When Spiderman's Web Runs Dry

Peter Parker swings through the gleaming metropolis, arcing across steel canyons, rappelling off skyscrapers on jet trails of web.

Apparently without warning, he extends his wrist in the classic position – and no web shoots out. Long overdue for a soul overhaul, Spiderman falls.

Although Spiderman II came out in theaters over a year ago, I opted to stay home while my two Spidey fans viewed the Webbed Wonder. I just watched it for the first time, and it left me deep in bloggable thought.

As we got ready for bed, I told Mitch, “This reminds me of the Odyssey* episode where George Barclay considers quitting ministry.”

(George finds himself swamped in seminary studies and interim pastoring. Time is even tighter than money, and his family feels that Dad’s ministry call has them all in a pressure cooker.)

Mitch was also struck by the comparison, and together we talked about the gut-wrenching reality of people, called by God, whose web has run dry.

For months Peter Parker had been forcing the rhythms of his dual existence, driven by the necessity of anonymity to protect those he loved, yet unable to maintain normal commitments in the face of superhuman responsibilities. He couldn’t even deliver pizzas on time, with criminals to catch and children to rescue along the way.

So the superhero gets fired from his pizza delivery job. Peter Parker takes the fall for all the places he can’t be because Spidey had business elsewhere. And while Spiderman performs breath-taking aerials in glass and steel ravines, the chasm in Peter Parker’s heart is growing too wide for him to cross.

What do you do when the cost of your Call becomes too high and you’ve got no more change in your pocket?

I’ve walked by the dumpsters and so have you. We’ve seen the crumpled red-and-blue Spidey suits once worn by people of great spiritual passion, wadded up and reluctantly forsaken in last-ditch desperation, perhaps in an attempt to save a marriage, finances, or sanity stressed to the breaking point by ministry. Because we too have found ourselves in mid-air with no web left, we feel only love for these bruised servants, and pray they return one day to claim that suit again.

At the top of this blog, I said Peter Parker’s web ran out “apparently without warning.” But he had plenty of warning. When we listen to our hearts, the dashboard lights blink long before the engine falls apart. When we do not live from an integrated heart, we become wounded soldiers who cannot accomplish our Commander’s mission. We all have multiple roles pulling us in a hundred directions, but we cannot long survive a fractured and fragmented sense of who we are.

As Peter Parker and George Barclay could tell you, there is no Easy Button.

But there are answers. Sometimes you’re called on to stay steady and sacrifice the thing you want most. Sometimes you need to restore the balance, accepting the loving touch of those you rescue as in turn they rescue you. Whatever your answers, they lie hidden in the secret places where your heart communes with His. Listen now, “Walk with Me and work with Me--watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you.”

God hasn’t called you to be half alive or half yourself. Do what it takes to reconnect and live again. Let Him make you whole. Keep vigilant watch over your heart; that’s where life starts. And when you find you’re running low on web or wine or oil, He wants you back in the flow. Whatever He says to you, do it!





*Focus on the Family produces a first-rate children’s radio show called Adventures in Odyssey. It’s the kind you buy for the kids, then can’t turn off yourself. The episode referred to is “George Under Pressure” and can be purchased on the “More Than Sundays” album with 6 episodes especially for ministry families.

March 22, 1987

I strolled into the Industry Hills Sheraton in La Puente, California, invited by my roommate’s boyfriend to his Dad’s birthday gathering, a first-class Sunday brunch buffet. Almost everyone had arrived, so I took a seat near one end. Five minutes later, the last family member straggled in, and my life changed forever.

We talked. He asked about my interests and direction in life. I admired his easygoing manner and tanned good looks. Recently graduated and employed, I felt finally independent of the strict missionary parents who had hoped I would find a nice Baptist boy at Biola. He had seen plenty of the girls who didn’t have strict missionary parents. For five years, he’d given up on dating, instead fishing often in Azusa Canyon, alone. Listening, waiting, learning to live from his heart. I told him I wasn’t the romantic type. He just smiled.

After hours of conversation, he offered me a ride back to his folks’ place. At the far end of the deserted parking garage, I saw two cars, a generic sporty one and an odd-looking thing resembling an ancient VW, black, with a big yellow taxicab number stuck on top. I headed for the sports car, and tried to think of humorous remarks deriding the other vehicle’s clearly unconventional owner. Until I realized I was walking with him.

When we parted that day, he shook my hand, looked into my eyes, and said he hoped we’d meet again. We did.

Mitch saw my heart that day, at a time I’d forgotten I had one. I am a completely sold-out romantiholic, and he knew that immediately. Sometimes in the quiet moments at end of day, I sigh deeply and say, out loud if he’s not already asleep, “Could anyone in the world possibly be as happy?”

I hope you all are.

For my married friends, when the days grow long and the paychecks or tempers short, please pause for a moment and remember how and why you fell in love and Who guided you to him or her.

For my single friends who would so very much like not to be, please invite me to join your "Pray-me-down-the-aisle" team. Marriage is so incredibly wonderful that I want everyone, who so desires, to experience this Eden at the foot of Calvary.

If you are a bird with broken wing, the God who sees each sparrow fall promises you a future and a hope. He is the God of second chances, or as many as we need. Your dreams can fly again.

And if you do go on that first special date, never miss a really good opportunity to keep your mouth shut, in the presence of someone else’s treasure. Out of Mitch’s multitude of cars, I don’t know of one he loved more, or parted with more sacrificially, than his 1959 Morris Minor. It quickly grew from comical to legendary status in my eyes, particularly since I’ve worn it now on my left hand for nearly 15 years.

Thank you, Sweetheart, for the nineteen most romantic years of my life! I’ll tell you so in person when I get home tonight! :-)