The other day, driving to church, K was talking about his tummy hurting. I don’t remember the whole conversation now, but he ended up saying something like, “just my tummy is hurt but my whole me is ok.”

And that stuck with me. His whole me.

I had to write that down and keep going back to it. That saying about “out of the mouth of babes” is really true. Sometimes the way K phrases things just stops me in my tracks, and this was one of those times. I couldn’t really figure out what it was that struck me but I knew I needed to spend some time sitting in it.

Last month, I got to speak in church about the important of addressing mental health in the church. It was incredible on a lot of levels and healing for me in a lot of ways as I have spent most of my life doubting the importance of my voice.

The theme behind the mental health focus came from Matthew 22:37-40

37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

The basis of the goodness of all things working together is rooted in loving God with our whole heart, soul and mind. So, why does the importance of the mind get so overlooked, and even condemned or intentionally neglected in some Christian areas? I have a whole lot to say about all that…..another day.

So, all of that was floating around in my head as I sat with K’s words about his “whole me” being ok even though his tummy hurt.

It made me think of Paul in Romans where he talks about being joyful in his suffering. Paul also talks about a burden that he continually asked God to remove but He never did. And yet, he remains grateful. Maybe his tummy hurt, but his whole me was ok?

So then….. I’m thinking my son just nailed the age old dilemma of a loving God allowing awful tragedy to happen, or bad things happening to good people, or not removing certain pains and traumas that we ask him to. And in this, I think the church has done a poor job of discussing what being grateful in times of turmoil really means. It doesn’t mean we laugh and ignore pain, it doesn’t mean we dismiss the hurt or the heaviness of what we carry. We can cry and be angry and feel hopeless, while we also acknowledge that God is good and is walking with us.

It’s in this tension that I think real, deep, martyr level faith exists. To be able to trust God enough to yell and scream at Him, and also trust Him enough to keep going. To trust that God is working and God is bigger, even when our human eyes can’t see it or feel it.

Faith based upon intimate relationship allows us to hold that difficult and often painful tension, to both validate that our tummy hurts while also holding onto the truth that our “whole me” is ok.

As I continue to think about this dichotomy, I am also struck with the truth that in my darkest times, my whole me did not feel ok. And when things bigger than a tummy ache happen, the “whole me” can feel pretty broken, discarded, used up and empty.

As western Christians, well, western people in general, we seem to operate most naturally as a disintegrated system. We go to different specialist for different areas of our body. We take different meds to control various symptoms, and then more meds to control the side effects of those. We work to shut parts of ourselves down to fit in or to move on. There is not a lot of integration. We even work really hard to define ourselves by all the things that make us different and spend very little time focusing on the things we all share.

If we as a Christian people really put into practice that our “whole me” needed to be loving God, and working in tandem to do so, I wonder if it would be easier to feel like I’m broken in the context of knowledge that my God is a mighty healer. And then would it be easier to take my brokenness to Him, or to the other whole body followers around me, and find true acceptance and healing? Isn’t this how creation was supposed to be, walking naked with each other, AND WITH God, in the garden of His creation? That seems to be a perfect visual of being fully present with our whole me….. no shame.

Our whole me, body, heart, mind and soul, was created by God intimately. We were not created for this world, but for relationship with our Creator. The refiners fire process we are in on this earth is full of pain, growth and discomfort. Satan prowls like a roaring lion to devour us. But our whole me is destined for glory; Wholeness and reunification with God in Heaven. When we keep in mind the whole me, the whole picture of who we are, we can keep that in tension with the pain of this world.

Honestly, when I think about it too much, I get overwhelmed. It’s such a simple concept and also seems to contain depth and richness that my soul needs. It was so easy for K to know that while his tummy hurt, his whole me was ok and he was going to be fine. He also didn’t dismiss that his tummy hurt. He brought both to me, a parent he trusts and knows he is loved by.

Maybe I can take both to my God, that I trust and know I am loved by? I can rest in the knowledge that the things that have broken me do not define me. My whole me is defined by Him, and he calls me perfect.