Not Numb

So much grief has been experienced in this world recently. Grief happens everyday. Everyday, somebody suffers something. Never a day goes by that someone doesn't die. Never a day goes by that a woman doesn't miscarry, or someone is abused, or a marriage breaks up, or child starves, etc. In your life or my life, these things might happen here and there, on occasion, or not yet. But somewhere, everyday.....somebody is experiencing the most tragic pain of their life. And this is just a small glimpse of the painful options.

If pain were on a shelf in your pantry, it would be crammed in, stocked high and low. And it never runs out. And until Kingdom comes, it never will.

The Bible says we are to mourn with those who mourn and rejoice with those who are filled with joy. That might sound like poetry, and the idea sounds good.... but this is real. I took this idea of mourning with those who mourn, to heart, many months ago. I was reading a blog of a woman I do not know, and she was sharing some deeply painful experiences going on in the lives around her...and she asked that if any of the readers were willing to share in the grief so that this family could have some of it lifted off of their spirits...to please ask for that grief to be shifted. As crazy as it might sound.....I knew right then I was supposed to take some of that grief. This was for a family I did not know and for a siutation in which I had no involvement. That day, I got on my knees and I wept and I mourned and I felt a very heavy weight for several days. Then I felt it lift. I can only tell you that whatever the purpose was....it was my honor to go through it. But more than anything now.....I just know that this is true.....the we should and we can mourn for and with those who mourn. We can carry burdens that are not our own. We can lighten the load of another....and they might never ever even know. They don't have to know. This is between you and God. But I believe that person who's grief you share, will have a lighter burden...I believe this.

Lately I am depressed. I know that I know that I know that my spirit could use a lift and I have a prescription for Zoloft that I have had since Shawn was 5 months old and I was diagnosed with post-partum depression. I have plenty of those little blue pills, and I have a refill available, and my doctor would give me more if I called and asked her. I'm not taking the meds because I know for me, right now, today, I am supposed to feel what I feel. I am not supposed to be numb or even uplifted in these moments. Have we any idea the heaviness of grief that Jesus carried for us before He was crucified. He carried it ALL.

I am supposed to feel sadness and grief for the lost souls in this world. I am supposed to feel outraged that children die and starve because they cannot afford a clean water source. I am supposed to grieve for the relationships that do not work out. I am supposed to feel upside down when I reach and try and fail. Our Lord Jesus has never felt numb. He feels all of our pain and He can fill it......too.

I had a great conversation with my dear bible study girlfriends this week and we talked about how everything we do is apparantly in an effort to stop the pain or avoid the pain altogether. Our coping mechanisms may all look different. Some people drink or use drugs. Some people try to cure their pain with relationships. Some people try to steal the things that might numb the pain. Some people kill their pain (with guns....yes). Some people eliminate their pain by eliminating themselves. Some people climb to the top where they think there is no pain. Some people try to outrun their pain. Some try to outsmart their pain.

The whole world's pain is a product of sin. And it s.u.c.k.s. For ourselves and for the ones we come into contact with, all we can really do is lean into the only healer ever made available to man. All we can do is trust that there is an eternity without pain and that if we believe that and if we serve God for that purpose.....that is our gift and our treasure, in Heaven with Him.

I am well. I am good. My heart is healthy and my faith is strong. I'm just learning that maybe I can and should carry more pain than that which belongs to me. I'm honored and I am heavy....but I carry this heaviness for the savior of my life, the Lord that I love. If this glorifies Jesus, I never want to be numb.

I am not going to proof read or edit this. It is what it is.