The Journey

"Even in laughter the heart may ache, and rejoicing may end in grief." -Proverbs 14:13 Grief is a funny thing that sneaks up on you when you least expect it. There is no respect for time and place. Mourning may overtake you at work or in the middle of the grocery store. It keeps you up all night or invades your dreams. Sorrow has many faces. It is loneliness in a crowded room, unwarranted anger, a roller coaster of emotion, or apathy. Everyone is different, and everyone laments in their own way. Some find an inner drive to reinvent themselves while others drown in hopelessness and succumb to defeat. "No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear."  - C.S. Lewis In research for this blog, I ran across an article about a female chimpanzee whose baby died. That mama chimp carried her dead baby around for three days. One Sunday morning as I was getting ready for church, I saw a vision of myself so clearly, I began to weep. In my gri...

If you had to choose one word to describe yourself, what would it be? Only a few months ago, my word would have been gray. The same word used to describe ashes or overcast skies. I woke up with the new year realizing I had taken up residence in a perpetual state of nothingness. Merely existing. Barely walking, barely talking, barely breathing, no identity. I was melting into the gray walls of life.  Going through the motions, but dying from the inside out. Two failed marriages and a brief, yet destructive relationship later, my prayer was to not become entangled in another relationship, romantic or otherwise, that was not a divine connection. I prayed,  do not let anyone cross my path lest you send them.  For years, it seemed as though that prayer had been answered until I found myself at the end of another it-wasn't-what-it-seemed and how-could-I-be-so-blind misadventure. The shiny apple with a rotten core. This time instead of shouldering all ...

Photo by Ales Me A heavy blanket of despair was draped upon my shoulders, but it provided no warmth or security. I was blindly stumbling through thick darkness searching for any glimmer of light in this circumstance. The force of the proverbial rug being snatched out from under me took my breath while deception loomed eerily around me. Every hair on my body stood to attention with the realization that nothing was what it appeared to be. Scouring for something tangible I grasped for anything to cling to because at that moment the One who was my only hope of survival seemed a million miles away. The God of all creation had turned His back, lifted His warm covering, and withheld His protection. I was wearied with unfulfilled promises, shattered dreams, unending devastation, and the relentless struggle to break free. I shared on my personal Facebook page how this has been one of the hardest years of my life. I have survived more trauma and much more tragedy in former years. Howe...

Photo by Samuel Martins Surpassing the confines of just an emotion, a broken heart causes actual, physical suffering, a pang that can be felt in your chest cavity. The emptiness of a hollowed-out soul lies imprisoned in the ribcage and each bone aches from the inside out. Torment stretches its ugly fingers to the core of the mind where painful memories are housed, where hurtful words linger, and where swirling thoughts run rampant as it extends its cruel feet to the very pit of the stomach flooding the entire torso with grief, angst, and brokenness. The torso is the middlemost part of the body from which every appendage stems. It is your center, your equilibrium. Is it any wonder that when the heart is broken, everything else in life seems to fall out of balance? "The human spirit can endure in sickness,   but a crushed spirit who can bear?"    Proverbs 18:14  There is hope, though. Psalm 126:5 enco...