people talk about not putting so much emphasis on just how much time one has. *We all have one day.* Well, no, if I had had one day I would have gotten drunk. One day I would figure I could get again. But 16 years was not going to be re done so easily. Just sayin’.
Marjie this comment is so very telling and helpful. I have corresponding by email with another reader who after a recent relapse decided that she needed to be in community and that she’d made a mistake leaving recovery meetings behind. For me, it’s where I get help and give help and live in community. Yes, it gets boring at times. Yes, some people bug me. Yes, it is a flawed community. But I need it just the same. Thanks so much for writing, friend.
I don’t know Laura Kramer, but I’d like to echo her comment: “Love your authentic heart. Love the journey you are on.” Thank you for sharing it with us through your blog.
(I’m so looking forward to reading your book! When will it be available to preorder?)
Lisa, thank so much for your words. The book can be pre-ordered right now. I have a place in the sidebar where you can click the cover, but you can buy it at all the usual outlets.
Maybe I should include a link at the end of posts, since a lot of people read the blog on their phone and don’t see the whole site. Hope you’re happy and well, friend. Hugs.
Heather, I know what it’s like to be confused and afraid that you got the wrong path. I was in the closet for 33 years, lied and told everyone I was straight because I was ashamed AND because I believed it was wrong to be gay. I did everything I could think of to make myself straight, including self harm. I never acted on my attractions, never had a boyfriend, and tried dating girls (who eventually dumped me because they were self-aware enough to see there was no spark). I think your observation about the shame of alcoholism and the shame of being in the closet is astute. The difference is that you can be gay without ever having sex, but you need to have had alcohol to become an alcoholic. I’m not an alcoholic, but I think we can connect through the universality of shame and how we have overcome that.
What I really want you to know is that your post on Torn will give hope to a gay kid, give hope to a parent of a gay child who doesn’t know what to do, give hope to those who want to love their neighbor but don’t yet know how.
Like Justin Lee, I read the Bible differently now than I used to. I don’t believe that it is a sin to be gay or a sin to be in a loving relationship. But it’s not important that we all believe the same thing before we come into communion with one another. If that were a requirement, there would be no church with more than one member because no two people will have exactly the same concept of God. No one knows the mind of God, and no person can say “This one is going to hell, and this one is going to heaven.” (This is why I take those who say they love me but are giving me a warning with a grain of salt. While I can’t know whether or not all of my beliefs are correct from the point of view of God, neither can they.)
So all we can do is figure things out as best as we can and muddle through one day at a time. I’m comforted in thinking that it is better to err on the side of being too loving than to err on the side of being too judgemental.
Martin, it’s so fabulous that came and responded here. Welcome! I am so grateful for your encouraging words regarding that post. I’ve already heard from people who are now reading it as a result and who are having their hearts cracked open wider. For me, nothing could replace the experience of actually getting to know some people who were gay. Before that, it was just another issue to have an opinion about or take a stand on. I don’t have a stand anymore, I just have open arms, I hope. The rest of it–that belongs to God. And like you and Justin, I have had to let go of a particular kind of reading of the Bible that was bent to fit my evangelical faith and that contradicted itself left and right and worst of all, contradicted that still, small voice of love in my gut. Thank you, Martin!
Hello, sister.
Your post on Torn attracted my attention, but I chose not to comment. Reconciling a strong understanding of sin with a strong understanding of God’s love is beyond me. I’ve read a lot and really like Alan Chambers’ position on the discussion, but it’s a subject that’s just too big to comment briefly or with confidence. I’m not surprised you got comments all over the board.
I take refuge in Mal 3:16. After a long list of all the ways the leaders of the land are confusing and misleading the Lord’s sheep, Malachi says, “Then they that feared the LORD spake often one to another: and the LORD hearkened, and heard [it], and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the LORD, and that thought upon his name.”
I take that to mean it’s no sin to be confused and misled, and that the right and proper action of confused people is to keep talking about the Lord in the context of our confusion. The fear of the Lord is still a precious thing, even when answers of exactly what to fear are few and far between.
Hello Anonymous,
Thank you for this post and I know it is off-topic, but I just wanted to thank you personally as I am one of those totally confused people and it was so comforting to realize that it is okay to be confused. So, thank you!
Nancy
What a beautiful comment! I love this. And it’s a reminder that Unity doesn’t require Agreement. We live in union with all kinds of diversity of thought and belief. Thank you for writing!
Trust that sooner or later, perspective will prevail!
Christine, these are good words.
Love your authentic heart. Love the journey you are on.
Thanks, Laura. I feel the same way about you.
You are doing the work of the Lord, and even though it’s rewarding, it’s also the road less traveled and very difficult. We all need our heart broken sometimes in order to see things how God does. Just remember that no matter what, God loves you, and His opinion is what matters most:-)
Jamie, what wonderful words for me this morning. Thank you! I like the way you put that, that when our hearts get broken we see things how God does. Because really, imagine how “broken” his own heart is every day as he looks at this world. And yet in that brokenness he gave his son so there’d be more hope than heartbreak and love enough to heal us all.
I can understand the numbness and isolation part so well. I had a similar experience recently. Thank you. This is very helpful to me today, Heather. Thank You…Dolores ♥
Dolores, I’m so glad this helped you or spoke to you. That’s the goal in the end, huh? Just to encourage someone on the path. Hugs to you, friend.
Amen, Friend. Hugs to YOU too.
Dolores
Amen, dear friend. It is the goal, Heather and you do it so well. Hugs to you too, my friend. ♥
It’s easy to skip meetings and focus on me. I’ve done that for a while now, and I’m also surprised by my resistance to return, especially after 18 years of recovery. I’m not sure I’m going back yet or ever, but it’s good to hear you talk about. Thanks, Heather. You’re helping a lot of us.
Kim, you understand it well. Once you get in a rhythm of not doing meetings, it’s hard to break. Honestly, I’m so scared of that happening to me, because in my case–I don’t think I could stay sober on my own. But more important, I don’t think I stay a good human being who wants to help people. Sometimes I think that even if I wasn’t an alcoholic, I’d want to go to meetings because those rooms are SO filled with desperate people who are open to help. I can’t think of anywhere else in the world you can go and just know that you’re in a gathering of people who admit they’re broken and in need of each other. I love that. Thanks so much for taking time to comment, Kim. You mean so much to me. H