your hurt and God's glory

 by Alanna

I remember sitting out on my front porch with you in the dark last summer. I think that's maybe when we really became friends. You still make my kids laugh and hold my baby but things are different now. I see the pain in your eyes. I feel it when I hug you. That afternoon you stood in my kitchen and when I hugged you goodbye you crumpled in pain. Hurt. Again. Your mind. Your body. Your spirit. Broken. I want so much for you to know that your Creator made you for more than this. Your broken texts and your quiet words echo in my mind too much. If I could hold the feeling of immense worth and love in my hands and pass it into yours I would close your fingers around those feelings so you would never let them go. I want so much for you to believe truth. I want the lies and the fog to clear. I want you to see. I want you to be safe.

You shed tears that day. The one I will never forget when you sat at my table. The bread between and the holy moment quiet and unbroken. Where did you go? I cried so long and I pounded so hard on that door. And time passed and my heart grew numb with the hurt. I want you to know grace. To know how loved you are. To know the King of the universe and that He never expected more from you than just quiet trust. For all the unanswered questions that I never had an answer to. You changed my life in so many ways. And in the car that day when we spoke of goodbyes. And I saw in my son's eyes his heart brimful, but the tears didn't spill over when he whispered those awful words. I was so thankful that day to be able to face forward and cry and cry and he never knew. How can I give him answers to a reality that breaks me to pieces. I want you to believe.

You are precious and valuable and I wish I had spent more time in our childhood rehearsing those truths over and over to you. How to deal with the regrets now. You ran to so many things except to the one place where you would find true healing. I'm sorry I haven't loved you better. I never knew the right words to say. But my heart broke when you called me. It breaks for you still. All that pain in cycles you can't escape on your own. I see in you a reflection of where I would be if He hadn't chased me down.  Your Creator made you fearfully and wonderfully beautiful. I wish I could take your sorrow from you. I wish you could see that your Savior bled for all that hurt and sin so that you wouldn't have to. I want you to be free.

I pick up the pen to write you and it's always a complicated dance. There's so much in my heart that I want for you. So much healing and hope and peace. Deep down and rock solid. But I struggle too. I know the dark days. The clouds feel like a blanket today that suffocate me and the snow coming down just makes it that much harder to breathe. I have to fight for joy too. I want you to be whole.

In a mysterious way that I can't comprehend, you hold my heart still. The green mountains and the rocky paths. Your people's greetings in the streets. How can one small place hold so much human suffering. I'm so sorry for all my country has done to you. I'm so sorry for all of your hunger and your orphans and the occupation and the army's brutality over all these years. He promised, when the poor and needy seek water and their tongue is parched with thirst, that He would answer them. Sometimes I confess with Lecrae that He feels far away. In all the rubble and chaos. It feels jarring to me that I can sit and type these words from a safe house with a full belly and electric lights. I can't pretend to know all the hurt you hold. I want your people to be well.