Falling Through

On Saturday around luch time, my husband and I were sitting outside, adjusting to our empty nest, when our youngest daughter called. She called to tell us that she had fallen through Rush. She wasn’t invited back to any pref parties. She was devastated, wounded, confused, and she needed us. It took almost no time at all for us to do some haphazard packing and race to the airport, hop in my husband’s little plane and take off to be with our hurting chlid. On our flight, I cried a lot and I’m pretty confident my anger and confusion surpassed that of my daughter. Like most summer afternoons in the south, convective clouds were building and scattered at our altitude. Although clear skies are always the first choice when flying, sometimes you have to fly through the clouds. As we approached one on Saturday’s rescue mission, my husband warned me to hold on, “About to feel a little bump.”  If you have never been on a small plane and experienced the “little bump”, let me tell you it’s offputting. Your stomach drops, you watch the altimeter on the dashboard spin backwards a few hundres clicks and as you look out the window, all you can see is white. You are Falling Through the cloud. When you are falling through, you aren’t counting your blessings or fretting over the extra 5 pounds you have put on. You aren’t making grocery lists or wondering what your friends are doing. When you are Falling Through, you are consumed in the moment. 

The stab of rejection when one falls through rush is all consuming. You had all the outfits picked out. You are groomed and polished and amped up to meet new friends and show them why they should want to know you better…. When they don’t, the bottom falls out from under you. Your stomach drops and you watch the altitude spin backward as you plummet. The white haze of rejection is all you can see. It’s brutal and awful, but to be fair, it is temporary. You aren’t free falling. You aren’t falling out. You are falling through. When in a cloud, you eventually come out the other side.

I don’t know anyone who hasn’t experienced the wounds of rejection, and I certaintly don’t know anyone who has lived a life with only clear skies. A few years ago, when I was stuck in a really dark cloud and flattened by fear and doubt and anger and confusion, I found myself on my knees, cryng angry tears to God. In the darkness, one small phrase cut through my haze: “Whatsoever is True”. Just one line in Paul’s letter to the Phillippians in which he is teaching them on what they should set their minds on…. Whatsoever is true.

Being rejected doesn’t change who you are. Our daughter was the same kind, beautiful, smart, adored, funny creative young lady on Friday before she fell through and on Saturday, when hundreds of girls rejected her, she was still the same kind, beautiful, smart, adored, funny and creative young lady. 

What other people think of you isn’t solid ground. It feels like everything sometimes, but it is just unstable atmosphere. The stability that we must find our self worth in is what God says about us.

If we believe in Jesus, God says,

“We are His children” (John 1:12)

It gave Him pleasure to adopt us (Ephesians 1:5)

We are made in His image (Genesis1:27)

We are a chosen people, a royal priesthood…a special possesion….called out of darkness into marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9)

 

These truths don’t change. Whatsoever is also true is that she goes to a great school. She is loved by many friends and family members. She is healthy. She has a fantasic metabolism.  Whatsoever is not true are the lies, “Nobody likes me.” “I will never fit in”. “Everyone is talking about me.” It is imperitive in all our lives that we set our minds on what is true. We will all fall through things, and when we find our stomachs dropping and our vision blurred, cling to the truth.  

God loves you so much. He loves His son way more than I love any of my children. In fact, he loves my children and yours way more than we are capable of loving them. He loved us so much that He sent his only cherished and adored son to come to die for you and me and our kids. His perfect and blameless child died willingly on the cross to pay for our sins. He paid for our fury and the times we rejected others without even realizing it. He paid for our selfish interests and stubborness and all of our ulgliness that we try to hide, and if we believe in His  son, we will not be punished or held accountable for those things. One day, we will see Jesus and live forever with Him in heaven. (John 3:16 my paraphrase) That is the truth. Set your mind on it.

You will have to fly  through more clouds…. But you will come out the other side. Don’t waste the lesson. You will fall THROUGH.

 

**** FYI…. 24 hours after falling through Rush, we were eating lunch after church and she received a snap bid. In fact, every girl did. We left her yesterday afternoon, covered in spary paint and glitter and a huge smile.