When Your Suffering Seems Too Much with Chaplain Fr. John Meyer
What do you do when you are suffering and want nothing more than to avoid it?
The holy mystery of “Jesus is the Garden” is the sacred blueprint to follow when what we are facing seems too much to bear.
Learn how to go to God, even in the times you want to run away.
This Lent, allow the Divine Physician to hold and propel you forward to new life.
Click Here to Listen to Last Week’s Podcast with Roxie Beckles
Transcript:
Lindy Wynne (00:01.706)
Welcome to Mamas in Spirit, a podcast pointing you towards God in everything you are and everything you do. I'm Lindy Wynne and it's a blessing to be with you. Hello everyone. Welcome to this seventh season, the seventh year of Mamas in Spirit, this mini retreat in a podcast, our Lenten series where we get to learn in all the ways, both in our literal lives and in our lives of prayer.
that God's grace is sufficient, which we can find in 2 Corinthians, verse nine. What a joy it is. It feels very Eastery, even though we're in Lent, to be here with our beloved Chaplain Father Jon Meyer, who is just a precious friend of my husband Brian's and mine. Father Jon thank you for being here.
Fr Jon Meyer (00:56.6)
Happy Lent and seventh season. Congratulations, Lindy, on six full seasons and seventh season. That's beautiful. And
Fr Jon Meyer (01:17.102)
For those of you who have been listening for a while, welcome back. I'm praying that you're having a very blessed Lent so far. And for those of you who are new, may this podcast just deepen your understanding of God's unconditional love and draw you evermore into that love so that it transform your life and help you to be a greater...
witness to that love, especially to those around you.
Lindy Wynne (01:48.111)
Yes, thank you so much for sharing that Father Jon and I feel very questionable because I often don't say too much about Mamas in Spirit or about myself or either one of us in the beginning of podcasts and I forget that like there's new people here because we are already brothers and sisters in Christ and that is the most important thing that we want you to know is your belovedness to God and that we are already brother and sisters in Christ and that we are blessed beyond measure to be here with you. When I started Mamas in Spirit, a tiny mustard seed in my heart
planted about seven years ago, because it took a lot of time and preparation to get to season one. It was really, I was unaware that it would be a healing podcast. And that really is what it is. It's for us to all go to the well of living water for everything that we need, because God is that generous and that good. And so that we can, by the grace of God, heal, that we can live lives of hope and ultimately be with love, love itself.
here now, eternally and share that love while we're here together on earth. So we are blessed by you. Please reach out at any time at mamasinspirit.com or mamasinspirit.gmail.com for us to pray for and with you. We love you. That's why we do this. Even if we've never met, we love you like God loves us. So all glory and praise be to God and in that spirit and the Holy Spirit, Father Jon, will you please open us in prayer?
Fr Jon Meyer (03:13.546)
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Fr Jon Meyer (03:21.496)
Father, thank you for this time.
as we enter into this mini-retreat, help us to be aware of our own condition, our emotions, our thoughts, to be aware of your presence, maybe where we resist that presence or those things that you've invited us to become more intentional in this Lenten season.
Fr Jon Meyer (03:56.984)
May we draw above all from the great wellspring of your grace to depend on that strength that comes only from you.
Fr Jon Meyer (04:11.766)
And whether we are in a place now of weakness, of frustration, or whether we know more acutely your peace and joy.
Lindy Wynne (04:22.684)
.
Fr Jon Meyer (04:29.004)
All is for your glory. And may this special season be for us a journey through the desert that.
allows us in greater purity.
Lindy Wynne (04:43.192)
Thank you.
Fr Jon Meyer (04:46.798)
to experience what lies ahead.
Fr Jon Meyer (04:52.6)
May you bless Lindy and myself that what gets shared is all for you.
Fr Jon Meyer (05:03.0)
provide us wisdom and the graces we need to speak in you.
and allow your spirit to speak through us.
We ask this through the intercession of our Holy Mother Mary and all the saints in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Lindy Wynne (05:27.273)
Amen.
Lindy Wynne (05:31.188)
Amen. Thank you, Father Jon, for that beautiful prayer. also speaking of our sorrows and of Lent and of difficult times in our lives, lives that are more desolate and the beauty of the mysteries of the Rosary and these stories found in scripture is to also see our own experiences in them and to see the roadmap, the blueprint of life, Jesus in them guiding us and helping us to navigate
every single thing we face in our lives. And as you talked about like our feelings and where we're at right now, we're going to be talking today about total dependence on God. Hence the scripture, your grace is sufficient because God's grace is sufficient. And Father Jon, I imagine you can relate to this, but hopefully you can speak to this is that my life in so many ways I have felt is a wrestling between myself and my surrender of self to the will of God.
time and time again as I've entered different seasons really of Lent in my own life, different seasons of suffering, I sense my own grappling to kind of hold on or hold on to my own will until I very quickly reach the end of myself and find myself suffering even more and by the grace of God surrendering myself so that God can fill me, so God can nourish me, so God can help me, so God can sustain me, so that I can know peace, love and joy regardless of what I'm facing in.
my own life. And many of you already know some of some of my my experiences of suffering in my own life. The greatest one was Sister Gianna Junker talked about last year in Lent, which was just so profound is that I am my greatest cross, very humbling coming from a Dominican sister who is as precious as her. And that
I am my own greatest cross. It is because of myself, oftentimes, that I suffer so much and that grappling to surrender myself to the will of God and really the goodness, the generosity of God. And so I share that because in some of my circumstances that I experience as I navigate life and I walk through that kind of unfold before me have been situations of illness in my family. My husband has faced chronic illness.
Lindy Wynne (07:44.545)
We are a family through the gift of adoption. Brian and I have been infertile yet felt very called to adoption by the grace of God before we knew that for sure. And our children, a couple of our children are living with disabilities and with mental illness. And so not only as the two shall become one, but as we all become one, hopefully and prayerfully in the Lord, we suffer together.
and hopefully we surrender together to the Lord for that infilling. And so today we're gonna be cracking open stories and really navigating deeper into the layers of relying on God's grace and the sufficiency, which is, I mean, that word is not even enough to explain the way that God blesses and gifts us to be able to journey through in love itself.
Fr Jon Meyer (08:37.486)
Thanks for sharing that. The word that comes to mind in... So maybe to just preface that, I'm currently assigned to our diocesan seminary here in Los Angeles and work in particular with guys who are in their first year of seminary formation. They're just coming out of the world and many of them these days receive the call to the priesthood.
after a conversion or reversion to the faith. And so, needless to say, many of them enter the seminary with this great zeal and hopefulness about following God and wanting to give their life to Him in love. And yet at the same time, what becomes apparent is, and this was the case for me as well, that
Lindy Wynne (09:25.497)
you
Fr Jon Meyer (09:34.606)
There are things that hold us back, that there are experiences that maybe we didn't ask for or habits that we formed or attitudes that we carry that are not in line with God. some of those attitudes are toward God himself. And so the word that came to mind when I was listening to you, Lindy, is a word that I often think about with the men that I'm accompanying.
Lindy Wynne (09:58.259)
you
Fr Jon Meyer (10:03.714)
And it's the word curiosity. When we, especially in this time of Lent, when we're trying to focus more on where do we need purification? Where do we need conversion? Where's the Lord inviting us to a greater, whether it's openness to Him or maybe it is a greater effort of love toward our family. Usually I would say it boils down to the exchange of giving and receiving.
Lindy Wynne (10:29.163)
.
Fr Jon Meyer (10:33.216)
love is kind of how the cycle of our Christian discipleship typically goes. And so with these men that I'm accompanying, the hardest thing is that, and I would say it's among the first steps that we take when we become self-aware, like, I need to work on this or, this is hurting me, like I'm suffering, is
having this curiosity, which you can say is maybe like a desire, which we can't presume is always there because especially if we're talking about things that have hurt us in the past or, and I think in my own life, I've shared this before, with losing my mom in my early 20s to cancer and just even various smaller
disappointments and rejections that we, when we're hurt, we're not necessarily curious. We, in fact, if anything, we kind of hunker down into like this survival mode or this place where we need to protect. And if we're focusing so much on being protected, then our thoughts tend to be directed more toward building
the wall, the proverbial wall, so to speak. How can I, whatever that is threatening me, and a lot of times what's threatening might be outside of us, know, might be whether it's like if we're stressed about finances or about our job, if we're stressed about, you know, the people that we live with, or sometimes it's...
It's, as you were pointing out, you know, we're our own worst enemies. And so there are things within us that threaten us. and I would say that includes some of the wounds that we carry. so curiosity can't be presumed, you know, in, in this healing process. and yet as I am learning with these, guys that I journey with is,
Fr Jon Meyer (12:55.918)
creating a space that over time encourages them to become curious about, okay, well, why does this hurt me? Or why does this threaten me? I mean, naming it is a big step too. For example, sometimes I'm often insecure about wanting to please people or
wanting to, I have some perfectionist tendencies. And so if I'm in the protective mode, I'm not thinking, why do I do that? If I'm in the protective mode, I'm just, in a way, it's just kind of happening. It's like I'm parts of me to take control. But if I take a step back and begin to see, well, wait a second, why am I stressed? Why is this,
causing anxiety? Why is this making me angry? That's a question of curiosity. it begins to, if we're willing, you know, and this is where I think God's presence is so important. But I maybe we can, I don't know what direction we necessarily want to go in this, in this talk, because sometimes our resistance to curiosity is, is directed to God, you know, we might be angry at God, or we might have doubt.
in God. And so even if we identify like I'm angry toward this person or I'm anxious about what might happen if, you know, I lose my job, for example, but we can also carry this autonomy, this self-reliance. And I think that is where, especially in this Lenten season, God is saying, wait a second, wait a second. When we look at
the story of Exodus, which is kind of the paradigm for the Lenten season and the Israelites and their journey from Egypt into the desert. We see time and again, the Israelites trying to, you know, kind of grasp at the things that they need to do. You know, this is when they like complain about not having food and they complain about not having water. And it's like, we're going to die or we should go back to slavery. Right. And God is, is reminding them over and over again, I'm, faithful and
Fr Jon Meyer (15:17.528)
gives them food, gives them water. And so all that to say in those places of our life where we are maybe feeling called to probe a little more, is there curiosity? And maybe the second question would be, where is God in the midst of that curiosity?
Lindy Wynne (15:44.309)
.
Thank you so much, Father Jon. And I love how you said like, I don't know where we want to go with this because Father Jon and I have already surrendered this podcast to Jesus and to the Holy Spirit. And I'm about to share things I did not expect to share here today. And like in my prayer before didn't necessarily come up, but I know that this is what I'm called to share. So when I started Mama's in Spirit in the very beginning, which we already touched on today, which is probably providential at the time.
I had three women in my life who were very, very sick and were struggling to survive with children that were either relatively young or were very young. The youngest child at the time I think was six or seven. And then another one of my friends had children who were in middle school. And then my other friend, Carolyn, who you've heard about many times before if you've been listening to Moms in Spirit.
had children in their early 20s. And so that sorrow and that difficulty of that time was really part of the birth of mamas in spirit. And that's a story for another day that it just shows so beautifully like God's goodness and God's redemption in difficult circumstances. Yet when I think back to that time, and I'm gonna speak specifically and mostly to Carolyn.
because she was the one that I had the most intimate relationship with at the time. She was an answered of prayer, a sister in Christ, a role model. I like to say that she taught me how to die because I watched her die. Like in her last days, I was blessed to spend time with her and I will never forget her gaze, the gaze of her heart being fixed on Christ while we were all like watching her to learn from her.
Lindy Wynne (17:38.141)
And so watching her die in such peace and with the grace of God, just like so evident and so profound, that changed me. That like changed my life. And yet she also taught me how to live because even in her last months, in her last weeks of her life, she was a joy. I even remember what she said to me, the last word she said to me when I said,
really goodbye to her in a sense, even though she's still with me and I know that and I sense her so close. I remember her looking into my eyes with such liveliness, like with such passion, like with really like the life of Christ and filling her and her speaking to me. And so I share this because at the time it was really devastating and I don't think that I accepted death as a part of life as much as I have now.
this number of years later, about six, seven years later. And so I recently found out that someone else I love is struggling with illness, really, really serious illness. And that curiosity that you said, Father Jon, because this is someone that I really love, and I really love her children, and they're really, really important to me.
this time, like God working on my heart and in my life with that deeper acceptance of death and even like what we would see as premature death in life, not that that will happen. I don't know what's gonna happen. This is like living with ambiguity yet for many of us, if not all of us, I think a lot of our fears stem around death and the fear of death of those we love or our own. And so,
It's interesting because I think about a lot of the spiritual readings that I've read and the ones that have touched my heart most fully. Like I think one of them is man's search for meaning. Wasn't that when he was in the Holocaust and he was in the concentration camps? It's like, my goodness, he spent all this time in the concentration camps attending to and being curious about like his own experience and then the experience of those around him and then being able to like bless us all.
Lindy Wynne (20:00.359)
with like these insights and this depth and this help that was because of that curiosity and that attentiveness and that depth. And I see that so much in like our Catholic spirituality and our Catholic readings, like that attentiveness to the interior life. And so I know that this is a season of Lent that I am re-entering with a friend that is precious to me.
Fr Jon Meyer (20:29.55)
And that is the end of video. Thank you for watching.
Lindy Wynne (20:30.991)
And I know, like when I found out that the mere thing that I can do is like what Jesus did in the garden and that is turn to the Lord. Turn to the Lord and ask the Lord to take the cup of suffering away if it's his will and ultimately abandon myself, albeit very, very imperfectly, hopefully by the grace of God to God's will and to God's infilling so that I can love.
And the last thing I just want to say about this is that all of these experiences with these women that are precious to me have taught me that that is also the pilgrimage, hopefully and prayerfully of my own life. Like all of our lives on earth are finite, my own included. I'm 48 years old and I feel like we never know how long each year is a gift. Each day is a blessing and to stay in the day. And in that, you know, there's a beautiful freedom and healing and accepting.
that, like my own death, death, whenever that will be so that hopefully and prayerfully, by the grace of God, I can live and love fully like these women who have lived and loved so fully and have been living witnesses to me.
Fr Jon Meyer (21:49.09)
Thanks for sharing all that. If you don't mind, wouldn't, you know, to maybe probe this experience a little more, because you shared, you know, some important, I guess, details. You know, if we think about like what I hear and what you said, what I hear in what you just said is that, you know, there's a fear of death. And in fact, I remember
You know, and just several years ago, running into an article that talked about like the fear of death as being kind of like the primordial fear for all of us. Like it's the great unknown out of all the things we don't know. Like death is the one with the least certainty because we, other than, you know, Jesus, we don't really have anyone who's testified to life after death. So, but you are also sharing
certain, you know, these stories of women that you've encountered who testify to this joy in the midst of the certainty of death. And, you know, I'm curious in your own experience. I just said, am curious, huh? In your own experience.
Lindy Wynne (23:06.001)
that I am hearing.
Fr Jon Meyer (23:13.582)
How has that fear of death manifested in maybe like unintended ways, in ways that might be more of a sign of that fear driving you versus like a willingness to even look at the fear, if that makes sense? Because you mentioned at the end about like coming to a greater acceptance of death, which is a, you know, that would be another step in the process. I mean, that's an important step, that acceptance.
But can you think of ways that before that acceptance, that the fear of death has somehow had a grip over your life?
Lindy Wynne (23:46.257)
I think that I can speak to that most specifically more than personally because I just want to be really honest with everyone. I'm a work in progress and I don't feel like I've personally arrived at that. I feel like that's a work that God is doing in my heart and in my life right now. Like that's...
that's kind of a spiritual space and exercise that I don't know how it's gonna unfold, not meaning my own death, but like, I don't know what this is gonna continue to look like for me interiorly yet. I just sense this is the movement. It almost feels like the ultimate release or laying down of one's life in a sense. And Kathy McElroy, she is from Alabama and she's amazing.
One year I interviewed her about preparing for my own death and she's still living, praise God, yet still very much like fighting for her life or, know, she takes, she's receiving care to be able to still live, medicinal care and all the things. And she's amazing. She's just another role model. So if anybody wants to listen to that podcast, I can help you find it if you need.
And so anyways, I bring that up that's still on me yet, speaking of Lunt, and these two stories are stories that were on my heart for this particular mini retreat in a podcast where we share our conversions and reversions. And I think there was a part of me, Father Jon, and everyone gathered, and I wonder if y'all can relate to this or not, is that I think there is a part of me that thought,
this suffering is so great that I'm going through right now or when I would like come to the end of a specific suffering in my life. But I think that's so difficult and that's so hard. was almost like a shield of suffering had been placed over my heart. Like, well, I know how painful that is. I know that depth of pain. So somehow that will shield me from experiencing that depth of pain again. Well, that is not the way it works. I have learned.
Fr Jon Meyer (25:59.886)
Hmm.
Lindy Wynne (26:06.032)
Sweet world. So this last year, as in the year that came to completion in 2024, two things unfolded that were incredibly difficult in my life and they were new. They were like sufferings that I had never experienced before. And I have learned that if my heart is going to be open to the Lord, it's like the seven sorrows of Mary, the seven piercings of her heart.
our hearts will be pierced again and again in life. Praise God we have Jesus. We have the divine physician and the healer. And so the first was that my husband Brian had a health scare. And for a week we thought that he may have cancer. And it seemed like all medicinal signs were pointing towards that he may likely have this. And so in that week of my life, now we have one small child
Still living in our home and she is 10 and she was we were blessed with her through the gift of adoption So during that week and living with that ambiguity it felt and I felt very fragile and very vulnerable and very close to the Lord very Dependent on the Lord and we barely told anybody about this many of you know Maybe from your own suffering with illness or other things or someone you love
Sometimes it's harder to tell other people because it's more to navigate, like navigating how everybody else is like responding and then talking about it and whatnot. So we chose to keep it pretty quiet and there were some people praying for us and that time, that week was really a week of like intense prayer. And one night I went out on my front porch and sat on my little rocker, which I like to joke, I'm on the Southern darling front porch and I barely ever sit on the rocker but.
That night I did. And it was like me and the Lord. That was it. Like it was quiet. We live on a little bit of land. Like I knew God was with me in that moment. And that was the moment that like God cracked open my heart to my deepest concern. Like the thing that I was carrying with me that I was most concerned about.
Lindy Wynne (28:26.805)
And of course, anybody who's a mother knows or loves somebody like your own child knows there's no love like a mama heart or a parent heart. And my greatest concern was for our youngest because one, we don't want any child to lose a parent ever, let alone young. And our child, I feel already has lines of grief written in her story, lines of loss through her adoption while we're so blessed to be family and
She's the dream of our heart and all the things like the poor little girl, the little soul is going to have a lot to process as she gets older and she learns more about her story. And I think for anybody who has experienced adoption, I would imagine may, may, may feel that way. don't know. We'd have to ask each person, like there it's like the story starts with, with loss in some ways. And so that, that night, as I sat out there, I did something that I learned from Carolyn when Carolyn was dying.
She asked God that she could live to see her daughter get married and then also to see her first grandchild. While she saw her daughter get married, yet she was nine and very close to death before a grandchild was ever born. And so she was very adaptable. Speaking of adaptability, like this is like the adaptability that comes from heaven. And she changed her prayer that she'd be able to kiss her grandchildren in heaven before they came down to earth.
And that struck my heart so deeply. Well, I've told people, I don't think I've ever asked God specifically like for something. That's just like not how my prayer life has been in my lifetime. I discovered God as a nine-year-old girl and God was more like a presence and like very messy. Everyone, I have definitely turned away from God at times in my life. Yet like God has always been like,
the infilling like, you know, the presence I needed, the refuge I needed, the perseverance I needed, the peace, all the things. And so this time though, I was like, I asked God for something. So the first thing that I asked God that night on the front porch for was that Brian, my husband, would survive to see our youngest graduate from high school. And then I rescinded my prayer. So I really hope that we can rescind prayers.
Lindy Wynne (30:46.925)
Because I was like, no, Lord, that is not my prayer. My prayer and my request from you is that Brian lives to walk our youngest down the aisle for her wedding. And I knew in that moment, and I know now in this moment that I have no control over that. I have no control. I have no idea if that's going to happen or not. Yet there was something so beautiful and healing.
Fr Jon Meyer (30:57.742)
Hmm.
Lindy Wynne (31:15.198)
about just being there with the Lord and naming it. Just naming it. You talked about that Father Jon, and we did not plan this. Just naming the desire of my heart and placing it tenderly in the tender hands, the hands of Christ. Because I have no idea what's gonna unfold in my life. All I know is this very moment that I'm with all of you. I know nothing else.
Yet I do trust by the grace of God, Emmanuel, that God was with me on the front porch in that moment. God is with me now and God will be with me always. God is with you always. That's God's promise. That is Emmanuel. And so that was one of the most difficult experiences, even though my husband didn't end up having cancer, which is so interesting.
yet there was in a sense like a reversion, a return to God with all of my heart. That's what our catechism speaks of conversion in that moment. And then very quickly, the second thing that unfolded is that one of my children landed in a situation that as a mother that we most do not want to happen. Like when we think of all the things that could happen with one of our children and we think of, well, I would never want this to happen. It was one of those things. And that was incredibly
vulnerable and incredibly difficult. And I learned from that situation, which total dependence on God, plus the one that I already shared about that healthcare, once again, about my total dependence on God, because I think my avoidance of suffering is like me, like wanting to control myself. So it's like, okay, I don't have to experience the suffering because I've already experienced this other suffering. And so that was so hard.
That was so hard, but somehow I'm not gonna do it again. Well, that's all me trying to rely on my own will and my own self, but love is vulnerable. And we've talked about this so many times in Momma's in Spirit, in Momma's in Spirit podcast. mean, that's the thing. If we choose to return to God, hopefully for the healing and the grace and the infilling of God to love again, we're choosing to still be vulnerable. But there's that old quote, who I have no idea where it's from. Maybe you do Father Jon, that's about like,
Lindy Wynne (33:34.636)
It's better to have loved and to have lost and never have loved at all. Like that is the question in many ways.
Fr Jon Meyer (33:56.78)
that you share is a reminder, I think, for all of us of the... and you use the word vulnerability, but maybe another word, strangely enough, that comes to me is the beauty of the unknown and how it places us in such a frail position.
that really as human beings who choose, we don't always choose what happens to us, but we choose how to respond to it.
And in those most vulnerable and uncertain moments, there's so many different directions we can go in, you know, with our thoughts, with our emotions, and then ultimately with our actions. And this is where I think, you know, you begin to see people, you know, holding grudges, you know, toward God, maybe even toward themselves because, you know, they don't...
We don't like, I shouldn't say they, we, myself included, we don't like being in that discomfort than the pain that comes when we feel so helpless and we're not in control.
That is a precious moment to reverence because too often I think our immediate response is, what can I do? Or maybe we even want to distract ourselves, right? We want to numb that discomfort. As you said, you know, avoid the pain, avoid the pain. And of course so much in our society just screams that, Avoid the pain. Focus on pleasure, focus on what you do have control over, focus on, you know, the outcomes that you can.
Fr Jon Meyer (35:57.794)
you know, have some level of guarantee and.
for myself.
I think most, maybe not most, but a lot, a lot of the wounds I inflict on myself, so the judgments and the self-criticism and the self-condemnation and maybe even self-hate derive from those moments when I have the expectation that isn't met.
So whether I should be in control of this or I should have an answer to this and I don't, that's when we begin to, as you said, we become our own worst enemy.
And yet, rather than going there, which I've done so many times and still continue to do, I'm beginning to retrain myself.
Fr Jon Meyer (37:01.102)
approach those vulnerable moments differently. I would say in a better way because there's so many lies that we begin to tell ourselves because we are not in control. But not being in control is in fact a truth. It's a truth that we don't like, but it is a truth that
I think to your point and what your story is alluding to is that it becomes an opportunity to accept the unknown, to accept what remains in the dark. And sometimes that darkness can be an evil, but a lot of times that darkness is just the limitations of our human knowledge.
so Lent is such a great time to bring up that vulnerability and to again, have curiosity over how, how do we respond in those moments of vulnerability? How do we tend to try and grasp or to react when we are avoid, when we, when we experience a pain, but we want to avoid it, we don't want to go there.
Lindy Wynne (38:21.31)
You
Fr Jon Meyer (38:31.01)
Jesus.
who is the perfect man, we do believe, and the Catechism states this, that even though he was fully God, that in his humanity, there are certain things that he did not have full knowledge of, including his passion, which is why when we read in the Garden of Gethsemane before he is arrested, he cries out in prayer like, Father, take this cup from me, yet not
my will but your will. And this becomes a very precious moment that I think mirrors so much of our experience. I mean, as you were sharing with that scare with Brian, I mean, you could translate that prayer to, Lord, let this cup pass from me, but not my will but your will.
And that I think that's what Jesus teaches us is that we're all going to have moments where we experience a pain or an uncertainty that we don't want. We want to reject, we want to avoid. And yet, no matter how the efforts that we make to try and either, I don't know, pretend it's not there or to minimalize it, to rationalize it, to...
Lindy Wynne (39:42.441)
Any questions?
Fr Jon Meyer (39:56.172)
or to overcome it with our own efforts, we always end up inflicting pain on ourself when God is inviting us to say, give this to me. Let my will be done in this because he promises us and we see this, you know, again, going back to the Exodus story in the Israelites that he's faithful, you know, the people cry out, Lord, how am I going to feed?
all these people. mean, right, this happens in the Gospel too. That's Moses' prayer. And we very much relate to that. But then God shows up and maybe not in the way that we want Him to, maybe He doesn't take the cup from us, but He didn't take the cup from Jesus.
And so, but we know that Jesus in his perfect unity with God the Father was always entrusting himself to the Father. I mean, isn't that what Jesus says? I come not to do my will, but the will of him who sent me. And this might include pain, this might include, you know, so much uncertainty and it might include, it might, and I think maybe to what we're talking about here is,
reconciling with the ways that we have in an unhealthy way, try to grasp or control the pain in our life, the wounds in our life, only to inflict more wounds upon us. but here's the alternative is that now we can surrender. Now we can accept God's invitation to, to walk with us in a way that maybe we weren't before.
And the word that you used, I think, was trust. And trust is, you know, it's a word that we might throw out a lot these days, but fundamentally, it's a word that we don't actually embrace these days. I mean, there's so much suspicious. that culture of suspicion is so prevalent in our society today.
Fr Jon Meyer (42:14.612)
And it is suspicion that's going to close us off from God and close us off from others and in a way close us off from our deeper, like true self, because parts of us again, don't want to face the pain. And so, but if I can just be practical for a second, what you testified to Lindy is an acknowledgement and awareness that you were in a difficult situation.
And rather than fighting against it, you turn to the Lord. And that's, think, the crux that we can acknowledge. I'm in pain or I'm in a situation that I'm uncomfortable in, or there's things about myself that I don't like. And rather than continue in whatever pattern of behavior we, we typically react to in those situations to be intentional and say,
Okay, Lord, I invite you into this pain.
I don't maybe I don't normally trust you here and that might be worth exploring like why don't you trust the Lord there? What would happen if you didn't get your way? Or what would happen if what you're trying to cling to you actually let go of? And that's those are you know simple but they're kind of telling questions right they kind of reveal more like where our heart is actually at because God isn't asking us to
Lindy Wynne (43:46.959)
Yeah, I got it.
Fr Jon Meyer (43:49.73)
Just suck it up.
God is not asking us for our perseverance to take the form of white-knuckling and to just say, it is what it is, but to acknowledge that maybe that I don't trust God as much as I think I do or that I don't believe He loves me in the way I think I should believe that He loves me.
And that honesty, I think in and of itself begins to access a new freedom.
And I know that's something that I've experienced in my life, even just more recently in being surrounded by working with these seminarians, that there's a lot of things that I don't have control over and man, does it upset me because usually when I'm faced with a trial or an obstacle, it's like, okay, how can I overcome this? But I think God is...
is inviting me into more of a space of where he's asking me like, where am I here?
Fr Jon Meyer (45:10.22)
why am I not taking the weight? And because I'm used to wanting to carry the weight or of putting that pressure on myself, which isn't, you know, healthy and because I'm a weak human being is really not practical when God wants to do so much in and through me if I actually just let him.
Lindy Wynne (45:34.062)
Yes, amen. And I love how you said the word practical and use those questions. And so what's really on my heart for everyone listening and what I think a beautiful invitation is really two things from this season of Lent and this particular mini retreat in a podcast. And first is reconciliation if you haven't been or if you feel drawn, even if you've been recently and
So that's the first thing, that is a glorious sacrament that invites us to that conversion and reversion by the grace of God, that total return to God. And then the second thing is, is that we're all molded and shaped and crafted uniquely by God, fearfully and wonderfully made. And we're all in different seasons of our lives and...
God whispers into our hearts. So I would love for you to stay attentive and be attentive to where is God drawing you to be totally and utterly sincere with him. Like I feel drawn to different places and spaces at different times because those are places that I can really retreat into my own interior life, my own heart and into the sacred heart of Jesus. So for me, many of you know I have a she-shed that I
turn into a chapel, like a personal place of prayer. So I will go there. Like during those stories that I told you, like especially the one with my daughter, like I went to the chapel and I prayed in that chapel and I wrestled with the Lord in that shed, that chapel that I have. Yet now it's very, very cold outside.
And I created like a little tucked away corner in my home with a prayer chair, with a chair that's a prayer chair to me. And I can go there. It's like a place that I feel drawn physically so that hopefully while I'm there externally, embodied, we're embodied souls, that my soul can go there with the Lord, my internal life, my heart can go there with the Lord. And it's so interesting, Father Jon, listening to you, Sharon, about the Garden of Gethsemane.
Lindy Wynne (47:45.844)
is that in my chapel, my Shisha Chapel, there is an image of Jesus in the garden. And I thought, it's so interesting how I feel such consolation whenever I see that image, that image in general, even if I see there's one in a little chapel in our church and our local church and whatnot, our parish. And I am so consoled by that image. And I think it's because Jesus went in...
kind of the completion of his suffering, like the fullness of his suffering, like he was sweating blood. His tears were blood or sweat blood, something of the sort. And like that's how intense his suffering was. And he was so barren and transparent with the Lord. And he said to the Lord, like, if it's your will, take this cup of suffering from me. But the cup was not taken. he like Father Jon said, he didn't know what he was going to face, but he knew.
I think he knew it was gonna be horrendous as it was. And so there comes in that sweat of blood, those tears of blood. And so I bring all that up so that hopefully you will engage personally. Like these mini retreats are not just meant for this moment, it's meant for us to journey pilgrimage further in our lives as we close, hopefully in greater intimacy with Christ personally.
That's what we hope and pray for for you, that you will engage in a deeper prayer life, that intimacy with the Lord we're talking about, that you will engage in greater communion in the sacraments with the Lord, that you will commune with other brothers and sisters in Christ more intimately, and that ultimately that you find yourself more deeply in the sacred heart of Christ. And there's also many, many.
retreats and things of the sort you can go to for healing and to commune as well. And so know that we are praying for you. We are hoping the very, very best for you. Like I said earlier, which sounds so weird in some ways, like we love you, but we do. That's why we do this. This is a ministry and we are just trying to share what we have received. The love of God. Like we are so dependent. Like we've talked about, like all of us are on the Lord every single day of our lives. And that's one of the
Lindy Wynne (50:08.823)
reasons that we witness and give testimony to our own lives and why Father Jon and I come on and do these many retreats where most of the other ones are other people coming on that I have heartfelt conversations and interview about their conversion stories, because we're doing like hopefully the same. Like hopefully we're re-engaging day after day, moment after moment in our own relationships with the Lord, the one who loves us most to be filled with exactly what we need to be close to him.
and to love as we're each uniquely called. So Father Jon, in that spirit, in the Holy Spirit, could you close us in prayer?
Fr Jon Meyer (50:48.206)
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Fr Jon Meyer (50:54.323)
Thank you for this time that we've had together and revealing to us, especially in moments of darkness and vulnerability.
Fr Jon Meyer (51:06.017)
the truth of our goodness.
Fr Jon Meyer (51:11.343)
and the design that you have formed from long ago of making us dependent on you and one another.
help us to embrace more fully that image by a renewed curiosity of those places that scare us or cause us anxiety.
Fr Jon Meyer (51:39.352)
but come with us as we explore those areas more deeply so that you might shed your light and not take away the pain, but rather provide a pathway by which all that we suffer.
might.
lead to a glory, a resurrection, a new life, a freedom that we didn't have before. Father, I pray in a special way for those who are listening and right now just need your strength.
Fr Jon Meyer (52:22.232)
the humility that's needed for allowing ourself to be loved where we find it so difficult to be loved.
Fr Jon Meyer (52:36.622)
May you protect them especially and.
Also, to give a new knowledge of how precious those sufferings and those vulnerable areas of our life are, that we may not look with them with the eyes of condemnation or self-hate, but that we might see ourselves as you see us.
Fr Jon Meyer (53:06.284)
in hope of healing.
and conversion and transformation, we turn to you with confidence.
and with a trust in your love.
Fr Jon Meyer (53:25.614)
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be world without end. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Lindy Wynne (53:44.609)
Amen. Father Jon, thank you so much. You are a gift and blessing to us. Thank you for your prayers. They mean the world to us. And for everyone here gathered, if you haven't been to reconciliation for a time or feel nervous about it or anything else, please reach out so we can pray for you. And also we can help direct you to an examination of conscience. I can meet with Father Jon about that.
because he'd be the pro in all of those areas. And so also if there's a way that I can support or encourage you in creating a prayer space, I'll also, I'll put up some images of my one that's inside my house, as well as what's outside and actually where I record my podcast, we call this our prayer room. And I record in the corner of our.
prayer room and it just it's so I sense the the presence of God so fully and just so covered and so held and that's what I want for you as well and we want for you. So reach out at any time and subscribe to Mamas in Spirit on Apple Podcasts or Spotify wherever you listen YouTube we're on YouTube if you want to be with us in video and also please share Mamas in Spirit.
especially if there's something that touches your heart or you just feel drawn to share it with someone or a specific mini retreat in a podcast with someone because that may very well be a way for that person to be blessed hopefully and prayerfully with hope and healing and a sense of togetherness that they most need. Can't wait to be together again next time. This is Lindy Wynne with Mamas in Spirit. May God bless you and yours always.