The unity of grief

Most people have gone through tough times in their lives.  Be it deaths, broken relationships, illnesses, mistreatment, betrayal...  I feel like grief leaves wounds that never completely close.  Oh, they fade, and through the grace of God any heart can heal, but memories will always linger.

But the up side of grief, if I may speak simplistically, is that because it is so universal, it can be shared.  No two stories are ever going to be the same.  No two griefs will ever perfectly match.  But two wounded hearts can share the pain and the peace that their stories have brought.  (I remember the first time one of my friends lost a brother after I'd lost mine, thinking, "Finally, I can offer words of encouragement so they know they're not alone."  But afterwards I realized--it was just as uncomfortable and sad and distinctly Not As Comforting As I'd Wished as the other times.  Even if it feels like you have all things in common, another soul's grief can never be fully entered into.  So words of hope and encouragement are always beneficial, not just from people who know.)

Remember after 9/11?  People would gather to share their stories, their hurts, and to begin the healing by acknowledging that their pain was not theirs alone.  In its individuality, it was universal.  School shootings and natural disasters are like that too, but often when people endure sorrow on an individual scale, they don't share like they might if others were going through the same experience.  Often we keep individual griefs closed in, as if our pain might inconvenience others.

This is a stock photo because obviously I don't actually take pictures when people are grieving.

I've been thinking about that recently.  A woman I know recently had this to say about her journey through grief.  (I would never just link someone's random post, but she wrote this to be shared, and to be a thread of comfort to others.  Her journey from grief means giving up rights to her story, as it were, if it means someone could be helped by it.)  I would recommend reading it, by the way.  I'm not going to lie--I cried when I read it.  I've never lost a child, but I'm a human, so I reacted to her suffering.
And that's the way it should be.  At work, this sparked a lot of discussions.  We all shared a little about the sad times we've gone through in our lives.  I've worked there for more than a year and this was the first time I'd mentioned my brother to some of them.  Everyone had a little piece of grief to offer, and in every offering, the burden was made just a little lighter to bear.

Of course...  I really haven't gone through as many tough times as some.  All things considered, I've gotten off pretty easy on the grief scale.  But that's my point--people can share grief, even if it's not the same.  Even if I haven't suffered as much as you, it doesn't mean that we can't be a comfort to each other.  And, most particularly if we're both believers, we have so much comfort to give each other.  I remember being much impacted by a story of grief told by a man I knew, who, instead of focusing on his own grief, reminded me that none of our suffering compares to the Lord's suffering.  And it's not just that He suffered, He suffered for our sakes.  So we can stand together, and with certainty that overshadows grief, say that My Redeemer Lives.  It's not like that takes away the earthly pain we experience, but it causes our hearts to focus on the One Who can bear our pain in the toughest moments.  Because sharing pain and grief with others will never compare to the lightness that comes with sharing our burdens with the Lord.

I see monsters

As I've mentioned before, I work at a daycare.  A job, I love by the way, but I just had to go through my annual learning certificates (which help me keep the job I love, but I don't love quite as much as the job itself).  Turns out, the state requires that I know certain things so I'm fully equipped to work with children.

Will I remember anything I learned?  Almost certainly not.  Sometimes I get panicked when I realize that I've been issued a CRP certificate and I might one day be called upon to perform actual CPR on an actual person.  I feel like I would be one of those people who just like start hyperventilating and don't accomplish anything helpful.  Though one time I was in a situation where someone's foot got run over by a car, and I was the only person who kept her cool and got the situation sorted out.  So... maybe I'd be okay?

But that's not what this is about.

In addition to superfun times in my Communicable Diseases class (sarcasm alert) I took a class on child abuse prevention.  I add the "prevention" because I kept referring to it as just "child abuse," but those conversations got awkward.  "What was that thing you had last night?"  "Oh, I had this child abuse thing I had to do.  I mean, I didn't abuse children.  I learned how not to.  Not that I ever did before.  Just...  prevention.  It was a prevention class."

Anyhow, it was sort of terrifying.  As we all know, I work with kids all the time.  During the week at my daycare, I work with fabulous children who have (from what I know, anyhow) solid homes and loving and nurturing families.  On the weekends with Sunday School I work with fabulous children who have slightly less happy homes.  I mean, they might be happy homes, but they're not stable.  They might be loving, but I can't help but think that they're probably not very nurturing.  It's a sad fact, but a lot of broken families are exactly that; broken.  I spend time with kids who have these unavoidably warped views on life, who mistrust men, authority figures, and basically everyone.  Kids who curse like sailors and stay up till four in the morning watching questionable movies because nobody ever tells them they shouldn't.  That's life for them.

Something else they have to deal with?  Abuse.  I won't go into the specifics, mostly because I take the mantle of trust that they've placed in me very seriously, but I know kids who have been abused.  In various ways and by different people.  But it's horrifying.  No child should have to worry about things like that.  But these kids, my kids, have to worry about this.  Nobody is there to protect them--mommy works two jobs to support them and her boyfriend (who is on disability, you know, because of his back, because I've learned it's always the back).  These are kids who are raised by sheer force of will, guidance from TV, and the occasional grandmother.

It shouldn't be like that.  In my child abuse class they talked about the different indicators and whatever of child abuse.  Kids you should keep your eyes open for because either they are showing indications of being abused, or their home life is such that would lend itself to abuse.

It made me upset at the world in which we live.  That we have to learn to look for the monsters in the closet.  That I work at a daycare, with only kids who are younger than school-age, and we are mandated by the state to keep our eyes open for kids who might be abused at home.  I'm not saying there's ever a good age to start abusing kids, but the little defenseless ones are especially not okay to abuse.

This is rambley and doesn't make much sense, but I just...  have been feeling sad about the whole thing.  That I know kids who have told me about being abused, that I live in a world where I have to look for it, that I live in a world where there really are monsters in the closet.

And it makes me hope that in my small corner of the world, I can maybe be another influence in these lives.  I can't pretend to be the changing force in anybody's life (that is, in fact, the Lord's job, I'm thankful to say, and not a burden on my shoulders), but I know that I can be there for the kids I do have.  These are kids who move a lot (which always makes me muchly sorrowful), but while they're here, living in "my" neighborhood, my prayer is that the Lord can use me in their lives in whatever way I can.  If that means waking up early on a Saturday morning and going to a track meet, I'll be there.  If it means helping with homework, I'll be there.  Hugs, the occasional birthday party, and basketball (some of my favorite memories from last summer are actually being coached in basketball by some of my older Sunday School boys--because secretly I love basketball), those are things I can be there for.  Some kids will never share the deeper parts of their lives with me.  But for the kids who do entrust parts of their lives to me, I want to be able to cope, and to share with them the only One Who could ever handle the pain they've been given in their short lives.  It's only through God's grace that my life is so together.  I can't reverse their lives and somehow change it to make sense.  But I so greatly desire to help them see that through God, their lives can make sense.  We so often mourn, at my house, the lives we see with so much potential to be something, yet equally with so much potential to go off-course and become one more statistic.  Not like we expect the worst, per se, we're just pretty practical about it.

And it's sad.  Sad that we live in a world where we have to be practical about kids who might one day become statistics.  Kids who know monsters personally and try to leave the ugly parts of live behind when they get older, but end up making a mess of their lives, because they don't know how to do differently.

So that's the rant of the week.  Life makes me sad.  I mean, I know there's so much more to life, and I'd like to think that the real and perfect power of God will make a difference right now, today, in some of these lives, but I know that a lot of these stories have a lot of twists and turns before surrendering to the Lord.  And I know I won't always be there for these parts of their lives.  As much as I want to somehow be there for them, always, I know life doesn't work like that.

But I'm so thankful for these days I have been given with them.  For the privilege of being able to be with them in these days, even if they're numbered.  That's okay--the message of hope never dims.  What they learn about the Lord now will never change.  When their lives have changed, when their circumstances aren't what they always dreamed of, Jesus Christ will be there, the same yesterday, and today, and forever.

And that's a lot more than I say for myself, any day of the week.

The 12 Days of Dedication

I was reading Numbers 7 for my nighttime reading, and every time I read it (all 89 verses, haha, because it's the kind of chapter you feel silly stopping in the middle of, because whatever you read tomorrow will be a carbon copy of what you read tonight!) it rings through my head in a very 12 Days of Christmas style.

Presumably because there are lists of numbered things that were given, and they were given on 12 separate days.  Funny, that.

Anyhow, I've always sort of had it in my head as a song, and tonight realized that it doesn't fit at all.  But, I shall pretty much always sing it as a song when I read it, so I share it here, so you can annoying get the 12 Days of Christmas tune in your head as you read Numbers 7 next.  Because I love to share.  You're welcome.

On the first day of dedication the prince of Judah brought,
One weighty silver charger.

On the second day of dedication the prince of Issachar brought,
One silver bowl
And a weighty silver charger.

On the third day of dedication the prince of Zebulun brought,
One golden spoon,
One silver bowl,
And a weighty silver charger.

On the fourth day of dedication the prince of Reuben brought,
Various fillings,
One golden spoon,
One silver bowl,
And a weighty silver charger.

Okay, so this could go on forever.  And I'm cutting out may important things.  But as I said, this is actually remarkably difficult to condense appropriately.

On the twelfth day of dedication the prince of Naphtali brought,
Five first year lambies,
Five only male goats,
Five off'ring peace rams,
Two off'ring peace oxen,
One goat for sinning,
One first year lambie,
One ram for burning,
One young bullock.
Various fillings,
One golden spoon,
One silver  bowl,
And a weighty silver charger.

Phew.  That is a mouthful, and it leaves out a lot of important details.  And uses the word "lambies" because "lambs" isn't enough syllables.  So go, my friends.  Go forth and read Numbers 7, appreciate the exquisite detail, and feel free to let me know if you find a way to make this passage flow more smoothly (particularly lines that use words like lambies and off'ring)!  I think I'd sleep better at night if I had a version of this song that actually fit to this chapter!