Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Lament for Conner...and all of us

A while back I wrote about my friend who suddenly lost his middle school son in a car wreck that the whole family was in. Below is a gut wrenching piece from him that reflects the depths of both suffering and faith available to us as men. Don't read it if you expect fluffy platitudes about life with God.
 

Lament For Connor

 

That ugly scar of fresh turned earth

Holds tight my broken son whose worth

The world will never know. And I

Turn stricken face to steely sky

And ask a question that will start

Fresh groaning from a broken heart .

Where were you, God, on that dark road

When violence took what I adored

And crushed him? Did You see her shock,

Her wailing, kissing bloody locks?

Did You stand by with folded arm

Or with Your finger cause this harm?

What did I do to make you mad?

If this is love I’ve more than had

Enough. How can I speak of You

To foes when this is what you do

To friends? I’m worn out now and just

Begun to walk the path I must.

Yet I have nowhere left to turn

For hope or joy. I cannot learn

Another voice than first I knew

And trusted. Were they true,

The promises you made to me?

Can I full trust what I can’t see?

I know that my Redeemer lives.

I know a Sovereign takes and gives.

I am a blind and broken man,

So I will hold on while I can

For now. Is grace enough to keep?

Until we see Your face, I weep.

 

I'm eternally grateful to my friend Tod for sharing his suffering. For those of us who know him, we know him to have a gift of insight and truth. That he continues to apply those gifts regardless of the circumstances of his life doesn't surprise me at all. He has been chosen from among us to be an exhibit of God's glory, and I mourn with him that it is in such dramatic fashion. Blessed are the people who have been chosen for lesser shows, and count it only God's grace if you are one them, created for the lesser trials and displays. Only give yourself over to the pain of others so that you can better know God's love and consolation through them, and they through you.

 

Jesus said that his yoke is easy and his burden is light, and that it is for those who are weary and heavy laden. How easy it is to believe such a claim when all is light and airy around us, our outward circumstances providing us with ease. But finding his deeper meaning can only come with the shadow's descent, the dark clouds hovering, the very ground under feet pulled away.

 

Pray for my friend that, he find it. He will.

 

 

3 comments:

Flyawaynet said...

I will be praying, and I believe He will find it also.

Keith Brenton said...

Not all the words of comfort nor all the "fluffy platitudes" that could be offered with the best intention could begin to heal like the expression of honest grief those verses express.

mmlace said...

Brian, thank you for sharing this. I feel compelled to share it with some of my family, at least with my parents and sisters. Back in November, my aunt and uncle lost their 12-year-old daughter, who was hit by a car. It was something that affected all of my family. My aunt and uncle--I still think of them and pray for them daily, and for their older daughter Cori, 15, who I just spent a week with as a counselor at the church camp she attends. They seem to be doing well, but I can't begin to imagine the pain and emptiness they must still feel at times. Thank you for posting this. Much love in Him--mmlace