Finding the Trap Door

Ever since I first learned to read, I was never one to turn down a good mystery. In my elementary years, I followed The Bobbsey Twins (Nan and Bert, plus their younger twin sibs Freddie and Flossie) around solving mystifying mysteries like who let the dogs out and why did the spotted cow moo? (Incidentally, when I grew up, I named my bosom buddies Freddie and Flopsie – the Bobbing Twins – in their honor.)

In Middle School, I couldn’t resist helping Nancy Drew do her sleuth thing and Trixie Beldon solve gripping who-dun-its like the mystery of the missing clock. If you’re muttering, “Trixie who?” right now – it’s okay. I know Trixie wasn’t as popular as Nancy, and nothing wrong with girly-girls, but I preferred Trixie over Nancy because she was more of a sporty tomboy like me who wasn’t above getting her hands dirty. Yeesh. I was a twelve-year-old book snob.

Anyway, throughout my teens and adulthood, I could rarely be seen without an adventure/mystery in my hands.

You may not believe this, but I’m currently reading – of all unlikely things – the original Tarzan of the Apes series, written by Edgar Rice Burroughs in 1912, and I can hardly put my Kindle down. No offense to Johnny Weissmuller or Ron Ely (my two fave childhood Tarzans), but the real Tarzan was incredibly raw, captivating, and edgy. (Spoiler alert: he thought nothing of butchering man or beast, often killing his prey in cold blood, and ripping them apart with his teeth.) Nothing like the homogenized versions of Tarzan our generation has come to know. (And there was no sidekick chimp called Cheeta, although Jane and Boy did exist but not in the same vanilla esthetic form that we were pleasantly spoon-fed.)

Whoa, are these original stories GRIPPING! Such excellent writing. Ole Edgar sure knew how to create a blatantly unsolvable problem and then when all seemed lost, provide the reader a glimpse of a hidden trap door promising hope. A way out after all! Unforeseen salvation!

Okay, so how does this relate to my flesh and blood 21st century life? And maybe yours too?

Blech. I hate to admit it but my vertigo is back. After more than a year’s reprieve. And right when I’m gearing up for a new book release.

Stupid vertigo. The bane of my existence. The burr in my saddle. The “thorn in my flesh” like the apostle Paul mentions in 2 Corinthians 12, his unknown illness which the Lord opted not to heal. Borrowing Paul’s won’t-You-do-something-Lord! technique, I’ve asked and pleaded and groveled and begged for this nauseating dizziness to depart hence, but alas, it has not. At least not permanently. Sigh.

Man, this is one mystery I would SURE like to solve. In the meantime, I simply cannot resist the temptation to complain about my misery. Who wants to be a dizzy blonde? Yucko. I know my whining is annoying and even sinful, but grousing seems so cathartic … at the time.

So naturally, Papa God, who loves to show us through scripture that He already knew what we think we’re just learning in real life, goosed me (not so gently) in the direction of 1 Corinthians 10:13, NASB: “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, that you may be able to endure it.”

And then I stupefyingly stumbled across my way of escape. He was totally right. One night I suddenly found my trap door.

Yep. In the dead of night, as I lay on my back in bed trying not to barf as the room spun around and around me (such is the nature of vertigo if you’re not familiar), I randomly turned my head left at an approximate 45 degree angle and then for some reason, my attention was inexplicably drawn upward to a specific high picture on the side wall that shifted my eyes to the ten o’clock position.

BINGO!

Suddenly the spinning room slowed down to low gear and then … miraculously … it stopped spinning altogether. All the items in my room slogged back into place and sat still. Stationery. Eerily stagnant.

It was pretty unbelievable, after years of trying every head and body position imaginable through exercises and therapy and enough medication to float an ark.

But there it was: my trap door. The escape hatch. My way out.

My soul bursts out with praise to my Creator every time I lay down and the very breath is ripped from my chest by the furniture whizzing around my head. Because now I know how to endure it. Papa God didn’t take away the malady but even without the mystery-solving expertise of The Bobbsey’s, Nancy, or Trixie, He showed me where the trap door is. Turn head just so. Look up.

Hey, maybe I should have looked up the whole time. The secret passage isn’t so secret.

How about you, my friend? What’s the mystery in your life that you’re hard pressed to solve? May I pray with you to find your trap door? Just clue me in by commenting below and I promise to sleuth with you. Trap doors come in all shapes and sizes and hardly ever look the way you expected!

 

P.S. If you’d like to help me out by joining my launch team for my upcoming 365-day devotional, Bless Your Heart, I’d love to have you! Just click HERE and fill out the team application. Many thanks!