The Beauty of the Darkness of Grief

These days I'm finding that I can't breathe.
I feel like there is a giant pressure on my chest making each inhale painful and incomplete.
I feel heavy.
I feel slow and confused.
Everything seems to take too much effort.
I feel anxious, fidgety, nervous, racing internally.

“No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing. . . And grief still feels like fear. Perhaps more strictly, like suspense. Or like waiting; just hanging about waiting for something to happen. ”  - C.S.Lewis, A Grief Observed

It took me by surprise, this grief. But I guess grief is like that. It can surprise you. Sometimes it shoots out of me in hot, ugly sobs. But most of the time it is just a suffocating blanket wrapped about me.

It feels dark.

But in this season of Advent, I find peace in the fact that darkness and light are the same to Him. The night is as bright as day (Psalm 139:12). He sees just as clearly in the dark as He does in the light.

It is never pleasant to be in the place of grief, to be buried under the weight of loss.

But somehow, to sit in that place with Him, the darkness loses its coldness. It becomes warm and alive, though no less painful.



In the end, it is not about escaping this place. It is about inviting Him into it.

Nothing buried, skirted, or circumvented can heal.

Grief is a cup that must be drunk to the dregs.

So, I drink. Fully. The sweetness and the bitterness. I drink with gratitude for what I had, for the light that will come.



But, for now, it is dark.



"For the darkness of waiting
of not knowing what is to come
of staying ready and quite and attentive,
we praise you, O God:
For the darkness and the light
are both alike to you." -- Ruth Haley Barton

Amen.



I wait for you, here, Lord.



"The people who walk in darkness
Will see a great light;
Those who live in a dark land,
The light will shine on them."
Isaiah 9:2

The Softness of Jesus Body

Last night was darker than I could have imagined.

Twice, I had to hold my son while he screamed and shook in terror and pain at the procedures being done to him.

After the first one, he was angry with me and would not receive my comfort, feeling betrayed by the one who was to protect him.

I curled up next to him in his bed and sobbed with him. Somehow, my tears for him soothed him to sleep.

But when dawn came, there was no dawn in my heart.

My heart cried out for the Lord to relent, to come and save now, to rescue, to restore.

---

I heard a knock at the door of the room. Fearing who I would see and what they might say, I looked up through the haze of my heart's pain.

But the face I saw was one filled with love, wreathed in compassion, and anchored by eyes of concern.

It was Jesus.
He was wearing a middle-aged woman's body, but it was Jesus.
He sported a red t-shirt and shorts and sandy-blond hair.
And His arms, His chest, His hands encompassed me as I sobbed in the hallway of the hospital. His t-shirt caught my tears. His lips kissed my cheeks. His voiced prayed for me.

He came.

But it took me a while to recognize Him.

---

I have long believed that God gives each of us the specific body that He needs for us to have in order to receive His love into our inner selves and in order to give that love to the people that He brings across our paths.

He gave me eyes that delight in beauty -- and then He spoke to me through color and pattern and texture.
He gave me a body that feels Him in creation -- and then He spoke to me in the wind.
He gave me a soft tummy -- and then He gave me kids to rest on it.
He gave me a loud laugh -- and then He sent people that needed to hear joy from afar.

And today He gave Jesus a body that is not what Hollywood would call glamorous or ready for the Red Carpet. But it was beautiful. It was soft and warm and comforting. The bearer of this body offered it up to Him, and He used it powerfully in the midst of the darkest moments of this journey thus far.

Oh, how society has confused what is important in the body.

But today is was brought into sharp focus:
what is important about our bodies is that they are His to use.

Their shape, their size, their weight, their height, their color, their smell, their attractiveness, their mobility, their muscularity -- none of this matters. Our bodies' sole purpose is His love - to give and receive it. On the altar of His love, each body fulfills its purpose, each body becomes what it was intended to be.


That's it.


Today, I got to meet Jesus. And she was beautiful.

Flexible Faith

During this dark night, I have found that my greatest fear is not the loss of my son's life.

My greatest fear is that this dark night will cause someone's faith to fail -- that somehow, watching this from the inside or the outside, someone will find God too inscrutable, too unknowable and walk away.

"Someone" -- including myself.

---

The other day, I was reading the portrait of Jesus preparing His disciples for the coming darkness that His death will bring upon them. (Luke 22)

Sweet Peter is all bravado and bluster making statements he knows nothing about, making promises he can never keep, being "strong" as best he can in the face of some very confusing things that Jesus is saying. And Jesus turns and speaks to Peter:

“Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat;  but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.”


These words have stuck like a pin in my heart . . . "I have prayed that your faith may not fail." Jesus, Himself, prayed this for Peter. Jesus knew what was coming for Peter, and HE was praying for him, for his faith, for life beyond the darkness.

At a time like this, I want Jesus praying for me, for my husband, for all three of my children. Yes, I would love healing and answers, but what I want more than anything for all five of us -- and for all those watching this from the outside -- is a faith that will not fail. A faith that grows under this intense pressure.

I need you to pray this for us, Jesus.

I know that Hebrews 7:25 (therefore He is able, once and forever, to save those who come to God through Him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf) is referring to the perpetual intercession You make on our behalf for salvation, and I need you to intercede on our behalf.

Pray, Jesus, that our faith does not fail.
Refine it.
Make it flexible and not rigid so that it may bear this strain without breaking.

Pray for us, Jesus.

A Voice in the Breeze

Six years ago, I was in the middle of a very dark season of life.

One sweltering, summer day I  was at Costco filling my car's tank with gas. My kids were in the car, and I was standing there praying for God to reveal Himself to me, praying for a sign of His Presence.

Out of nowhere, a strong, cool breeze washed over my body, cooling my spirit and soothing my heart.

---

Many times, as I've filled my car's tank at Costco, I've remember how He met me that day, and how on that day He began to speak to my heart through the wind.

Today, I remembered again.

---

Today, I find myself amidst the darkest season I've yet to walk in this life -- watching my oldest son waste away in agonizing pain as the doctors scratch their heads in confusion.

I stood beside my van, the gas guzzling into the tank, and I remembered. I remembered how You met me here so long ago.

My heart wanted to ask if You were there . . . but the air was hot and was not moving.
This was not an easy question to allow my heart to breathe. It was certainly not a "gimme."
I was scared.
I was scared You would not show Yourself, that I would be more alone, somehow, after my heart released this query to You.

But I couldn't suppress the question,
though I was terrified of the answer,
afraid that the air would not move,
that the warm blanket of still air would remain around me, move in on me and suffocate me.

But I asked.



"Are You there?"

I waited in silence, aching.
Holding my breath.
Feeling the heat move in on me.
Scared that my God is not Who I thought He was.

But the faintest tickle of air brushed against my arms -- as if a guy smoking a cigar has released a puff of a smoke ring from his mouth onto my forearm. It was so faint that I stood there for a second wondering if I'd imagined it.

I looked down.

I felt it again. A tickle of air on my forearms.

The little feather sweeps of air kept coming, not strong, but Present.

"Okay. You're here."
My heart sighed a bit of relief but then choked out,

"But I need You stronger. I want You stronger."
"Here" doesn't seem to be cutting it right now. "Here" still means that my son is wasting away and in great pain, and You're not doing anything to make it stop. "Here" doesn't change the fact that my second son is carrying the weight of the possible death of his brother with him. "Here" doesn't cut the darkness with blinding light. "Here" doesn't take away the nauseating ache from my heart.

And then the tickle of air turned into a flutter of air.
And then a brush of air.
And then a gentle breeze came and caressed my whole body, and as it did, I very clearly heard, "I am coming."

The breeze kept cooling me, sweeping some of the heat from my spirit and body. "I am coming," You kept whispering.

"I am coming."

"I am coming."

---

To be honest, I don't know what His coming will look like.
I just don't know.
But I will know when He comes.

And right now, I just need to know that He's coming.

The Beauty of Swim Lessons

Armed with goggles, beach towels, and some tummy butterflies, Corban, Elliott, Anna and I opened the doors to the pool area of the rec center near our house. The moist, overpowering smell of chlorine greeted us and told us that it was again the time of year that brings us to swim lessons.



Corban and Elliott were up first. Like old pros at this game of swim lessons, they strapped on their goggles, kicked off their shoes and went to work. I held Anna on my lap, and we cheered on the boys as they were schooled in the art of swimming.

When their half-hour lesson was over, it was Anna's turn. This was the first swimming lesson she had ever had. With a bit of apprehension, she made her way over to the steps, and with great bravery, she did what her teacher asked and required -- until it came time to put her face into the water.



The cries emanating from her four-year-old lungs echoed off the walls of the pool area.

I went over, knelt beside her and emncouragingly told her that she could do this. Her teacher (a veteran at teaching swim lessons to young children, with the bite marks on his arm to prove it) gently but firmly encouraged her. He would not allow her to give up.

After much coaxing, her face went in as she bent to the wishes of her mom and teacher.

But the crying did not stop.

From a few feet away, I kept encouraging her.

But the crying grew louder.

She was now standing outside the pool.

"MOMMYYYYYYYYY! MOOOOOOOMYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!"

I walked over to her and guided her back to the pool. I asked her teacher what would be best for me to do -- stay and encourage or walk out of line of sight. He suggested I leave line of sight.

So, I did.

Corban and Elliott were greatly distressed.

"Mommy, Anna's crying," voiced a concerned Corban.
"I know, sweetheart, but she needs to learn this. Come over here where she can't see you."

Like three traumatized little birds, Corban, Elliott and I huddled just out of Anna's line of sight. For a half an hour we listened to her cry for her mommy. The only time she took a break from her crying was when she would shakily comply with her teacher's request to float with his hand beneath her back or to hold onto the wall and kick her feet or to dip her ear into the water.

And then the crying would begin again.

My heart felt like a writhing snake trapped inside my rib cage.

----

As soon as the lesson was over,  the three of us rushed over to her. I wrapped her up in  a towel and held her.

"You DID it, sweetheart! You DID it! You were so scared, but you DID it! I am so very proud of you! You were so brave!"

Elliott bee-lined for her teacher and told him that tomorrow he needed to start with the easier things and work up to the harder ones. (Yep. My six-year-old was instructing a 30-year-old on how to give swim lessons.)

Corban knelt down in front of Anna and took her face into his hands. Gently, he turned her face toward his and said, "Nan, you are okay. You're okay, Nan. You're safe. You are okay."

Elliott came back over and told Anna that he had fixed the problem and told her teacher how to teach class tomorrow.

----


As I was loading a calm but heart-raw Anna into her car seat, I asked, "Nan, what was the scariest part of all that?"

With a shaky voice, she said, "Putting my face into the water."

"Yes, that is scary, isn't it?"

"But also," she quivered, "it was scary that I was calling for you and calling for you and that you did not come."

A bomb of mom-grief went off in my chest. *groan* What could I say? How could I explain?

Then, in a torrent, pouring from my mouth came, "Oh, sweetheart! I heard you. I heard every time that you called my name. Mommy was there the whole time. I never left for even a moment. Every time you cried, every time you called for me, I heard. But I could not come to get you. This lesson was one that you had to learn. It broke my heart to hear you crying, to see you so scared, but I knew that this was important, so I had to let you learn it, even though it was making my heart hurt to see you so scared and so sad."

----

I pray that I don't forget this moment when the Lord spoke to both Anna's heart and my own.

Those times when I cry out for release, when I pray fervently for a change of path, when I seek light desperately and only see darkness, when I feel alone and can't see His face. During those times, I will pray for a heart that can remember this moment, for a heart that can hold onto the truth that He is working for my best no matter how scared I am, no matter how much it hurts, no matter how little sense it all makes.

----

Today, Lord, touch my heart. I am standing in Anna's place of panic and doubt. Touch my core and remind me that I'm not alone, that You're working. Remind me that even when I can't see Your face, that you are closer than my breath.

And when the time is right, please come and wrap me up in a great big towel and hold me close and whisper truth to my heart.

Moonless Trust

Moonless Trust
by Elisabeth Elliot


Some of you are perhaps feeling that you are voyaging just now on a moonless sea. Uncertainty surrounds you. There seem to be no signs to follow. Perhaps you feel about to be engulfed by loneliness. There is no one to whom you can speak of your need.

Amy Carmichael wrote of such a feeling when, as a missionary of twenty-six, she had to leave Japan because of poor health, then travel to China for recuperation, but then realized God was telling her to go to Ceylon. (All this preceded her going to India, where she stayed for fifty-three years.) I have on my desk her original handwritten letter of August 25, 1894, as she was en route to Colombo.

"All along, let us remember, we are not asked to understand, but simply to obey.... On July 28, Saturday, I sailed. We had to come on board on Friday night, and just as the tender (a small boat) where were the dear friends who had come to say goodbye was moving off, and the chill of loneliness shivered through me, like a warm love-clasp came the long-loved lines--'And only Heaven is better than to walk with Christ at midnight, over moonless seas.' I couldn't feel frightened then. Praise Him for the moonless seas--all the better the opportunity for proving Him to be indeed the El Shaddai, 'the God who is Enough.'"

Let me add my own word of witness to hers and to that of the tens of thousands who have learned that He is indeed Enough.

He is not all we would ask for (if we were honest), but it is precisely when we do not have what we would ask for, and only then, that we can clearly perceive His all-sufficiency.

It is when the sea is moonless that the Lord has become my Light.

-----


Amen. Let it be so.

The Beauty of the Wind

True Confession: I love the wind.

I love walking in the wind. I love feeling it mess up my hair. I love to lean into it and feel it tickle my skin as it passes through my clothes. From the top of my head to the bottom of my feet, I am wrapped in an invisible presence. And this presence is undeniable. I can hear the trees moaning. I can see the leaves wildly waving. I can feel my hair blowing around in a brown cloud about my head. My clothes are plastered to my body. My skin tingles and stings. My eyes water. I breathe deeply of the sharp air, and the wind takes my breath away from my lungs

To me, the wind has come to represent God.

It is a constant reminder of His presence. The wind is something that I can't see but that I can feel very strongly. My eyes can perceive the effect of the wind, though I can't capture evidence of it with sight.

Wind is a signal of change. It is a sign of changing seasons, of changing weather, of changing landscape.



Right now, my life is very windy.



I went for a walk this morning in the wind. It bit into my ears and my hands with its icy nature, but somehow I found myself invigorated, as if the pain of the wind was reminding me that I'm alive. Without pain, I wonder if we ever really live.


And at this time, my life is filled with pain. The winds of change are blowing with great might, and I know that anything not securely fastened is going to be gone in the morning. Hebrews 12:27-28 talks about a removal of all those things which "can be shaken" so that what remains is only those things which "cannot be shaken."

Much is being shaken in my life.

After this wind dies down, many things will no longer remain, but what what does remain in the morning will be the immovable pieces of my life.


As I was leaning into the wind on my walk this morning, I had a picture in my mind of myself on a beach.

At sunset, I stood on the beach and drank in the beauty of the shore, the shadows, the light. I watched the dimming light play with the grasses and the ripples in the sand.
But as I drank in the beauty, I felt the winds beginning to pick up. I watched as the water was being stirred into a frothy mess. I observed the sea gulls taking off in flight, pushing the wind with their wings.
I left the beach, my clothes flapping agains my legs and arms, knowing that the beauty I had seen that evening would not be there in the morning.

At sunrise, I went to the beach again. The landscape of the beach was completely changed. The sand was still there, the water still there, but nothing else seemed the same. The shoreline, the flotsam, the debris, the tidal pools, the sandbars all made it feel like a completely different place.

But it was still breathtaking in its beauty. The sun glinting on the water and fracturing into diamonds, the waves making music, the shadows, the light . . . they reminded me of what I had once known.

No, it didn't look like what I had seen the night before, but this new landscape wakened my hear to sing in a new way, in a way the scene the previous evening had not done.


But change is hard, and it is important to mourn what was.

And so I mourn.

I mourn the beauty of what has been. I ache with what I leave behind. I choke out sobs, and I wrestle with the many "why?"s that are surfacing in my heart.

And then I walk into the wind -- I lean into it.

I can do this because the wind is my God. The wind is the Lover of my heart.

Yes, right now walking is much harder than it was when the wind was not present and the air was still. But when I lean into it -- when I lean into Him -- I find the bracing reality of His presence.

It is going to be a hard walk. It is going to be painful. And when the wind ceases, the landscape of my life will look very different, but it will still be beautiful.

So right now, all there is for me to do is to mourn what was, to trust the One who promises good for those who love Him, and to lean into the wind . . .