Coping with the Pain
zondag, januari 10, 2016
Sometimes I have this enormous weight on my chest.
I feel like I almost can't catch my breath.
The weight of the world...or something like that.
I almost collapse when I think of everyone's pain.
War.
Rape.
Murder.
Death.
Loss.
Sadness.
Depression.
Emptiness.
The list goes on
and on
and on.
And it all ends in pain.
In death.
I understand why all those year ago I searched out a group of hippies walking around for peace and had a desperate desire to join them...as ineffective as it was...it just made you feel like you could get away from all this death.
That maybe instead of opening the news and seeing more terror...you could open your tent up and see people dancing around a tree.
I grew up in a church.
As far back as I can remember I have been saved.
Since as far back as I go...I've had an idea that this world is not the end.
That I will one day have no more tears.
Today I had a hard talk with Ki...our 5 year old.
Our Great dane is turning grey...and the harrowing process of arthritis has taken hold over her legs. And Ki has heard us talking about what the future is going to look like for our old lady.
"Mom, is Farah going to die?"
"Yes, Shakinah...she will die one day."
"No, but is she going to die soon?"
"Well, not in the next months, but she's getting old and she isn't going to live so long now."
"Will she go to heaven?"
(Oh no the dreaded "do animals go to heaven" question...yes Dad..I still feel a little scarred from when you told me that animals don't have souls. I will avoid that question like the plague)
"We'll just have to wait and see."
"Because when I go to heaven there will be no more crying and animals, and my friend M said we won't need food."
(Seriously M's Mum??? Like seriously?)
Why I write this conversation is because I see it in my daughter already...this viewpoint that spans out and looks to things further than just the here and now. That looks to the hope that there won't be any sadness one day. She's 5 and she gets that concept.
What a comforting thought that has always been to me.
And not to say this to demean other's beliefs but I honestly do wonder: how do you cope?
Even when I wasn't living as a Christ follower
I still had in the back of my head that however it looked...there was a point that I was walking to. That this life wasn't the only life I would have.
If this life is it...if all this pain that everyone is experiencing...is worth nothing...
then what's the point?
I mean I have a pretty good life...I live in a developed country
I have free drinking water.
I don't worry that someone is going to invade my city and steal my children from me.
We own a home.
I can have as many children as I want.
I can have a job and earn money.
Actually if I am unemployed the government would financially support me.
I've got it good.
But what about that yazidi girl who has been ripped away from her family and is sitting in a dark room with countless other girls waiting to be sold in a market as a sex slave?
Where she will be regarded as nothing but an object to hurt and abuse.
What about the mother who lies watching her infant cry night after night, because he's starving to death and she has no way of satisfying his hunger?
What about parents who lost all three kids in a car accident? Or women who were gang raped? Or refugees who have left every ounce of their world behind to come to a place where they are seen as lesser human beings? What about? What about?
I saw it on a daily basis...painstaking poverty. Abuse. Disease. Pain. Hopelessness. Death.
And now that I live comfortably in my nice home...I can close my eyes if I want.
And pretend that it doesn't happen.
It does.
And I have to put my faith in a hope that all this is going somewhere. That all this is going to turn out good.
That's how I cope when I open my eyes and look around.
I don't take this weight off my chest. My Savior does.
The hope I have:
That one day there will be no more tears in the presence of my Jesus.
(And hopefully some real good food).
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