Generous Of Heart

"In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And He who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will." --[Romans 8:26-27].

Ah, the beautiful but seemingly inscrutable writings of Saint Paul! I always love the mystery of his writings, but his complexity assumes so much foreknowledge. Then, I am lost.

But I AM buoyed by the first statement, that "the Spirit helps us in our weakness." The Holy Spirit is not a one-way path for US to reach God. The Spirit in turn prays FOR us, even when we are so upside- down and overwhelmed, that we cannot articulate anything at all.

I have been there, my friends, at a time in my life when I knew, in my heart, that something was awfully wrong, but when I could not, for the life of me, figure out why my life was so deeply dark and dizzying.

As I raced through my days, I was all too aware that my father had died abruptly. HE was supposed to be the healthy one, caring for my frail and seriously ill mother. But he was the one who had awoken one morning, drunk a cup of coffee and collapsed on the floor. He was gone before the ambulance even came.

I became the one to take on the care of my mother. As the only daughter, the youngest one--even in modern America-- that was my responsibility.

Dutifully, I cleared out her house, and moved her near me, into a senior home. My heart became a deep hole, blacker and blacker. I fell into despair.

My own health began to fail. My doctors were asking me, aside from the obvious health diagnoses, what was REALLY going on?

I took to long periods of reflection and meditation. Finally,  it all slowly came back to me. Many decades before, I was in a life and death situation,  living far from home. I was shattered by this traumatic experience, but my mother had coldly told me that she would not allow me to come home. She had abandoned me at my worst hours.

Now, similarly abandoned from the sudden death of my father, my mother required that I take care of HER.

My heart fantasized about how it would be if I had had another sister to take my mother on. But that was a tempting fiction.

My heart fantasized that my brother or my uncle or some far-away relatives would suddenly swoop in and care for my mother. This was equally a fantasy.

Neither of these scenarios was realistic. Nor were they God's Will. This is the meaning of "The Spirit intercedes in accordance with GOD's WILL." The Spirit does not automatically follow your own wishes.

I would have prayed, but I did not even know what to pray FOR. If I had prayed, "God let me walk away from this dreadful responsibility", then ultimately, would I not have been praying that I could stick her in a nursing home with impunity, and quickly forget about her?

My mother had figuratively kicked me when I was down. Now, I could not do this same thing to HER. I realized that when you are the only one person available for a task, then, whether you like it or not, you have been Called.

Each day, as I drove to pick her up from the senior home, I was groaning to myself, 'Do I really have anywhere near enough strength for this?'  I did not know it at the time, but I was really asking "the Spirit himself [to] intercede for [me] with groans that words cannot express."

Gradually, I began to feel a Wall of Protection around me when in her presence. Where I had previously felt aghast that I had been asked to care for such a cold, rejecting mother; I came to see that finally, I was gaining the closeness that I had always wanted, with my own mother. I like to think that I was learning to lean more strongly on God, too.

When I had been taking care of my mother for over a year, I felt inexpressible weakness and exhaustion. One day, on the way to her place, I asked No One in particular, "How long can I keep doing this? How long will my own health hold out?"

I was becoming impatient with my mother over small things, such as her increasing confusion and forgetfulness. I was ashamed at myself. I went to talk to my pastor. He told me about the Benedictine pathway of life. In other words, while we may make mistakes and stumble, we do get up again. Overall, if we are ever- rising in our faith and Devotions, we show our pure intentions before God. For, God knows the generosity of our Spirit.

I think that this must be the meaning of "He who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit." At times, I would snap at my mother, but God knew my heart. Through the Spirit, God knew the generous and loving arc of my determination to care for my mother in her final days.

Finally, one day in mid-winter, my mother went to bed and never woke up. She was gone.

Part of me was horrified. Had I, in my prayer over my waning strength, hastened her demise? Had I really been praying, "Do something about her, God, I don't think I can keep going on like this?'

But no, it had been the SPIRIT who had heard my inexpressible groanings, and who had interpreted them in accordance with God's Will.

It was God's timing, that the season had come for my mother to pass on. It was time for me to let her go, as well.

If I had been able to literally hear what the Spirit had responded to me, I might have heard, "Well done, my good and faithful servant."

Lord, no matter what I pray for, and even if I cannot pray it in words, you know my generous heart.  You measure out the seasons of my life, and you understand that in my weakness, Your Spirit makes me strong.

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