Thomas Nelson - Pack Up Your Gloomies Mini

This collection of
gloomee-busters
belongs to:

Pack Up Your
Gloomees in a
Great Big Box,
Then Sit on the
Lid and Laugh
Minibook

Title Page
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PACK UP YOUR GLOOMEES IN A GREAT BIG BOX, THEN SIT ON THE LID AND LAUGH

Copyright 1994 by Barbara Johnson. All rights reserved.
No portion of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any otherexcept for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

The poem on pages is taken from Is It Just a Mood or Real Depression? by Carl Sherman, Family Circle (1 April 1992), 65.

ISBN 0-8499-5071-6

3 4 5 6 9 PLP 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Printed in Hong Kong

Contents

PART ONE
Pack Up Your
Gloomees

I searched for a word to describe all the STUFF that can happen to us. Words like problems, troubles, or tragedies just didnt cut it because they were too grim. But then I found itgloomees. I think youll admit its hard to say gloomees without at least a hint of a smile.

The other day I found a bit of verse by Bertha Adams Backus that sums up my philosophy for dealing with life when pain and trouble bring on the GLOOMEES:

Build for yourself a strong box, Fashion each part with care; When its strong as your hand can make it, Put all your troubles there;

Hide there all thought of your failures, And each bitter cup that you quaff; Lock all your heartaches within it, Then sit on the lid and laugh.

Tell no one else its contents, Never its secrets share; When youve dropped in your care and worry Keep them forever there;

Hide them from sight so completely That the world will never dream half; Fasten the strong box securely Then sit on the lid and laugh.

People who know my story ask me how I ever survived dealing with my son, Larrys, homosexuality and then enduring the lonely estrangement that occurred because I lashed out at him with anger and even hatred. This happened after Id already endured devastating injuries to my husband and the deaths of two sons just as they reached the threshold of adult life.

All of these experiences squashed my heart, but out of that came a fragrance in my life that could never have happened without going through the crushing pain. One of my favorite bits of verse says it so well:

THERE IS NO OIL WITHOUT SQUEEZING THE OLIVES, NO WINE WITHOUT PRESSING THE GRAPES, NO FRAGRANCE WITHOUT CRUSHING THE FLOWERS, AND NO REAL JOY WITHOUT SORROW.

How did I survive? I tried a lot of things and I learned a lot, mostly by trial and error. And Im still learning. I try to steer away from the pat answer and the hollow formula. I also avoid the instant solution, the microwave maturity, the quick fix, the heavenly band-aid without surgery. That just isnt the way God works.

I believe laughter is the best prescription for pain there is. When the gloomees close in, thats the time to see the humorous side of things, not to deny reality but to help make sense out of what is so UNREAL. And sometimes, it gets very unreal indeed!

PART TWO
Were All in This
Together...
Youre Just in a
Little Deeper

No matter what the pain and problems may be like, everybody is looking for the answers to two basic questions: WHY? and HOW?

Folks who write to me often ask, Why me? Why us? Why our family? But just as often they also want to know, How? How can I deal with this? How do I learn to live with this pain?

I dont have all the answers. Frankly, sometimes Im not even sure I fully understand the questions. I wish I could always have something to say that would make everything all right right now, but I dont.

I do know one thing, though: WHATEVER COMES TO ANY OF US IS SENT OR ALLOWED BY GOD.

To some people, that may make God sound weak, uncaring, or even sadistic, but when youre facing the real world it helps to remember that God is in control. He is still at work, even when we feel that our suffering will never end. Like the psalmist commanded, we must hope... in God.

I like to compare suffering to making a cake. No one sits down, gets out a box of baking powder, eats a big spoonful, and says, Hmmm, thats good! And you dont do that with a spoonful of shortening or raw eggs or flour, either.

The tribulation and suffering in our lives can be compared with swallowing a spoonful of baking powder or shortening. By themselves these things are distasteful and they turn your stomach. But God takes all of these ingredients, stirs them up, and puts them in His own special oven.

He knows just how long to let the cake bake; sometimes it stays in Gods oven for YEARS. We get impatient and want to open the oven, thinking, Surely the cake must be done by now. But not yet; no not yet. What really matters is that the cake is BAKING and the marvelous aroma is filling the house.

I find that people who trust God with their suffering have an invisible something, like the invisible aroma of a freshly baked cake, that draws people to them. As Paul put it, all things [all the ingredients of pain and suffering] work together for good to them that love God.

When we believe that nothing comes to us except through our heavenly Father, then suffering begins to make a little sense to usnot much, I admit, but a little bit, and thats all God needs to work in our lives, just a mustard seed of faith.

Then we can see that God is using our pain to work something in us that is redemptive. Every trial or broken relationship goes into Gods oven and eventually we begin to smell like cake or fresh bread. Even our suffering counts for something!

PART THREE
How Do You
Cope When the
Apple of Your
Eye Becomes a
Bone in Your
Throat?

By far the greatest number of letters I get about ongoing pain come from parents of children who have caused them tremendous disappointment. In many cases children simply choose to rebel against all the values theyve been taught. In other cases, they make poor choices that affect the whole family.

What do you do when you raise a child to have Christian values and pour your life into teaching him or her the difference between right and wrong, and then have that same kid throw it all back in your face by growing up to follow a lifestyle totally different from what you have taught?

To watch helplessly as a darling child you have nurtured and loved goes off on a detour is one of the most frustrating emotional vacuums a parent can endure. Discouraged parents go through a kaleidoscope of emotionsanger, shame, hurt, feeling unappreciated, and resentfulI know because Ive been there.

For parents who are feeling guilt and self-pity about what a child may be doing or has done, I have one important reminder:
WHERE THERE IS NO CONTROL THERE IS NO RESPONSIBILITY.

Face it, your adult child is out of your control. That means your child is no longer your responsibility. When an adult child goes off the deep end of rebellion, a mother has to remember that she has had eighteen years to build in her values. If her child has gone against those values, it doesnt mean she has failed.