Wrestling

Two years ago, on Good Friday, I wrote the following poem:

cross and candles

paper and pen

sin and shame

poured out in ink

at the place

where grace was

poured out in blood

confessing, lamenting

in my own Gethsemane

tears and forgiveness

flow together

flame touches fear

brokenness burns

each ember dies

ashes

what remains as I rise

hope

freedom

gratitude

joy

and Your deep, deep abiding love

It's humbling to read those words now. I remember exactly what I was dealing with at the time. While I may be older and wiser, I find myself wrestling with the same things. 

Tomorrow night at a Good Friday vigil, I'll write my sins and sorrows on some red paper and nail them to a cross. Then at midnight on Saturday, just before it turns to Sunday, all of the papers will be taken off the cross and burned...in the same pot I burned my own papers two years ago in a private ceremony.

Sometimes I wonder how many papers I'm going to need to burn before I stop wrestling.

"I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness." -- Lamentations 3:19-23