This, my story... (part 2 of 4)

Well, the body I was trapped in was growing. And as I was becoming a teenager, I was also becoming nervous. This is because I was gaining some height, and I was worried that I would end up “freakishly tall” – something over 6 feet 2 inches, surely, and most likely more like 7 feet. So when my growth spurt began to slow, and then came to a stop at 5 feet 10 inches, I remember being super relieved. I could live with, even enjoy, this amount of height, I decided. (The only really frustrating aspect was that most of the boys my age were shorter than me – significantly shorter – and I did like the boys…)

But here's the essence of this trapped feeling I'm writing about: I was coming to see and believe – and it made sense to me, deep inside my soul – that I’m an eternal being living in a mortal body. It was what I had sensed at a young age, long before I could begin to articulate it, or understand what might explain my feelings.

One of the signposts of this phenomenon - which, by the way, I think we all are experiencing - is probably so obvious to most people, that they simply overlook it. This sign, at least as I see it, is a basic discontent with the status quo of this life. Think for a moment about all the things that bother many of us: disorganization, sickness, death, unfairness, evil deeds (murder, rape, etc.), and the tyranny of bodily sustenance through work or other means. These range from bothersome to tragic, and are that to a majority of people across the earth, whether in developed or developing countries.

And then there’s the whole issue of time... C.S. Lewis discussed how our frustration with time is an indicator of eternity. When I first read this (as a C.S. Lewis quote in A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken), it really made me think. Why are we so amazed by the passing of time? If we were created for time, would it surprise us like it does? Would we exclaim over and over how we can’t believe another week or year has gone by?

It was when I began to accept that I was created for eternity, that the truth of what I had been taught in my early years started to make sense. Not the legalism…not the “don’t play cards” or the “don’t go into a bar,” or other similar messages... But what began to make sense was that there was a plan. A plan that, deep inside of me, made more sense than the one my body seemed to be stuck with.