For Those I Love, Who are Suffering

I feel like I am on the battlefield.  The wounded, the dying, are all around me.  I have too many friends wading through grief so heavy, it breaks bones and dreams. Too many friends who are carrying loads that should never need to be carried.  I am the nurse on the field, witnessing tragedies all around me, and I am in shock.

I am mostly standing frantic, pleading for relief on their behalf, tearing hair from my own head.  I can only cry out to God and shake my fist at the dust and yell at death "you've taken too many, already."  I hold pressure on one wound when another explodes beside me.  I am not enough.  My friendship, my words, my experiences are not enough to stop the bleeding.

I'm at work and I see patients suffering, dying.  They are all too young.  They all had things they still wanted to do.  And then in my own community the losses, the blows to health and homes, to marriages and children...this life is so hard.

I am grieved and broken over others' sorrows because I recognize the thin line that separates 'me' from 'them.'  Gone is the illusion that suffering is 'over there' and not 'right here,' waiting to pound on my own door. I can imagine just how horrific these realities must feel and for these friends who I am walking with, I carry their sorrow and anguish with me.  How long?  How come?  Why now?  Why me?  Their questions might as well be the beat of my own heart I know them so well.

I am shaken.  I am angered.  The truth of this life is unsettling: we will all die.  We will watch those we love die.  We will experiences losses and hurts, tragedies, and heartaches.  None of us are immune.   None of us expect them.  

And I run.  Straight into His arms.  He who is the only safe haven in the midst of the storm.  I don't understand.  I don't even pretend to have any answers.  The only things I do know, I have learned from being in my own deep and dark places: I know He is good in ways that we cannot even fathom and His plans are far better than the momentary evils we endure.  I know that He is a redeemer, and all that is being done will be un-done in our forever reality to come.  I know that He is near to those who suffer and His presence is richer and realer in the middle of suffering than any other place.  And I know that His grace is sufficient for those who seek it.  Sufficient in all things, through all things.  He will not let the dark overcome us.  There will be day.  Glorious day.  Even if the night is long, there will be day.

Sometimes I wish there was another way to live- without tragedy.  But then other times I am revelling in the glory that is God's ability to take even the worst circumstances, even our greatest sufferings and scars and make them into something beautiful.  How can that even be possible?  But then, that has always been the way of this world: Jesus' own scars ransomed my soul.  

For now, the hope of a future without suffering, pain and death is enough.  And the knowledge that His presence will never leave me, nor those I love, in the midst of personal tragedy is better than any other truth or practical help I could offer.  

So God- be near, and nearer and nearer still to those who are suffering.  They need more of you.  Keep their heads above the water, do not let them drown in the weight of their crises.  Be their enough.