The Best Way Out is Not Through
Neither one of us showed up at Target that night with the intention of breaking up. It just happened…like winning the lottery or being struck by lightning. But you can never prepare for such life-altering events. Still, I showed up, knowing exactly what I wanted to say to get past this massive chasm of ours: “The best way out is through.”
I guess these words kind of escaped the tip of my tongue as well because they were never a part of my script. But saying them felt like my call to action for my once fiancé. One to fight for the us that no longer existed and hope for a way back that was no longer visible. I knew we could get through it, though, because that’s the best anyone can do…just get through it.
Months inched by, loitering like smoke in the air. I just wanted to be on the other side of heartache and misery. Pretend like it never even happened. But one morning, I couldn’t stop replaying our demise. It was more than an annoying song, popping in and out of my head. It was a broken record I couldn’t fix: that single phrase, a rupture to my eardrum, drowning out all sense.
Even in the afternoon, as I read Forgiving What You Can’t Forget, Lysa TerKeurst so wisely took note of the same phrase. I brushed it off without a second thought. Sulking and sabotaged by the words finding a stronger voice. But later that night, watching one episode of Law & Order: SVU end and the next begin, I heard Him. The mid-season finale was entitled “The Only Way Out is Through.”
In retrospect, those words didn’t just come out of nowhere that night. They were a part of the script. They were the Lord’s call to action for me. Yes: I wanted to be on the other side of everything that dark chasm had waiting for me in 2021. But I had to accept that I couldn’t just teleport there. I had to take the throughway.
Jesus did it.
Jesus recognized that if the only way redemption was to come from ruins, He would have to take the throughway. He could have proved Himself to Satan in the Garden of Gethsemane, said “To hell with Judas” at the Last Supper, shamed Peter in the courtyard, and taken revenge against all His many betrayers. But Jesus loved us too much to interrupt the work set before Him. He endured the cruelty, the suffering, the humiliation. He knew how ugly and unfair the throughway was, but He also knew where it would lead Him.
What felt like utter defeat – from the nails piercing His body, to the sealing of a tomb – just three days later, Jesus made it to the other side. Victorious.
Whether it’s a chasm far too wide, a mountain far too high, or anything else that requires an outrageous amount of strength and bravery, the Lord will extend His grace to complete the work set before you, because He knows the only way out is through.
Happy Easter, my friends. May you rest in the hope and peace of this glorious day, and never forget: The victory is already yours in Christ Jesus.
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“For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.” — 1 Peter 2:19-24
