Trusting God In The Darkness
Sunday, May 25th, 2008
Jim Dodge, City House’s Founder
These are excerpts from a sermon delivered by Jim Dodge, City House’s founder.
A few months ago I received an email from a clergy colleague asking if I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. I replied back that no, I will still living in the darkness with no light at the end in sight.
My friend had heard that I had been dealing for a long time with a pressure related wound that just would not heal. And even as I come before you today a part of that wound is still not healed after almost two years since it first started.
Forty years ago I was serving in the Army in Vietnam. Like many others I was exposed to the chemical called Agent Orange. A few years after that exposure I was diagnosed with cancer, the treatment for which caused nerve damage, which then weakened the muscles in my legs. That weakness became so significant over time that I have had to rely exclusively on a wheelchair for my mobility.
One of the consequences of continual sitting is that one is prone to develop pressure wounds. Without adequate feeling for a warning, these things happen. As much as one tries to be careful with shifting weight and checking skin color, pressure ulcers occur and that’s just the way life is for those who use wheel chairs.
The one that I am currently dealing with is in the sacrum area of my body, just above the tailbone. After the surgeon finished the initial operation of removing the unhealthy tissue, I had an opening about 6 inches long, 4 inches wide and 1 inch deep. I was absolutely devastated and sank into a darkness that shut down my life. I was told that I had to lie in bed on my stomach or side. I had to be in positions where no pressure was put on the wound. My whole life came to a screeching halt as I found myself homebound with all my plans and activities cancelled.
At first I was in denial about the extensiveness of this whole thing. Give me a couple of months, I told myself, and I’ll be OK. But healing didn’t happen by the timelines I set for myself. I would spiral down even more and often found myself in a deep abyss weeping uncontrollably.
In the course of all of this I found myself arguing with God. I would demand some action. Do something. Fix this. You who raised Christ from the dead could certainly heal a wound. I would remind God that people were praying for me. Do you hear them, God? Are you deaf?
On and on this one-sided conversation would go. When I finally calmed down enough to listen, I heard a quiet voice within me say, “Trust me, Jim.” “Well, God”, I said, “ if that is indeed you speaking to me, could you give me some more details, like how long this will be, and could I see some evidence of some healing.” All I heard back was “trust me”.
Meanwhile the wound was not healing. I needed more surgery. The great medical device called a wound VAC was not closing it like everyone thought it would. I went through 40 treatments at the hyperbaric chamber hoping to get a better blood supply to the wound. I changed doctors. A skin graft was done. Days became weeks that became months. Will this ever end? My faith and trust in God seemed strong one day and weak the next. I was on an emotional roller coaster. As much as I wanted to stay the course trusting God, I often found myself in the darkness.
And so I continued to wait in the darkness believing that hope does not hurry and that the deepest truths are revealed in waiting. Each day I would seek to surrender more and more to the grace and love of God.
I wanted to believe that everything has the potential of calling forth in us a deeper response to our life in God.
I tried to see each day as a gift and enjoy that day and not get caught up thinking about that future day when all would be well. An unlikely friend helped me see that. My friend’s name is Elwood. He grew up in the projects of Chicago. His whole family was drug addicts. He came to Minneapolis, but continued drinking and using, engaged in criminal activity and was jailed. He was living in the darkness of addiction and crime. After being released from prison he stumbled drunk into the Salvation Army in downtown Minneapolis. There, when his life was at the bottom, he surrendered everything to God. He started going to AA, got a minimum wage job and was determined that he was not going to slip back to his old life.
I met him at his job site where I led a spirituality group. He came week after week holding on to the hope that God would somehow take care of him. He’s been sober 6 years now and proudly wears his medallion around his neck. I meet with him periodically and see a man who is still living on the edge financially and whose life is still pretty fragile, but is always positive. “How do you do it, Elwood?” I ask. “I just trust God, Jim,” he replies. And I’m humbled that this high school drop out living in poverty seems to have a deeper faith than this seminary trained pastor living a comfortable middle class life.
Over time my wound started healing bit by bit. The doctor gave me permission to be up more and more. The darkness had lifted a bit, but the cloud of uncertainty of when this will finally be over is still there.
I’m coming to believe that no matter what my physical state might be, on the inside, within the depths of my soul, God is at work renewing me. I’m coming to believe that I, like the Apostle Paul, am one of those who is weak, who is poor in spirit, aware of my own emptiness. And, in admitting such a state of my life, I allow God to fill me with His love and grace and then paradoxically become one of the strong ones. Paul, dealing with his own thorn in the flesh, realized that God’s grace was indeed sufficient for him. And in his weakness became strong.












