The past two weeks have been painful. I’m not speaking of physical pain but rather emotional pain. The kind of pain that takes time – lots of time for healing to take over. The grief some people are experiencing is far more than I have ever experienced or known about. I am not sure if it’s been there all along and I just have not been paying attention.
Take for example the woman who cried her heart out as she shared with me her husband left unannounced. She doesn’t know if he’ll be coming back. Confusion, guilt, and uncertainty resounds as she speaks. Her stare cries out for answers. I have none. Then there is another young lady who’s grandmother just died. The weight of the world, she feels, is on her back as no other relative is helping with funeral arrangements. Her grandma’s death is the latest in a series of personal disasters. She speaks of quitting life. A man also loses his beloved grandmother. Another woman continues to grieve the recent death of her father. A young man in his twenties has been consistently in and out of the emergency room because his blood pressure continues to rise unexpectedly and the medicine is just not working. He fears a stroke is inevitable.
Now, the unimaginable. A young man shares with me how he recently lost his two brothers; one to death and the other to prison. It turns out his older brother accidentally killed his younger brother and is now facing life in prison. As he speaks he relives the scene. “I tried” he says. “I tried desperately to stop the bleeding and keep him alive.” And now, he is the key witness in his brothers murder trial.
All of this is happening now. Has it always been there and I just wasn’t paying attention? God forgive me.
Help me pray God’s grace and peace for these that hurt. Help me pray that they may have a personal encounter with Jesus in the stairwell.
“If we were all to cast our problems into a pile, we would immediately take ours back”
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