Bruises

One of my very favorite songs is Bruises by Train and Ashley Monroe.  I guess I just really identify with it.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmXaaEvnnOQ

If you aren't familiar with the song you should follow the link and listen to it.  The chorus goes,

"These bruises make for better conversation
Loses the vibe that separates
It's good to let you in again
You're not alone in how you've been
Everybody loses, we all got bruises
We all got bruises"

Lately I've been feeling very bruised.  I think for all of us the feeling comes and goes.  And I don't necessarily feel bruises that are new.  Many of my bruises are more like deep tissue injuries. They have been there for a long time and will probably be there for a long time to come.  Sometimes they don't bother me much.  I can go about my life and function without issue.  Then suddenly an old bruise will get bumped, often in a very small way, and all of the hurt and pain comes rushing back.  

I have found myself more than once on my knees pleading with my Father in Heaven to take away the pain of my bruises and desperately asking him why I had to sustain those bruises in the first place. Although I know He has a perfect plan, it is so hard to accept that it is perfect when I can only see a few pixels in a huge picture.  

I have a friend who has bruises similar to mine and I often look at her courage and wonder how she does it.  I see her pain at times but I also see the strength she has to pull herself up and proceed on a path that at times must seem impossible.  

Over the past few days one of my deepest most painful bruises has begun to throb.  It always does this time of year.  I have known for months this was coming but was hoping that this year with all of the changes in our lives that the pain would not be as sharp.  I am finding though that the pain has not changed.  

And this year we have added an extra pain.  My grandpa's health is failing and he has entered hospice care.  I found myself last night questioning God, asking him why he has put so much pain into my Christmas season.  A time to celebrate and praise Him for the birth of His Son our Lord and Savior, has for me, been a struggle for the past 7 Christmas seasons.  Then last night at church we sang the song Farther Along.  

"Tempted and tried we're oft made to wonder

Why it should be thus all the day long
While there are others living about us
Never molested though in the wrong

Farther along we'll know all about it
Farther along we'll understand why
Cheer up my brother live in the sunshine
We'll understand it all by and by

When death has come and taken our loved ones
It leaves our home so lonely and drear
And then do we wonder why others prosper
Living so wicked year after year

When we see Jesus coming in glory
When he comes down from his home in the sky
Then we shall meet him in that bright mansion
We'll understand it all by and by

Farther along we'll know all about it
Farther along we'll understand why
Cheer up my brother live in the sunshine
We'll understand it all by and by

Yeah we'll understand it all by and by"

The message of this song struck me in a stronger way than it ever has in the past.  The verse that speaks of death coming and taking our loved ones had tears welling up in my eyes.  In a season of birth and joy the loss of loved ones seems to have an extra sting.  Not knowing day by day when I will receive that call that my grandpa has left this earth seems to have parked a big gray cloud over the top of me.  Trying to "cheer up my brother live in the sunshine" has seemed impossible many days recently.  

For most of my life I have turned to music in times of sadness and frustration.  In recent years I have turned to gospel music more than I ever had in the past.  I have tired to also turn to the bible but many times I struggle to turn to the bible because my pain urges me to turn away from, not toward, the Lord.  But as I turned to the bible this weekend I found this passage. 

Psalm 23:4-6

Even though I walk
    through the darkest valley,[a]
I will fear no evil,
    for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
    they comfort me.

5 You prepare a table before me
    in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
    my cup overflows.
6 Surely your goodness and love will follow me
    all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord
    forever.

I never thought of this verse as one that would comfort me at this time but it hit me in a way that I had never considered before.  There are times that we have to walk the the dark valleys.  But I can't say that it has necessarily comforted me.  It has almost made me angry.  Why must we walk in that dark valley?  And why must my dark valley be a valley of loss?  Why must my dark valley require me to travel emotionally secluded from those I love and need the most?

I have no answers to these questions.  But I do know that only though prayer, bible study and careful soul searching will I ever understand.  And I thank my Father in Heaven for giving me the understanding to know where to find answers even when the journey to those answers is painful and difficult.  

"I would love to fix it all for you
I would love to fix you too
Please don't fix a thing whatever you do"