Friday, September 30, 2022

It Takes A Lifetime

As I grow older, I find that I am more and more interested in vulnerable and even sometimes difficult conversations. I have to catch my breath in between them, and it's good to talk about baseball, or music, or what you had to eat yesterday as a break here and there, but hearing the truth of someone's life has become a gift to me.
Let's cut to it and deal with our joy, grief or broken-ness. Then find a way to support one-another; invite help from beyond our human weaknesses into the process.
I have said a few times on Sunday mornings, "A 'little bit raw' can stand awfully close to repentance."  
I know that has been true for myself.
So, in that spirit I began writing something that spoke to the cycle of insecurity and peace that I have felt my whole life.
From childhood, through adolescence. 
Through parenting and now into my senior years.
A good friend of my wife's who passed on just a short time ago, once said to Rhonda, 
"Oh honey, fear is what we feel, but brave is what we do."  I like that a lot.
The dark or unknown has always been there.  Jesus has not eliminated my sense of anxiety about those things which I have no control over, just equipped me to enter into those moments anyway...with trust.
Along these lines, I wrote this bit below.  It is attached to some specific thoughts related to my family and I, but there could be connection for others as well.

Just a child
Not ready to go
Saying goodbye is 
to swallow something
you don't even 
want to taste
Everything was new
Everyone was hard
New doesn't always
Make me feel like smiling
Still we say...

Be good
Be strong
Be well
Get along
Be courageous
Sing your song
Sometimes 
Finding your words
may take a lifetime

If my life's a story
I've been a hero
but I have also been a villain
looking away
when I should face it all
looking over my shoulder
at the giants; who stood so tall
Wanna walk, walk, walk
Walk into light
But still a bit 
afraid of the dark

Be good
Be strong
Be well
Get along
Be courageous
Sing your song
Sometimes 
Finding your words
will take a lifetime

Red dirt roads
We walked through
On my shoulders
Holding their shoes
Pig-tails; painted days
A sun that smiles
Kiss the frogs, "Morning Girl"
Across the miles
That day has gone away
Sometimes...I'm still a bit
Afraid of the dark

How well did we sing?
My love, my heart
How long is our hope?
They're grown, they're gone
Can they stand, be still?
Just stand and not run
My arms are open
My sight is clear
Your hand in mine
Yet, not too proud to admit...sometimes 
I'm still a bit ...afraid of the dark

Be good
Be strong
Be well
Get along
Be courageous
Sing your song
Sometimes 
Finding your words
                      takes  more than....a lifetime