living into the question
I watch Riley’s face as she describes her first in-person day in vocational school, how animated she has become, how her eyes shine and her smile deepens, her voice lilting while she recounts all the details to a close friend of mine who, having come over with a tray of baton cookies in her hands and her pockets full of hot chocolate pods, sits with us now at our table. What I’m witnessing now in Riley, this pop and fizz of adrenaline, reminds me of the giggly way she froths after zooming down a waterslide or speeding through a rollercoaster, like she’s living through a grand adventure.
She’s happy, I mouth across the table to Zoe, who nods, quietly matching my smile.
Riley’s fingers jab the air as she names all the friends in her group, some she met during her online class days while she awaited her spot in this program, others who are new to her.
“There’s this girl in my class, Wendy, she’s new; I met her today,” she’s saying brightly, hardly pausing to catch a breath, bending her ring finger down towards her palm, like she’s counting gifts.
I cradle my mug in my hands, sipping sweetness while we listen.
“She told me Wendy was her best girlfriend in class,” Zoe says, when at last Riley pauses to take a bite of a cookie, “because Wendy hugged her when she left today and told Riley that she’s so happy they’re in the same group. I told Riley she should invite Wendy over some time, that they could have a girls’ night.”
“That’s a good idea,” I agree. Kevin, Zoe, and I have all been asking God to cultivate some friendships for Riley, to bring some young women into Riley’s life with whom she can truly relate and share, and this at least sounds like it holds some potential. This Wendy sounds generous and gregarious, like Riley.
“Yes, we could,” Riley says, raising her eyebrows, reaching for her mug of hot chocolate.
Here we are now, on the cusp of a thousand possibilities, like we’re paddling slowly toward countless tributaries, just waiting to see where The River will take us, and Riley, who, despite countless setbacks and griefs, steadfastly clings to the belief that God is always doing something good, seems invigorated.
Sometimes you have to live into the question before you have the answer, I read recently in Abraham Verghese’s beautiful, sweeping novel The Covenant of Water, and I paused a moment over that truth to savor it, grabbing a pen to jot the line down in my journal, to treasure it. This is has been our experience, and it’s what Riley’s doing now, in this program at our local community college, living into the question, trying to discover what vocation might best fit her unique gifts and personality and life, although, Riley would say that this is not the question she is living into at all, not, what will I do, but rather that it is another question that has truly captured her attention.
When Riley received the email that her turn in the vocational cohorts program had finally come, she doubled over, suddenly losing her breath to deep, guffawing ‘there you go again, God’ laughter, receiving this much anticipated news with immeasurable joy.
“We’ve prayed for this for so long,” she said at last, still breathless, giggles still spurting around the edges of her words as she began to recover from the flood of grace and find her voice again. “I can’t wait to see what God’s going to do next.”
This, then, is the question Riley would articulate as the one she’s always living into, the question she’s lived into all her life, not what will I do, but what is God going to do?
Just weeks after we learned that Riley would be entering the cohorts this month, another friend who is also a teacher at the wonderful school from which Riley graduated told me about an internship opportunity that had come to the attention of the teachers and for which they believe Riley may be the ideal candidate. When I mentioned this to Riley, she laughed again, a big, bold, beautiful sound of thanksgiving, and she said, “I can’t wait to see what God’s going to do with that.”
‘What is God going to do’ is a question we live into before we have a circumstantial answer, but also a question to which we already have the substantial one, for God has promised that He is able to do more than we ask or imagine according to His power at work within us, and in our lives, He has repetitively kept that promise. ‘What is God going to do’ is a question Riley lives into with anticipation and excitement, with a heart ready to overflow with laughter in recognition of grace, and with eyes ready to shed trusting tears when she comes up against seemingly insurmountable challenges and crushing heartbreak. Regardless of how she feels about her situation, life for Riley is about living into this question with enthusiasm that just can’t wait and so, holds nothing back in anticipation. This is the definition of faith, to act believing before seeing any evidence of a specific outcome, to step into the river at flood stage, trusting God to keep His promises.
In reality, this is the question our family has been living into from the beginning, certainly from the first Autism diagnosis, when professionals assessing Riley answered my questions about her future by saying that whether Riley would ever talk or graduate or work or be able to be independent at all would be up to Riley, and when, in response, I thought, No. It’ll be up to God.
For years of not knowing what should be next or will be next, our family has lived into this question, albeit imperfectly, because this is the question of faith.
What is God going to do?
Over the years, He has repeatedly blown our minds with His generosity, with His overwhelming kindness and limitless power, just as He promised. I have been learning, for all my stumbling about, to echo the apostle Paul, who, when facing certain shipwreck on his way to a Roman prison, encouraged the men with him to believe that they would live, saying, “Take heart, brothers, for I have faith in God that it will be exactly as I have been told.” I have faith that God’s goodness and love truly are vast and unending.
Riley’s cheeks pink with enthusiasm as she tells us now about the topic for the first rotation of her cohort, flattening her hands in the air in front of her as though to carry it or to pass it across the table as yet another gift.
“I get to learn about healthcare,” she’s saying, with a tone that says, how cool is that, and I listen and listen and smile and smile, tasting again the goodness of God, savoring it all and treasuring it up. I don’t yet know about all the good work God has prepared in advance for Riley to do, but I can see that He means to use the opportunities before her to keep underscoring the mantra of her faith, the thing she says to anyone who asks her questions about her future, as if she can reach back and read the thoughts God once planted in my mind, that she will do whatever He wants her to do.
“We’ll just have to see,” she always says, because she’s living into the question before she has the answer, trusting God with the details, and that’s the grand adventure of her faith.
