Blessed Are Those Who Mourn 2: A Wavering Hope
(Son
of My Right Hand)
How do you prepare for loss?
Can you fathom for such preparation?
We are a society that thrives on
knowing days in advance before a storm hits, but what about the storms we don’t
see? OR When you know a storm of grief is coming, how do you prepare for it?
A close family member of mine has
been fostering a child for months now. She is the only mother this child knows.
The intent has always been to adopt. Without giving details, they've been
warned that the storm that “could happen” will
happen on a certain date. She begs with a tearful, mourning heart, “How do
you prepare for that?”
Do we give up hope? –But a life
without hope is no life at all.
How does a mother prepare to her
heart back?
“Only
in darkness can you see the stars.”-MLK
Upon hearing the news she shared,
I was just overcome. I grabbed some paper and a pencil and you are reading most
of what was jotted down plus, just trying to make sense of this and, to find an
answer. Sure, I can be remindful of the “This did not take God by surprise” or “God
has a plan” or “If it’s meant to be, it will be.” The list of these things
people say goes on and on.
However, no one wants to hear
that—the truth—when all that one feels and wants to do is scream, “THIS
SUCKS!!!” and while throwing fists to the sky sob, “WHY?!? WHY ME?? WHY?!?” And
through it all, while everyone is full of cliché truths, nothing eases the pain
like the knowledge that we don’t feel any pain that the Lord has not felt
Himself. He is with you and me in our rants of how much this sucks. He is
sitting there hurt and crying with you.
The pain is still deafening and grief is still shaping our robotic life, but we
are not alone.
After
great pain, a formal feeling comes – (372)
By
Emily Dickinson
After great pain, a formal feeling comes –
The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs –
The stiff Heart questions ‘was it He, that bore,’
And ‘Yesterday, or Centuries before’?
The Feet, mechanical, go round –
A Wooden way
Of Ground, or Air, or Ought –
Regardless grown,
A Quartz contentment, like a stone –
This is the Hour of Lead –
Remembered, if outlived,
As Freezing persons, recollect the Snow –
First – Chill – then Stupor – then the letting go –
The last four words of the poem
are the hardest and possibly is when all hope is lost.
Do we never take a chance because
of the heart break (or failure of a dream) that might happen? ---A life lived
in such bondage is no life at all. The heart breaks and failures make us who we
are. Do we become so fearful of losing that we never give? That is not the
answer either.
So maybe there’s no grand
revelation or solution in this blog. Maybe there’s no easy answer, no equation
or 12 stop process. So, what’s the point? What is the point of all of
this---this grief, in particular of this mother??
It is hope. Even in the darkest
days there’s hope, we all go through times when we lose it, when we feel like
God has truly forgotten us and our desires, but even on those days God places
people in our lives to carry hope for us. Merriam-Webster defines hope as “To
cherish a desire with anticipation.” The definition alone brings tears to my
eyes, because all I envision is a mother clinging to a baby.
Matthew 5:4 "Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted." (KJV)
Blessed Are Those Who Mourn
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