TALKING THAT GETS THROUGH

Dad lives nine hundred miles from me; I too infrequently get to see him. I went and picked him up to take him to Mom’s funeral. COVID restrictions had kept me from seeing him for months. I would have him alone for close to two hours for the trip to the service. We would talk. I’d find out how he was really doing. How he was feeling, thinking about things. We’d have a heart to heart. I would get to talk to Dad--and he to me. We couldn’t on the phone. Dad at eighty-eight is practically deaf even with hearing aids. And, not just deaf. He suffers from dementia. Dad’s dementia is as debilitating as his deafness. Now, in the car seated right beside him, I would get to talk to him. Only it wasn’t to be. Oh, we talked. Tried to. I tried. He tried, a little. Soon, a silence settled in the SUV. I felt that heavy-black-frustrated despair I’ve often felt before with him, and with others--even with those who have excellent hearing. I couldn’t get through to Dad, nor he to me. I felt we were shut off from one another. Dad was sitting right there beside me. Yet, he seemed still a thousand miles and ten years distant. I kept trying, but, I only succeeded in communicating with the shell of Dad, not Dad. There was the shape of Dad, the flashing, feigning and vanishing glimpses of him, the shadow of fleeting familiarities. But, not Dad. There was no rapport. No clear flow of sharing self. I just could not get through to Dad, nor he to me. I couldn’t really talk to him, thus, I couldn’t really know him in that moment. Psychology and philosophy have struggle with this. In the best of times, health, relationships, and circumstances we really do not connect with one another in a way we can really know one another. Sin did this. It caused this alienation. This gulf. You can live a lifetime with a person and in an unexpected moment glance at them and that one appears a stranger. You think, “I don’t really know him. What makes him click. What he really thinks. What he really feels. Where he hurts.” And, then we look in the mirror and realize that we don’t really know ourselves much less others. If we do not know ourselves, how can we hope to know others? Somehow, we realize that language is our best hope, our best chance of knowing and being known. And so we talk. There are ephemeral flashes of epiphany with talk, but, usually, talk doesn’t get through. As wonderful as language is, using it to reveal ourselves to one another is as successful as using hieroglyphics to explain Einstein’s theory of general relativity. As pastor, I have attempt to get through to someone who was in real trouble and whom I wanted to help. Perhaps, they were tormented. Perhaps, they were rebellious. Perhaps, they were hurt. Something cried out from within me. Sometimes it escaped through my lips: I would call their name, “___________, I’m trying to TALK to YOU, the inside you, the deep you, the real you.” I couldn’t get them to share themselves to me even though they were chattering away. Conversely, I have tried to share what I was really thinking, feeling, struggling with, to those close to me. In the process, I realized I might as well be on a video call with my audio muted. They could see my lips moving, but they just weren’t getting it. Not their fault. I just couldn’t get it out in a way they could get it. Yes, though talking is our best chance to know and be known, it fails miserably. Even if we truly listen to the other and he, us. There are just too many filters, façades, feignings, and language is simply to inadequate. I have painted a pretty dark picture only to emphasize how wonderful the reality of God is. See, God knows us. The deep us. The inside us. The real us. Others may not know us. We may not know ourselves. God knows us. Intimately. Completely. Totally. Not the façade. Not the postured us. Us. (Psalm 139). Knowing us, He communicates to us. He gets through to us. He talks to the real us. And knowing that He knows us, we talk to Him. We share with Him. We pour out our hearts to him. To another what we are saying still may not convey who we are, what we feel. But, then again, God can interpret our groanings that cannot be uttered. Oh, wonder! A God that knows us. A God that can communicate who He is to us. A God to whom we can talk and He gets it. He gets us. The real person God is and the real person we are communicate, and, communicating, we know, truly know one another. Try it. Talk to God. He is right there beside you. That’s talking that gets through.

TALKING THAT GETS THROUGH

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