The hardest thing about faith is the ability to hold on to
something that is not tangible. To believe that, no matter what my eyes see,
God is right beside me.
Since we closed the restaurant, we have lived by faith.
Trusting God, that no matter what our circumstances look like, He will always
provide. I have cried and cussed and laughed and been seriously depressed in
the process. I am not one who looks at the possibility of being homeless, or
carless or foodless and says, "Praise the Lord!"
I am one who says, "What the F Lord?!?!!?" I don't
talk to my God like He is some distant deity, I talk to Him like He is my best
friend. Flaws and all, realistic, honest, organic, true me.
I sit here... waiting... waiting for life to take a turn. A
financial turn, a job, a home, a car. Still in the same place we were when the
restaurant closed. 6 years of hardship... 6 years of lack... 6 years of hoping
and believing BY FAITH.
I don't see it. I don't see when it will end, but I believe,
BY FAITH in a God who loves me that is soon. It is not easy. Money continues to
evade us, cars continue to fall apart on us, and a home continues to be out of
reach. I breathe... my heart rate rises, my head pounds. It’s getting old, worn
out, tired.
Aren't you, the reader, tired of hearing the same old story
about the Beukers? Still without a job or a steady means of income to sustain
us? Haven't you questioned our motives, intentions or work ethic, due to the
situation we are in? I would, if I were on the other side of this.
God always provides. He doesn't fail us. But it doesn't make
the reality any easier. It doesn't make waiting until the final hour any
better. I still cry when we don't get the job applied for. I still cuss when
the car doesn't work and we have no money to fix it. I still get depressed when
I don't know how we are going to feed our kids. I don't share it as much. I
don't want to be "that person." You know the ones. The ones who
always need something, who are always down on their luck. I want to be the
person that is always helping, always giving, always encouraging.
I wrote a blog when my mom was dying called, “Jesus wept.”
It was about the notion that Jesus cried when he heard that Lazarus died, EVEN
THOUGH, even though he knew he was going to raise him from the dead. The
emotion of a friend dying was so great, that even the Son of God, who knows the
beginning from the end, let out an emotional burst of tears.
That is where I am today. EVEN THOUGH I know my God will
provide, THROUGH FAITH, the emotion behind the reality burst out of me with
great intensity. I am ready for this season of my life to be over. I realized
the other day, that half of Elijah’s schooling years have been hardship. HALF!
It started his 6th grade year and now he is in 12th,
getting ready to graduate. It’s pretty much all my other two kids know. They
were too little to remember the debt free, stay at home homeschooling mom. They
mostly remember loss and lack.
That overwhelms my emotions, and pours out of me. No matter
how hard we have tried, there has not been much respite. It has been a constant
pounding of the waves of financial hardship. My legs shake from the weariness
of trying to stand in the pounding. My body shakes from the cold water that just
pushed me over and tossed me around.
We, Bill and I, made a decision. We need to be in a place
where he can work, where there are opportunities for employment in his field.
So our eyes are including areas that are not in the Central Valley. Fresno, is
our home. It has been the city we have chosen to raise our kids. Twelve years
we have lived here. We are faced with the certainty that without a job, with
unemployment benefits gone, living on faith and food stamps, a borrowed car and
a rented house going up for sale… we are in the same situation we were when we
lost the restaurant…two steps away from being homeless, AGAIN!!!
Have we not learned the lesson? Have we missed something? I
am waiting for the moment. You know the moment when you finally make it to the
other side. When you can look back and say, “Awe, I did it, I pushed through
and overcame.” The Joseph moment. That is what I affectionately refer to. The
moment, when, after all the hardship he went to, was finally released from
prison and made ruler of all of Egypt, right beneath Pharaoh. Or how about the
Job moment. After losing everything, he remained faithful, never turning his
back on God, and God restored all that he had lost, 7 times over. Even Job told
the Lord to curse the day he was born, because the hardship was so great. I
have never done that. I just say, “What the F?!?!?” to Him.
There is only so much you can do, only so much you can say.
For me and my family, homelessness and serving God is so much more fulfilling
than doing something unethical to make a living. But it doesn’t make it easy.
In fact, it is excruciatingly painful and exhausting to keep having FAITH in
extreme hardship. In addition to the financial burdens, we have been faced with
the death of both of my parents, and the emotional trauma that came with their
rejection of me as a person.
Then there are my kids, who I try to protect. They too have
experienced hardship. My older son faced racism- yes, my predominately “white”
son was discriminated against by his coach, who is African American. It has torn
me up. Infuriated me. I have found myself looking to Martin Luther King Jr. for
quotes and encouragement. It has made me have even more empathy than I ever did
before for ANYONE who has been discriminated
against due to the color of their skin or race. More hardship, but for my
child. My daughter experienced bullying from her cheer coach. She learned to
stand up in the face of hardship and was then punished for it. My sweet little
girl, who loves everyone, began to turn cynical and angry. She saw injustice
and experienced the ugly side of nepotism. We had to help her process the pain
of watching the bully stay and coach and her being asked to leave her team for
standing up to her. Even today, she is fighting through it, learning to overcome
the abuse of a coach. My middle, highly dyslexic, struggles academically. We
had to fight and claw for him to be tested for a 504 plan, so that he would
have an equal opportunity to succeed in school. He fights stigma of having a
disability with humor and being goofy, but I know it hard for him.
FAITH… more faith… believing the hardship my children have
faced will benefit their character. I try to show them the positives of being
discriminated against, being bullied and having a disability. Empathy, being an
overcomer, loving your enemies… I try to stay positive and let it drive their
love for all people. Let is marinate to give them savory faith. The financial
hardship gives them a broader spectrum of compassion for others. They are
blessed! I mean blessed! My extended family floods them with blessings… Aunts,
uncles, grandparents… they shower them with the things we cannot. So they do not lack in material things. They do not live in poverty. They know they are loved, they know they are safe. They know what it is to have plenty and they know what it is to have lack.
So faith remains to be the constant in our lives. The one
thing that never changes, the one thing that we can all depend on. Faith, is being
sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. That is the story
of our life. The story that has carved the deep crevices of character and
compassion into our hearts.
I write, to help me process, to help me breathe. My heart
rate is slowing down, my blood pressure is lowering. It is my therapy. My way
to live. It gives me a canvas in which I can paint the picture of my heart. I
stand back and see color. There is no rhyme of reason to the strokes, but it is
our life. There is no more room to paint. I hope that soon the Lord will give
us a new canvas to paint, a new book to write.
For now, I will go back to my reality, hoping, believing, and
living by FAITH.
