This is the third rewrite on this piece and and the third title. I think it’s finally right.

In the 1947 film, It’s a Wonderful Life, actor Jimmy Stewart plays a character embittered by life’s circumstances who in a moment of desperation considers throwing it all away to suicide, but due to timely divine intervention from a misfit angel named Clarence, he ends up getting a new lease on life. What was then a box office flop is now a Christmas classic.

For me, a similar divine intervention came a little over 20 years ago. Although no angels visited me in the night that I can recollect, nor did I jump off a snow covered bridge into icy water below, I did considered ending my marriage and abandoning my wife and children which is essentially what George Bailey would have accomplished had he followed through with killing himself. Ironically, George sidelines his own self-harming plans to save another soul who does actually jump into the icy river. This someone else turns out to be Clarence, his guardian angel who preemptively jumps knowing the compassionate George will come to his rescue.

Though you may not initially see the comparison, I too was mentally preparing to jump. Not into the icy clutches of deaths embrace, but into the well trodden valley of abandonment which most likely would have eventually led me to the bridge anyway. Ironically, for me, this all took place while at the same time working as a case worker for Big Brothers and Big Sisters.  I was trying to help children of single parent households attempt to piece their lives back together following similar events in their own parent’s lives.

From the movie, George Bailey was a man who never outgrew his grandiose childhood dreams. He had big hopes and plans for his future. He was a man who passionately dreamt of adventure beyond the confines of his tiny cramped little midwestern town of Bedford Falls, Anywhere USA. He frequently spoke of his desire to be a world traveler visiting the greatest cities. What he thought he wanted most was to be a man of action, building huge skyscrapers and impressive bridges that would change the world. What he got was, stuck in a small suffocating office with a hand-me-down mortgage lending job from a dying father who equally wished for less obvious greatness for his son.

What I really thought I wanted was to be a famous novelist or screenwriter with all the perks and benefits I thought went along with that. While on the one hand, like George Bailey, I was an idealistic, sensitive, caring young man with a genuine concern for the needs of the downtrodden, but on the other, an arrogant, self absorbed, adventure seeking playboy.  I realize the comparison with George Bailey may be a stretch in your eyes, but to me, upon seeing it, I immediately felt the connection, although in contrast to George Bailey, my selfish side was usually in the lead most of the time.

Then one day, I met Evelyn, my own guardian angel. She was a middle age black woman and a career caseworker who sat opposite me a few doors over. Her particular life’s burden was being married to a career middle aged felon who was in and out of prison.  And though Clarence was clearly invisible to anyone other than George Bailey, Evelyn was an angel in broad daylight.  She also, unlike Clarence, never claimed or confessed her status as my guardian angel, but there is no doubt in my mind that she was indeed sent by God to interrupt my self-destructive behavior and selfish impulses.

Day in and day out, Evelyn patiently endured my cross-examination of her Christian faith and gently encouraged me with her quoted scriptures and her encouraging, calming voice. She challenged me to read the Bible for myself and never shied away from my doubting inquiries. Although her husband seemed to perpetually keep her in the midst of the storm, the peace she radiated throughout that unending storm was an alluring mystery to me.

Then one day it struck me, at least in retrospect it seemed like one day, but I guess I found myself increasingly finding it more and more difficult to look myself in the mirror. The thoughts of leaving my family behind was becoming more and more distasteful rather than more and more desirable. Now, rather than looking anticipatingly toward some unknown adventurous future, I was increasingly haunted by visions of what I would be leaving behind. In my mind, I kept seeing my three year old son crying out and reaching for me at the end of the driveway as I pulled away, saying, “Papa, please don’t leave.”

A monumental and epic spiritual war was being waged for my soul and the tension was manifesting itself in my dreams, visions and the physical world. Eventually this culminated in the realization that I was no longer the hero in the story running off to do heroic grandiose things. I could no longer rationalize a rosy scenario in my head where someday I would return to an older son and daughter and introduce myself as their long lost adventure seeking father. Someone who “had to do what a man had to do,” for my sake as well as theirs.

One of the things I’ve learned over the years is that when I start to rationalize my own selfish behavior, it usually means that I am trying to make excuses for doing something contrary to God’s desire for my life, or Godly wisdom. Not always, because the very nature of human interaction is a mixture of sorrow and joy, but frequently enough for me to notice under thoughtful reflection.  Selfish ambition is a part of the very nature of life itself in a fallen world, but I guess when you are having feelings and thoughts that will negatively impact those around you, you must question the motives behind them.  What are you trying to accomplish? Who will be impacted?  Is this really for their benefit as well as mine, or am I only thinking of myself?  Am I merely running from a situation that is uncomfortable, or is it a dangerously unbearable situation that you must flee from? 

Pain and suffering is a normal part of the human experience required for growth.  Unfortunately, those that live in a pain free bubble are desperately in danger of becoming the worst kind of spoiled rotten, self-centered and self-absorbed humans that no one desires to interact with.  Those that live in the worst kind of abuse and human suffering are equally in danger of becoming bitter and heartless and equally undesirable to interact with.  Somewhere in the middle roam the rest of us. 

Part of my rationalization at the time was telling myself that my wife and now, three children would be better off without me. I was wounded from a failed previous marriage and accustomed to running from one relationship to the next. Hiding from attachment had become my modus operandi. Ironically, one of my favorite quotes of the time was from a poem entitled, “Don’t Quit.”  However, I had become a runner, and quitting had become the easier path in this arena of human relationships. 

However, in only ways that He could, God demonstrated His love for me through a faithful, God fearing co-worker, my conscious, a patient wife, and a living Savior which helped mend my wounded heart and helped me learn how to truly love.., sacrificially. I don’t really miss all those things I thought I wanted so badly back then, so please don’t mistake my use of the word sacrificially.

You see, having a guilty conscious, or people who disagree with our beliefs are not bad things, but merely God’s tools for testing our motives. When listened to and thoughtfully measured against God’s word, they can be useful allies for correcting our courses in this journey called life, when ignored, like running a red light, it can have disastrous consequences.

In the end analysis, I’m thankful for Evelyn, whom God had placed in my life to help lead me to that crisis of conscious that brought me to that moment. I’m even more thankful for my patient and loving wife who put up with me during those trying times. And though it has sometimes been a difficult journey, it has totally been worth it. 

Anyway, call it the promptings of a guardian angel, call it God induced guilt or shame, self awareness or conscious, but whatever you do, don’t ignore it. For if you do, if you fail to question your own motives and actions, you really are setting yourself up for some of life’s biggest mistakes. Granted, we don’t always get it right, but when we do, it can be a beautiful thing, a wonderful life really.

In the film, what George Bailey received for his conflicted emotions and embittered thoughts of “the world being better off had he never been born,” was an entertaining, yet fictitious tour by an imaginary angel named Clarence of exactly that.  George got to see first hand, through Hollywood lenses that he really was a world changer in his small corner of the world.  Though naturalistically impossible for us, we can take this same guided tour through open minded and thoughtful reflection and seeking godly wisdom. 

My beautiful thing is still playing itself out these 26 years later, in the shape of just over a quarter century marriage, three wonderful adult children who love their father and mother and now a grandson whom I look forward to seeing as often as I can. When I think that I almost missed this I am overwhelmed with emotion and thankfulness to God for having reached into my life and revealed some life changing things.  Though I realize my situation might not necessarily resemble yours, don’t miss the point.  Never stop asking yourself the hard questions and questioning your own emotions and motives.   Never approach life in a godless vacuum.   Atheism may look like an appealing and uncomplicated life philosophy on paper, but it falls desperately short of offering enduring answers to life’s toughest questions.  God knows us better than we know ourselves.   He helps us in ways that we cannot fully understand or appreciate ourselves. 

The secret to living a wonderful life isn’t always getting what you think you want, but learning to love what you have in the midst of accepting a gift from a loving God we don’t easily understand.

The Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And let the one who hears say, “Come!” Let the one who is thirsty come; and let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life. Revelation 22:17

Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some have unwittingly entertained angels. Hebrews 13:2