In the “fight or flight” mode

Last week I told you about the onset of my meltdown in Lomalinda, an out-of-the-way missions center near the equator in South America.

I had yelled at my husband, “We should not have come here. We made a bad mistake. And I’m Not Unpacking One More Thing. We Are Leaving! We Are Going Home!”

And then everything went from bad to worse. (Click on that link if you missed it.)

A black panic threatened. I felt caged, unhinged, alone. A sinking, cold sensation overtook me, despite the tropical heat. I struggled even to breathe.

“When we’re in a crisis and need help,” writes Dr. Henry Cloud, “our brains have instantly changed.”

“When we are under threat,” he continues, “our higher brain’s ability to think clearly, make judgments, find solutions, solve problems, and calm down is being interrupted by a bath of stress hormones that take us to a ‘fight or flight’ mode.

“We get anxious,” he said, “and can be more prone to reacting than thinking.”

Dr. Cloud was describing me and yes, I was in the “fight or flight” mode.

In Chapter 8 of Please, God, Don’t Make Me Go, I wrote about the aftermath of the noon-time portion of the meltdown:

That afternoon Dave returned to school, the kids went to play at a friend’s house, and I continued unpacking and praying, Please, God, get me out of here.

I pictured myself hiking over to the hangar and demanding a flight out—but that wouldn’t work. The pilots would make a fuss and report me to somebody and in the end, I’d have created a kerfuffle and would still be stuck in Lomalinda.

I had to find another way. Another way.

Before long, Eureka! I stumbled upon a comforting thought—bizarre but comforting. If all else failed, I did have a way of escape. I could walk away, unnoticed, and keep walking, from Colombia through Central America and Mexico and California and Oregon and Washington and eventually arrive in Seattle. I wasn’t sure how pedestrians crossed the Panama Canal, but there had to be a way.

Oh, but wait—I didn’t have my passport! It was locked in some safe in the Bogotá office. I was trapped.

I’d never found myself in such a panicked state. I didn’t know what to think, what to do, what to pray.

I couldn’t even give myself a pep talk. At a time like that, words didn’t exist.

I can’t recall what I did next but now, years later, I am comforted by Bible verses that tell us: “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. . . . The Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God’s will. (Romans 8:26-27, NIV)

The New Living Translation words that last part this way: “the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will.” That was what I needed so badly when I felt powerless to know what to do.

God didn’t seem distant during those dreadful hours that day. I sensed Him close by me in the room, but He remained silent, standing firm while I whimpered and stumbled around in my distress. I could only groan and reel.

But in the midst of my temporary insanity, somehow—somehow—deep down I comprehended that the Spirit was praying for me, pleading on my behalf with groans my own words couldn’t express. I was rattled and confused and desperate, but He was not.

My crisis reminds me of Jacob wrestling with God in Genesis 32.

God had told him to leave the land he’d lived in for twenty years and return to his home country, so he set out in the direction God’s finger pointed, even though it could put him and his family in grave danger.

Verse  7 says it was a time of “great fear and distress” for Jacob. He must have been worried sick. Stressed almost to the breaking point. Anxious. Maybe in a panic. Desperate.

And it was in that place Jacob wrestled with God all night, despite receiving a wound to the hip. Continuing to fight while injured had to take great strength and steadfastness. He didn’t give up. He persevered, and he came through it—with a limp, yes, but also with God’s blessing and a new name. “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome” (Genesis 32:28). The name Israel signified his change in character as well as what God intended to do with and through him.

Similarly, in Lomalinda that day, I feared for my wellbeing and that of my family, even though I’d discerned months earlier that God had given us His blessing to go there.

For several days I’d been grumbling, wrestling with Him and my new surroundings, questioning His wisdom and goodness:

I had prayed: “God, You got this all wrong

when You sent us to this place.

What could You have been thinking?”

During those first few days I had felt increasingly broken—perhaps something like Jacob’s wound to the hip. Exhausted and afraid and desperate, I fought, I persevered.

Was it wrong for me to get steamed up and question God’s leading?

Was it sinful to wrestle with Him? 

Joy Smalley writes, “I used to believe that my need to wrestle with God came from a place of distrust and a lack of faith. . . .

“There are so many feelings, actions and desires that cause shame but wrestling with God should never be one of those.

“In fact, facing the truth of our perceptions about God, who we believe he is or isn’t and questioning him is an act of faith. It is an act of love. It is an act of trust and courage.

“This visual of Jacob on the ground, refusing to release God and demanding that he be blessed . . . reminds me of myself,” Joy continues. “I find myself wrestling in the dirt with God often, demanding that he show himself to me, demanding that he stay with me, questioning his sanity and care.

“Yet this fight isn’t about turning my back on God, it is about facing him, gripping him and refusing to let go.”

Joy has a point.

I wonder if I can extend a little grace to myself.

Can I believe that, like Joy, I wasn’t turning my back on God

but instead, I was facing Him, grabbing Him,

holding on for dear life?

She goes on to say, “Faith in him is an ever-changing, ever-evolving journey that is intimately personal with hills, valleys and deep deserts. But I still hope in him because of how he met with Jacob in the dirt. How he allowed Jacob to man-handle him, to throw him, to grip him and demand of him peace.

“. . . Our God gives us space to question his character, his will, his goodness and his purpose. This is why my feet are still planted in faith because my God wants me to be fully exposed before him without shame. . . .

“This God of yours is inviting you to wrestle and I encourage you to join him for there is peace to be found in the dirt.” (JoySmalley, “Processing God”)

Yes, Joy has given me much to mull over. Did I, like Jacob, come out of the fight with a change of character? Were the battle and perseverance part of the training for what God planned for my future? Did my messy meltdown strengthen my faith and bring me into a more intimate relationship with God?

Getting back to the verses from Romans, above, my heart overflows with gratitude because “the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.” The next verse tells us, “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them” (Romans 8:28, NLT).

That’s God’s grace. Mindboggling grace.

He offers it to you, too.
Claim those glorious Bible verses for yourself.
Let God's amazing grace rest on you,
fill you.
Remember: He delights in you!