hearing in the moment.

Coming back from Thanksgiving break, I got really sick on the airplane and my ears completely closed up for a few days. It was a really terrible experience, but through it God put these thoughts in my head. I typed them out at 4 in the morning last night, haha.

I always thought that when my hearing returned, it would be in one sudden, euphoric cacophony of sounds. That in one popping instant, or maybe even a few crackling seconds, everything would become clear and I would hear things as I had never heard them before. I imagined a sudden revelation of the tone of my professor’s voice, the rush of the wind in the trees, any sort of outside noise being crisper, clearer, more beautiful than it ever had been. I longed for that moment. I had been without full hearing for two days. I felt like an outsider. I felt like everyone around me was part of something that I could not join. I felt alienated and frustrated. I wanted so badly to be how I was. I wanted so badly to be better. I woke up one morning, and my left ear was open. And then it closed again. And then the right one opened when I stepped in the shower. But I hardly cared to revel in the sounds of the water against the tile; I was merely frustrated at the one ear that minutes before had been open, but was now closed. One ear was not enough. I wanted both ears. All sounds! All at once! Give me noise. Give me fulfillment. Give me my hearing. And so my day went by, all heard through my right ear. And another day has gone by. And here I am. And I’m not sure when it happened, but I think both of my ears are open now. And there was no moment. There was no euphoria, no revelation, no grand sensation of sound and life and wonder. It all just kind of sounds like life. And I can hardly remember what it was like to be without hearing, but I know that this just sounds normal and I wanted something so much more. It’s like I’m still waiting, not fully trusting that this is actually what it is to have full hearing. Because there must be more. I know that there is more. I felt the longing for more. Give me fulfillment. Give me my hearing.

But isn’t this what we do? We sit here in deafness, in darkness, in pain, saying to God, “Give me fulfillment.” Give me my hearing. Or my eyes. Or my comfort. Give it all to me, all right now, because I’m longing for it and I know I’ll appreciate it if you would just give it to me now in one sweeping, grand gesture of your power and I swear I’ll appreciate it, I’ll recognize it for everything it is, just give it to me now. And we wait, but there is no moment. And things do change and shift and we can hear a bit better, but there is no moment. And one day we are sitting in our room and we realize that we’re better. That we can hear. That the pain is gone. And it happened at some point but there was no moment. It happened so slowly. Did it even happen? Is this healing? Because things should be brighter. And why aren’t they brighter, God, didn’t I feel that longing and shouldn’t that let me know that things can be brighter than this? Because I’m still longing for it God, and I wanted that moment. I wanted that moment.

And in the selfish, pitiful way of humankind, we forget what it was like to be deaf. To be in pain. And we forget how badly we wanted out and how wonderful it is that He took us out because we just wanted that moment. That moment that won’t come now, here, in this broken place. And we forget that we were disgustingly broken but now we’re at least one stitch better and it’s nothing of our own doing. I can shake my head and blink my eyes and bite my thumb but I cannot make my hearing return or make my eyes see or make the pain leave. He takes us out of our brokenness, whispering softly, shining steadily, healing quietly, and we come out on the other side and forget that we are no longer broken, simply because we are caught up in our longing for a moment we never had and are still longing for.

I don’t want to be caught up in longing for these moments. I know that they are real. I know that there is more. But I know that one breath ago, I was more broken than I am now. And that was a moment. And so is this. And so is this. And they don’t come with clamoring cymbals or flashing stars, but this was a moment. And I’m being made into something that I’m not, but long to be. And I know that. In this moment. In this moment, I can hear. And this is a moment.