Last month's struggle

How do I walk through the oppressive darkness without being overtaken by it. How do I look upon the decay without becoming discouraged. The only words that come to mind are paralyzed and sucked dry. It seems everyone around me is falling apart and I have no words of life to speak nor even a solid foundation from which to speak them. Yes, there is solidarity between us, but it’s hard. I can’t fix their struggles as much as I’m helpless to fix mine.

The motivation is skewed, the emotion gone. But was it ever there to be missed?

Yes I can look back and see how this struggle has been present for years and years, but is that supposed to dry up this endless flow of tears? No, to me that’s just even more paralyzing. Hopelessness sets in and I struggle to even breathe.

How can I breathe life into anyone when I can’t even fill my lungs so life can pulse through my body.

I believe I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord. Be strong, let your heart take courage, and wait for the Lord.

Maybe it’s in this vulnerable state that I’m stripped of all I once leaned on and I’m coming face to face with the reality of me. The reality of this world and the brokenness that so grossly characterizes it. It’s in this being laid bare that I must face the ugliness of the self and the depressing state of the world. And therein I’m faced with a choice. I can wallow in the sad state of reality, sinking into a deeper and deeper depression, or I can step out in hope, embracing the possibility that there’s more. That things are being and will be restored.

Can one in the pit covered in sludge really help those with him out? Entangled with the web of chaos can he really help free those next to him who are begging to be released from it’s grasp? Does he have the ability or power to loose the chains of doubt from his neighbor? Can the one in the cave really see to lead the way out to the warmth of the sunshine of reality? If he’s never been out himself? Of if he was he was blindfolded? 

I can ask and ask, but talk is cheap. I must walk forward or take a seat. Is this hopelessness all there is? Or is there something greater. A man called Hope. One who came to redeem. One known in English by the name of Jesus.