Category Archives: grief

Beagles, Babies, and “Became”

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Isaiah 46:12-13 KJV
[12] Hearken unto me, ye stouthearted, that are far from righteousness: [13] I bring near my righteousness; it shall not be far off, and my salvation shall not tarry: and I will place salvation in Zion for Israel my glory.

This week there was an assault on a farm in Wisconsin that raises beagles for research purposes because they “are trusting, loyal, and easy to handle.”

In England, two men are on trial for unspeakable abuse of a baby they adopted then abused to death.

Jesus became the embodiment of unspeakable horror to pay for unspeakable pain. He bore our sins then bore the holy wrath of God.

He became the sacrificial beagle for the sacrificed baby.

When the minor griefs of my quotidian life hit me hard in my chest, I have to keep my eyes fixed on Jesus. I have to tell Him that I cannot fathom the depths of the horror He endured for this broken, afflicted, heartbroken world.

The wrath of a Righteous God

For the broken beagle

For the broken baby

For the broken-hearted

He is coming back soon

She says

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“That was too short!“

I tell her that it would have been longer if

She had been quiet faster

Will you write another one if I am quiet? She asks

Hard to, nay impossible to,

Say no

Beautiful mockingbird

Origami daughters

Their hair ribbons of color and light like their mothers

Were-are-will be

“nothing shall be impossible”

Wind! Birds! Mockingbird! Mother!

He is

The wind that shakes the trees, lifts the wings

Heals the world

(John chapter 3–all of it!)

Pareidolia

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Within days of the end of an era I lay beneath a cloudy night sky and drew faces from slow moving clouds and stars and planets

I resisted the urge to cup your face in my hand or bang the flats of my palms against the heavy plate glass of the cathedral

Yell your name

But I had to

Had to

Had to

Touch the hem of your garment

Pray you turn and say my name

How to want…to be His friend

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You have to see past the blood—your own and his

The stinging sweat and the jeering crowds

The voice in your own pounding brain

Nay, voices—

Saying that no king of anything could die like this

Alone and vulnerable in the dumpster fire of all

You have to focus on his eyes

What he sees and what is reflected in them

Love beyond measure/sky without end

And you must listen to his voice

Agony is too small a word for what he has done for us

The fire of the wrath of a holy God

Substitutionary Everything

Nothing left without Him.

The Parables

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Jesus knows that his beloved followers will need things to hold onto as they undergo the crushing persecution and ostracism of the first years (300ish) of Christianity.

So he gives them stories—stories so vivid and memorable and simple and beautiful that they can go back again and again to these stories to nourish them in the dark places they will find themselves in as followers of The Way.

The parable are rooms we can live in, stories we can inhabit, people and places and symbols we can return to again and again

As we wait in dark places

For the Return of the King.

You tell yourself

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You tell yourself it will do no good

To acknowledge the child who floated in the beads of the ultrasound or the mantras of the obstetrical attending—

It is for her best not to know

Or the terrible error in calculating

The time it takes to unpack and repack a Pilot

A truck, an Accord, a house, a life

You tell yourself

It would have happened by now

The Icarus Moment

The violent fall

When an ordinary man walks into light eternal

Only to become it

We will all be changed

Some moments last for all

Eternity

Returning to the place of grief

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After it became clear that the state of Texas was not going to provide adequate consequences for the assailant or adequate protections for the victims, I did three things—

I wrote a book so there would be a record of what had happened to us.

I asked to move and tried to expect less of law enforcement (a person cannot change who they are without losses).

I became involved in extreme sports. I became an adrenaline junkie.

Facing my fear and pouring myself into physical challenges with the risk of pain helped me to ease the grief, anger, and helplessness of what had happened to people I loved.

Like all addiction, this was not a long term solution, but it did help me.

Routinely facing fear of physical harm helped me to be more courageous when there was only the fear of human ostracism.

I still seek the adrenaline rush and lately it has been through swimming in challenging conditions.

When the lie is on a hand-made sign

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https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7762407/

The mother looks almost beatific patting her baby bump. She is going to great lengths and expense to end the baby’s life through dismemberment in utero.

Another picture from the case shows a supporter holding a sign asserting that abortion—the medical murder of babies-“saves lives.”

This is a statement which should be scrutinized with the same carefulness as injunctions over the gates of Auschwitz.

A lie is a lie is a lie, but covering human carnage with a bait and switch slogan is both Orwellian and apocalyptic.

The woman with her hand lovingly placed over her tummy is bent on killing her child prematurely.

It is hard to see such tragedy celebrated. Endorsed. Maybe even promoted by the journalists and photographers focused on elevating the rights of one human above another.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arbeit_macht_frei