The Lord gives and the Lord takes, blessed be the name of the Lord.
A better man than I spoke these words many years ago.
Although I must admit I love the way they roll off the tongue.
Blessed be the name of the Lord—
even though He allowed my life to be torn asunder.
Though He gave me my life,
He’ll also allow it to be taken,
along with all the others.
How strange.
The armies of despair have camped round about me,
and are knocking at the door.
I’ve fought them off with prayer and with hope,
with tears and with sincerity,
with everything I’ve known to do,
and yet here they are again.
There are five stages of grief, I’ve read about them;
in fact I read Kubler-Ross preemptively,
to get a jump on grief, and get a head start to healing,
so I could defeat despair and be whole.
But here they are—
the armies of despair knocking at my door,
threatening to tear me down.
The Lord gives and the Lord takes, blessed be the name of the Lord.
Can you imagine saying this and meaning it?
How strange and how beautiful.
Speaking of the stages of grief, I did them all;
and then I did them again,
and then I did them backwards,
and then I did the first one, skipped to the fourth,
backtracked to the second and then the third,
and wrapped it up with the fifth.
And then I did that in reverse order just to be thorough.
But here we are; despair and I looking at each other through the peephole.
Somebody has got to blink.
Am I just a toy on a string for the heavenly powers to play with?
Is it fun to watch me bleed, and then to bind me up;
and then to bleed me yet again?
Job, how can you say it—
can you teach me how to say it too?
And to really mean it?
~FS
Prayerful Life 