"Pain is seldom expected nor embraced. When it comes, it is often denied or swept under the rug of ‘God’s Sovereignty’. The Apostle Paul tells us that, as we ‘groan inwardly,’ we ‘wait eagerly’ for our final redemption (Romans 8:23). But few of us enter the tragedy of living in a fallen world and simultaneously struggle with God until our heart bleeds with hope. — Dan Allendar, The Healing Path

Back in June I spent a weekend in Alabama with one of my best friends, KatRose. We hung out at Lake Martin with her close friend Jen, Jen’s mom and a couple of Jen’s friends. It was a very refreshing time.

As we sat at dinner Friday night, Kat queried about my posts here, stating that some had scared her that I was losing my faith in God, because I talked of fighting and wrestling with Him. My other best friend Wendy had spoken of similar fears a while back. I think most people aren’t used to someone so desperately in love with God fighting with Him as much as I do.

Or should that be said in reverse? Someone who fights with God so much couldn’t possibly, in the minds of most, be so crazy in love with God as I am.

I think that’s because people tend to say they are fighting with God when, really, they’re ready to walk away from Him and this is their last, "do it or I’m walkin’" moment with Him.

How do I explain what’s going on with me? I was at a loss as to how to communicate this during my weekend with Kat. But I think I may be able to now.

Love, especially a Father’s love, for me has always meant a stoic non-emotional pattern where love and presence was withdrawn when I stepped out of line. I know that in reality, my dad never withdrew his love. However, to my tender young heart and mind, that’s how his actions were interpreted. And I was the most favored of my dad’s children. He often confided to me his disappointment and frustration in my siblings, something I didn’t want to know — and which led to a pattern in my own life of walking on egg shells, of expecting the best performance out of myself at all times, so I wouldn’t lose dad’s love. And when I did, I worked very hard to get it back and and not allow myself to do something to lose it again. Often that meant not being honest with myself or with my dad about most of the things in my life.

Throughout my life I’ve seen God as somewhat an extension of my dad. I have rarely fought with God, or been brutally honest about the whole of me because I believed if I did, He will withdraw His love and presence from me, just as my dad did throughout his life. It wasn’t until recently that I’ve been able to fight and wrestle with Him from a place of love, and feel like I’m standing in a place of grace and acceptance, no matter how brutally honest and argumentative I get.

The year I was overseas (2002-2003) was so incredibly lonely and pain-filled. I don’t want to belabor this point, because it’s not worth doing so now. But, please understand, it was the most difficult season of my life up to that point, and I was in desperate pain.

That was the year God revealed His deep, passionate, intimate, intense — man, is it intense! — love for me— me of all people! Me, who is obstinant, headstrong, vocal, brutally honest, argumentative, disgustingly messy, amazingly unorganized and ruthlessly lazy. He met me at my every point of need. And I had A LOT. Yet He met me there every single time. Every day, every night, every moment, He made His presence and love powerfully known. My relationship with Him really became a relationship — much more than it ever had been.

Interestingly, during that time I often scoffed at the phrase, "God is my husband". God cannot be my husband, I would whine. He lacks the physical equipment.

Yeah, go ahead… take a moment and digest that…. I can be pretty shallow at times.

Yet I realize now that during that time we truly were becoming Husband and Bride. Our relationship moved from "buddy/pal" — phileo love — to "Bride/Groom" love-affair agapao. Now I really DO feel like I’m married to Jesus, in an emotional/spiritual way. And I wonder sometimes how a relationship with a man is ever going to compare to what I have with God.

Then mom and dad died, my team was disbanded, I resigned from the mission agency I was with and moved back to LA, broke, homeless, jobless, careerless, and most of all dream-less and hope-less. The agony of losses I suffered, and the complete chaos my life has become in the last two years would have, most assuredly, brought me to a breaking point in my faith had it not been for the foundation of passionate love forged by God both in that year overseas, and the two or so years leading up to it.

It’s precisely because of the intimacy and depth of relationship we, Jesus and I, developed during that time that I am held fast to Him, and it set me up to be able to experience, for the first time, what healthy conflict is really all about.

It started with a desperate wailing cry, "If you’re going to rescue me, God, NOW is the time to do it. I need You NOW! Not later, but NOW. NOW is the time of my salvation! Please come NOW and save me! I’m drowning in this flood of emotions and thoughts!"

He came. He fought for me. Smoke billowing from His nostrils and thunder and lightning in His hand. I was rescued. My first "demand" of God since I was a small child, and He responded.

Since that time I’ve tested the "ice" more and more, like an ice skater on a frozen pond in Michigan in April. I poke my angry-confused-frustrated stick into the ice of God’s love to see if it will hold my weight. Each time I poke, I push harder, to the point where now I’m pounding it.

And I am blown away every single time. It holds. He holds. He is not at all like my dad. He doesn’t clam up and withdraw in hurt or punishment when I fight with Him. Instead, He fights back. He meets me right where I am and argues back with me. I feel like Jacob/Israel. Really! God loves me so much that He shows up to the fight and argues His case.

Do you know how amazing that is?? Do you understand the magnitude of this new revelation of His character? To be able to fight with God, and have Him fight back, not back down or withdraw or overpower or squash, or even threaten to do so because He is God. To me, this means that He really is that loving, gracious, compassionate, slow-to-anger, understanding God the Bible says He is. He’s not judgmental. And He’s not just merciful. He’s so strong and confident in His love for me — and so humble! He is Almighty God, after all. He could just quash me for my "impudence". But He doesn’t!! He doesn’t even seem to dream of it — that He’s willing to duke it out with me. He loves me so much He fights with me over things that I’m angry about, or confused or frustrated about. Oh. My. Gosh. He really is the best Husband a girl could ever dream of!

Being able to fight with God has caused me to fall in love with Him even more. I can now be honest with God about the full extent of my pain and my anger, of my wounds and my dark places, because I know He won’t leave me or run and hide His love from me till I "get it right".

Oh, and then there’s the best present of all. You know I said I know what it’s like to be Jacob/Israel. Well, in that struggle God saw that He could not overpower or prevail against Jacob… well, here it is in the Amplified Bible.

And Jacob was left alone, and a Man wrestled with him until daybreak.

And when [the Man] saw that He did not prevail against [Jacob], He touched the hollow of his thigh; and Jacob’s thigh was put out of joint as he wrestled with Him.

Then He said, Let Me go, for day is breaking. But [Jacob] said, I will not let You go unless You declare a blessing upon me.

[The Man] asked him, What is your name? And [in shock of realization, whispering] he said, Jacob [supplanter, schemer, trickster, swindler]! And He said, Your name shall be called no more Jacob [supplanter], but Israel [contender with God]; for you have contended and have power with God and with men and have prevailed.

In my wrestling with God, sometimes I see His point and move a little closer to His thinking. Sometimes, however, I cannot be moved. And, amazingly, I don’t ever feel like God is exasperated with me or surprised or angry that I will not concede to His viewpoint. Sometimes He doesn’t seem to even tell me His point of view; just lets me argue until I’m too hoarse to speak. I get the distinct impression this is how God wants me to deal with Him always. To be brutally honest and to not be moved unless and until I am truly convinced.

I’m becoming convinced of this more and more because, it’s in those times that I cannot be moved that I receive the greatest gift: my own "wound" from our tussle — My heart bleeds with Hope.