the situation

Regarding the situation which began in October and reached its unfortunate peak at the end of January and then seemed to spiral out-of-control all the way through April, things have taken quite a different turn. I speak vaguely of this; there's no reason to be specific, for almost all my readers are good friends who know exactly what I am writing about. There's an old proverb in the Bible that says, "As the dog returns to its vomit, so the fool returns again and again to his folly." There is truth in that--the fool may not like what he is doing, the fool may know that he is being foolish, and the fool may complain about his state... But he's still a fool. And proverbs says somewhere (not sure where) that it is foolish to try and persuade a foolish person to stop being foolish (nice play on words there). Unfortunately, proverbs is true, and I've come to realize that. In the end, nothing I say or do will keep the person from plunging back into the old habits. No matter how many times I sensitively and (at times) insensitively prod the person to repentance, that person has shown again and again that they just don't want to repent. I'm just wasting my time focusing so much energy on the person and the situation. I let it consume me (it's easy for that to happen when you care for someone so deeply), and then an old friend and wise mentor told me, "Don't let it destroy you. You must protect your heart." And his words struck deep within me. A man who preached sacrifice, bearing one another's burdens, being a shining light of compassion and care in the world, acknowledged that sometimes you just have to stand back. He backed it up with scripture very well.

I have pondered his words and prayed about the situation and talked to so many people about it, and all of their advice was ignored until a couple weeks ago. And I'm sure what's happened is both an answer to prayer as well as a natural occurrence within the rhythm of things. But I simply don't care like I used to. I do care, obviously. But I know, finally, that it's not my responsibility. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. And if the horse repeatedly refuses to drink--despite giving you all the signs that it wants to drink--then you're just wasting your time taking it to the watering hole. Better to just let the horse go and do its own thing and go on your way. And part of me felt selfish for this, and still feels selfish (guilt complex!), but I know it's the right thing to do, and God is blessing me within it. Instead of focusing on that person's life and my great concern for that person, I have just been focusing on myself (in a good way) and focusing on God's kingdom. And it's quite refreshing.