By Devan Grayson
You have thirty days to reply. My heart quickens as I get to the end of a notice from the IRS. I recently finished graduate school without a job offer to my name. Now, a letter arrives informing me that I have been audited. I know that it is impossible that I owe $3000 to the government; however, I also know little about tax documents or how to advocate for myself.
Ignoring that reality, I write the most eloquent and firm reply I can muster, attempting to reject their proposal twice before enlisting the help of my cousin who works as a CPA. He reconfigures my tax documents and the IRS promptly writes back saying I owe them nothing. My cousin also lets me know that the IRS actually owes me money if I ever want to refile one of my previous tax years. I felt elated the day I received the notice that my case was closed; however, the six months leading up to its arrival were wrought with fear and feeling as if justice was inaccessible.
I find myself ruminating on this memory as I drive home, thinking about the current irony in my life. In the beginning of 2021, I finally decided to take up the arduous task of refiling two tax years that my cousin had pointed out were incorrect. Again, I enlisted the help of a CPA to prepare my tax documents and was told to expect a response from the IRS sixteen weeks later. Sixteen weeks passed and still no word. I called the IRS, and after far too much time on the phone, a worker let me know that he put a note in my file saying the IRS had thirty days to address my tax returns. I felt powerless to an organization who had once used the same thirty-day term to threaten and frighten me. Thirty days passed, and I called again. I was told that this time the IRS had thirty days to reply to my request.
The second deadline has well passed, and on my drive today, I think about whether I want to spend needless hours advocating for justice to an organization where none will be found.
Apparently, there is grace for the government, but often, not for its people.
“The feeling of advocating for myself is all too familiar—I have spent a great deal of time knowing what it’s like to offer my heart to others who remain indifferent to how they’ve impacted me. I know other times, I’ve been guilty of doing the same thing. ”
What does justice truly mean? What does having a voice do when you’re subjected to an authority that renders you powerless? In this case, I’m not sure that it means me endlessly spinning my wheels, wasting my voice and time on an audience who doesn’t listen.
“Maybe I should just let the tax return thing go. It’ll come when it comes,” I think.
The feeling of advocating for myself is all too familiar—I have spent a great deal of time knowing what it’s like to offer my heart to others who remain indifferent to how they’ve impacted me. I know other times, I’ve been guilty of doing the same thing.
Faces of friendships lost alongside memories of relationships that may never heal, and images of clients and friends who have suffered atrocities at the hands of people within organizations who claim to be safe, like their families or the Church, surface in my mind.
Daily around the world innocent people are murdered, children are sexually abused and abandoned. Racism, narcissism, and misogyny run rampant. Death and sickness ravage the earth with little care to whose lives they claim. There are not adequate words for the brokenness I’ve borne witness to; brokenness without justice abounds. And this is the world Jesus calls me to live in.
And sometimes, I tire of advocating for myself. Other times, I’m tempted to believe I have the power to advocate for my friends or clients in ways that are beyond my reach. It can be difficult to watch people I care about hurt or choose to agree with accusations that may threaten their identity and their freedom. In those moments, it can be all too easy to think that I have the ability to assuage their ache or bring transformation to their souls.
I am grateful for how Jesus’ kindness and love have helped me choose new ways of relating to others that don’t involve me crucifying myself in an attempt to rescue myself or those around me. Instead, I’m invited to be with others, entrusting their souls to Jesus. As I’ve grown, I’ve also learned to love the ways that my heart bleeds for justice. It’s by learning to trust Him over and over again, that I find myself freer to rest as I hope in an advocate outside of myself.
I start to tear up as I reflect on how it can sometimes be difficult for me to trust that Jesus is my advocate and that He advocates for those I love. It is so much more familiar for me to believe that using my voice to fight for myself and for others is the only way to hope for goodness. Today, I trust that He sees all of the brokenness in the world and is deeply grieved by it. That He promises to bind up the wounds of His people and that He intimately knows the horrors of abuse, trauma, and betrayal because He lived through them. That even when I can’t see it, He is bringing goodness and life to the earth. And that, as He sees me tear up, He weeps with me because He intimately knows, more than I understand, why trust can be so difficult for me, and many people I love, to come by.
“He knows. He knows. He knows,” the phrase replays in my head as I continue my drive.
There is such goodness in those words as they remind and invite me to come home.