40

I turn forty in about three weeks.  I'm not one for milestones.  It shouldn't affect me at all.

But it has gotten me thinking about seasons of life.  When I was a young adult starting out, I was very idealistic.  I was idealistic about myself, about God, about marriage and family, about the church, about what could be done to make the world better.

Life will not conform to my ideals.  I can't conform to my ideals.  Everything fails.  I have always failed to be who I wanted to be.  God failed me--God did not fail himself, of course.  And God did not fail me, truly, because what I expected of God was not what God truly promised. But God certainly failed to be what I thought God would be for me.

The disappointment of unrealistic expectations failing to be met is the source of cynicism.  It's the root of all the belly-aching about the church, about the denomination, sideways cracks about spouses and children, putting on a happy face when something inside is cracked like an unseen broken foundation.  I think, for many of us, our thirties is a cynical decade.  My generation is certainly a cynical generation.  We kinda knew all along we were being lied to.

What comes next?

Love.  Love is about something real, not an ideal.  I've learned to love the local church for what it is, not what I want it to be.  I don't ever expect it to be the ideal.  I love it just like it is and do my best to help it be the best it can be for what it is.  My parents and siblings, same way.  Marriage and family, too, though that's harder.  I've got a long, long, way to go to have love for myself as I am.  God's in the same category.

It takes lots of years of going to God every day and being healed from our disappointment to learn to love.