When Thanks is Something You Don’t Want to Give

Years ago, one kid into our parenting journey, we took a cheap flight to visit Elaine’s family in Houston.

I’m not a huge fan of air travel. The trip to the airport alone drives me crazy enough, but everything that follows is a bit much: find a place to park the car, wait for the bus, wait in line to check in, wait in line for security, wait in line for the terminal train, wait at the terminal, wait in line to board, hope you get a good seat, hope someone big doesn’t sit next to you, wait to taxi, wait for takeoff clearance, blah blah, then do everyting in reverse when you land, all with a complementary bag of crackers and ¼ inch of leg room.

While waiting in the Houston terminal for our return, I slipped away for a quick trip to the restroom – one more thing I can’t stand about air travel. At the time, I hadn’t adjusted to parenting well, and the new church we had worked so hard to build wasn’t going well. Our marriage was struggling too. I’d say it was the worst chapter in our life together.

Nothing was right.

Anyway, in one of the worst moods I can remember, I walked into the bathroom, got a slap in the face from its familiar feng shui, paid my respects, and made my way for the door. As I washed up I had a brief moment of eye contact with the bathroom attendent, something I’d never seen in this place. He was a short, almost elderly man of Middle Eastern descent who had set his combs and towels on the counter with a reverent precision.

The place was holy so I left some money in his cup, then walked out, somewhat impacted. Though it was years ago, his aura has stuck with me to this day, frequently assaulting mine when I struggle to appreciate what I have.

To put it bluntly, because I don’t know how else to write this, he looked happy, so much so that I could feel it. You know what I mean – it’s impossible to be in the presence of happiness and not be somewhat aware of it especially if the two of you lock eyes. It’s a thing that us humans possess; not unike the way a dog can “smell” fear, we smell happy.

Anyway, I walked out of that bathroom wondering how its attendant, someone who had the worst job I could imagine, was happier than a guy who had so much more than I could’ve dreamed. Though my career had lost a couple of engines in mid flight, I had an amazing wife, my first kid, a house, a car, a house for my car, and as Lewis C.K. once said, was about to “ride a chair in the sky.”

Why was this guy so happy, and me so miserable?

As a middle-aged-American it was difficult to swim against the cultural currents that had left me focused on things I didn’t have. As a Christian male, and a would-be church planter/pastor in those days, it was impossible to lock eyes with career failure and simultaenously find peace in all the other good things that had befriended me.

Though things were lacking, disastrously so, I wasn’t unhappy because I lacked something required for happiness. I had refused to lock eyes with the great life that had been laid at my feet. I was too busy staring into the ugly face of everything that was missing.

He’s a jealous god, one that doesn’t tolerate competition, in constant demand of my worship. Every once in awhile he’ll give me what I want, only to demand more, leaving me in a perpetual state of emotional and spiritual poverty, hoping that the next carrot won’t be forever just out of reach.

But, cheesey and flannel-graphy as this will sound, there’s a different God to be worshipped, one that’s commanded me to give something that doesn’t come easy, especially for this American, would-be Jesus follower:

Thanks.

To do that, I have to unseat myself from the table of everything I’m hoping for, delightful as its unending bounty may seem, and repair to the dank scullery of my peanut butter and ice water life.

Thanks, God.

But when I’ve taken my mind out of the fantastic world of things that don’t exist, I can be present to the things that do. It’s a sacrifice to be sure, and requires great effort, but in those moments when I’ve managed, it makes room for something bigger, inciting me to spend my emotional and spiritual reserves on things that have nothing to do with disappointment, entitlement, anxiety, frustration, doubt, jealousy, etc.

I’ve lived on both ends of the $$$ spectrum, everywhere from rats in the wall (literally, seriously) to the nicest house I’ve ever lived in with plenty of sweet vacations and all the air travel I could hope for. Surprisingly, there’s been just as much happy in both extremes, and all points in between.

I can attest that it’s a waste of time to pine away for a situation that doesn’t exist.

It always forces me to turn a blind eye to everything else that does.