So here’s a story.
Two guys … let’s call ’em Bert an Ernie. They’ve been friends for years, meet up regularly most weeks at the bar and chat about other people, work situations and sports. Ernie has always been pretty open and honest about stuff that’s been going on and always asks Bert about his family and work; how he deals with the balancing act of life … but Bert just seems to avoid these deep chats as it’s easier for him to occupy his mind with other things, to keep things simple.
One day Bert’s wife leaves him, takes the kids and goes … devastated.
When he meets up that week with Ernie, they try to talk about it; but it’s hard for them because Bert has never discussed anything to do with his life or feelings with Ernie before. This makes the conversation awkward and Bernie struggles to understand his apparent need to tell his friend about what’s going on and finds it hard to know what to expect from Ernie, and what to say.
Ernie struggles. He wants so bad for Bert to talk it through with him and he wants to be able to help and support his best friend but can’t make him open up.
The two guys had been friends for a long time but only ever discussed surface level things, work, money, sports, hobbies … never the important things in life, or each other. If Bert had been open an honest with Ernie when it was easy, he may have been able to do it when it all hit the fan.
This often sums up my prayer life with God. I often find it hard to pray and when things go wrong, like …really wrong, I have no idea what to expect or what to ask for.
Like Bert, I need to learn how to open up now. It’ll make things easier to process in the future.
