Finding God in the End-of-Semester Insanity

I'm working on a research paper for my Prison Epistles class. It is a 10-page paper that was due on Thursday, but for a variety of reasons I only started working on it yesterday. This is my 4th year at Heritage College now, and I'm pretty well used to the end-of-semester insanity: it's a two or three week stretch where life is absurd. We work on papers and assignments and study for exams constantly, sleeping here and there when exhaustion overtakes us, and are almost completely driven by stress and anxiety to get everything done. The engine that moves us is the fear of failure, along with a dose of guilt for not having done the work sooner.

It has been my repeated experience during these times that any intimacy I had with God quickly evaporates amidst the heat of the pressure and stress. It's almost like when push comes to shove, well, I shove God out of the way: "Ahh I just need to get this stuff done!!" By the time the last paper is handed in, or the last exam written, my heart is such a frayed, barren wasteland that it takes some time before peace, rest, and intimacy with Jesus are restored to me.

Also, ironically (or maybe just sadly), the opportunity I had to grow from studying and reading and learning so much precious truth is sacrificed on the altar of productivity; forgotten in the midst of a flurry of anxious toil.

Well, after three years of that, I'm trying something new. I'm trying to walk through this time more God-consciously than I usually do. It's been a huge blessing so far, although its true that my academic performance has dipped. I was doing some research tonight for that Prison Epistles paper and read this following passage in a book, The Message of Evil and Suffering, by Peter Hicks. I was just so blown away by the beauty of the truth of these words, but I never would have taken two seconds to reflect on them if I was in my usual tunnel-vision, git-r-done mode:

"We have a God who suffers. The evil and the sin of the world break his heart. The suffering and the hurt we go through cause him sorrow and pain. In love and grace and infinite goodness he has chosen to bear our sin and carry our sorrows, to draw close to us in our pain and our darkness. Confronted with such a profound truth, we can respond to our own suffering in one of two ways. We can ignore God's involvement in it; we can face it alone, perhaps with stoic courage or perhaps by giving way to doubt, self-pity, anger and the like. Alternatively, we can accept God's involvement. We can acknowledge that he comes to us in our suffering; we can choose to be drawn near to him through it. ... In our suffering and weakness he speaks grace to us; it is ours to choose whether we refuse that grace and walk the road alone, or take it and find it sufficient. For in the gift of suffering there is also the gift of the suffering One, and there can be no greater gift than that.

"'Not that way,' we say. 'Any other way; the way of committed service, the way of holy living, the way of deep study of the Scriptures, the way of meditation and prayer. But not the way of suffering.' True, there are many ways of drawing close to our God, and he uses them all. But the choice of which ones he offers us has to be his. And of this we can be sure: our heavenly Father will give only good gifts to his children."

Amen. I hope all my fellow students manage to find some peace and serenity in the midst of a crazy time of year.