Desperate.

Have you ever been completely and totally desperate? Desperate is a word that we throw around a lot in our culture...we are desperate around Christmas time to find the perfect gift, to get our hands on tickets to a sold out concert or to get the baby to take a longer nap. We are desperate to find love or to get an interview for our dream jobs. But is that true desperation?

I have been toying with that word since Wednesday. I know I have used the word desperate to describe many situations through out my life. However, I guess I am not sure it was ever the right choice of words to use.

The most desperate situation that comes to mind was during my student teaching experience in college. I was leaving the school I taught at after a brutal day. I felt degraded, unappreciated, and worn down. I was already crying when I got in my car. I went to call my mom to debrief and realized I had left my cell phone on my bed. I turned my car on, drove out of the school parking lot and on to the main road. At this point the tears were really starting to pour down my cheeks but it was also starting to pour outside. It was one of those horrible spring days in Illinois where the sky isn't sure if it wants to rain or snow, so it does both simultaneously. I was stopped at an intersection when the man in the car next to me honked his horn. I rolled my window down and he pointed to my passenger side tire and said, "Your tire is VERY flat." I drove through the intersection and parked my car in an empty parking lot. I sat in my passenger seat for about 10 minutes crying even harder before I zipped up my coat, pulled on my gloves, and summoned the courage to dig in my trunk for my spare tire.

Like any good father, my dad insisted that I learn how to change a tire before I got my drivers license. I think that on a perfect day, inside our garage, using my dad's jack I could have changed that tire...but add the tears, the sleet, a tinny little jack that looked like it was made for a toy car, and directions written on the back of the wheel cover, I was rendered helpless. Cell phone-less, cold, and miserable I got on my knees (in a skirt) and attempted time and time again to use the jack. I felt helpless, foolish, alone and desperate. The longer and harder I tried, the harder it got. The harder it got, the more I cried. The more I cried, the lonelier I felt. I finally just gave up. I threw the jack down and sat on the cold and wet pavement in my skirt and cried.

Then, the sweetest man drove by. He was driving a huge truck covered with Marine Corp stickers which instantly told me I could trust him. He jumped out of his truck, introduced himself and took over. He insisted I sit in his warm truck, handed me a box of tissues and told me he was going to take care of everything. Ten minutes later, my tire was changed and he insisted on following me to the tire store.

I will never forget that story. I knew that it was God's way of saying, "I care about you...you are not alone." Yet, I know that was not the most desperate situation. I could have easily walked to the mall and called a roommate or gotten a tow truck to come. It felt desperate, but in actuality, it was far from that. It was inconvenient and poorly timed, but desperate is a stretch.

I guess along this journey that God has me on, I am learning a few things. I am learning that more often than not being joyful is way more of a choice than a natural reaction. I am learning that rarely does my being joyful have much at all to do with being happy. I am also learning that I am a prideful person.

I rarely ask for help. I have a can-do-attitude and really only feel comfortable truly asking for help from a very select few. I am not good at taking people up on offers to help, not because I don't trust them to do a good job, but mostly because I hate being seen as weak, vulnerable, or needy. That is something I am becoming more aware this year and I am really seeing it come into play as I recover from my surgery. I get stronger everyday and need less from others.

Yet, in my relationship with God, I think this attribute is hindering me. The Bible makes it clear that God is waiting for us often times to ask him. Countless stories are testaments to the fact that the Heart of God is for His people. The Spirit moves on behalf of those willing to show desperate hearts. Women like Hannah, Sarah, and Rachel show hope and faith in something that seems so unattainable. I want to pray fervently like Hannah did that God would bless my womb and that I would be able to experience the gift of motherhood.

That's where I am right now. I want to be desperate for God to move on our behalf. I want to be so unashamed to ask for God to intercede on my behalf that I literally let my pride melt away and ask with urgency knowing that it is my only option. I want to be desperate. I want to admit that in my own human body, even with the very best doctors around I am inadequate, but WITH GOD ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE. (Matthew 19:26)