Today was nothing out of the ordinary. I drove to the city to babysit, something I do 2-3 times a week, if not more. But what is usually episodes of Curious George and toy trucks turned into “can we do a craft for Father’s Day?”
You see, I was already struggling. As hard as it is for me to admit that, I was/am. Every year the week of Father’s Day rolls around and I go into this funk. I become so unresponsive, unreceptive, and uninterested in almost anything. I grow numb. It lasts a couple days and then I am fine, but it happens, and I never say anything to anybody. So when two kids ask you to help them make a Father’s Day present it is a painful shot to a wound that has already been wide open this week.
I am trying to be as honest. Honest not only to whomever might read this, but honest with myself. Somewhere along the way I adopted this visual in my head: I am standing at a stop sign, and to the left is the road named “I am okay” and to the right is the road “I am not okay”. There is no middle ground; I have to choose and once I do I tell myself that I have to stay on that road. I tell myself that it’s a one way, and you can’t ever go the other way.
Loss is painful. Father’s Day is the hardest day of the year for me. When a six-year-old little boy asks me to help him make a card for his dad it hurts. For too long people have made this bold assertion that “time heals things.” I do not believe that. Jesus heals things, and the concept of time does not apply to Jesus, so it is not time that we need, it is just Him.
But yet, I find myself starring at the reflection of myself in the mirror saying, “you have done this before. It has been almost 14 years. Be okay.” And when I start falling into the thought of “maybe I am not okay” I let myself believe the lie that since so much time has passed, if I tell people I am struggling they will think I am just doing it for sympathy, or for attention. I create these expectations for myself that people need me to talk about the goodness of the Lord on the days that are obviously hard. Which do not get me wrong, Jesus is still good. I still believe that, but it does not negate the fact sometimes you want to wish away where you are at. It does not negate the fact that no matter how much time has passed, you can wake up in the morning wishing it could all be undone. It does not negate the fact that although Jesus so faithfully let drops of healing rain down on you that still have moments where it hurts like hell.
I think that’s where I have gotten it all wrong. You do not have to choose a road. You do not have to be one extreme or the other. You do not have to be fresh off a loss, whatever form that loss might be, to have the right to struggle. Loss breaks you, Jesus pieces the broken things back together, takes the ashes and transforms them into beauty, but loss also leaves an imprint on you. The things that imprint us affect us not just in that moment but forever. You can be okay one second and the next not. You can be spiritually growing, in the word, and actively pursuing the Lord and there is still freedom for you to stop and just be honest. To say to yourself that it hurts, and to say to a hurting world that they are allowed to hurt.
I love the story of Ruth. I love the example she sets for women, but I also love another character in the story, Naomi, Ruth’s mother-in-law, because it addresses this concept of loss. Naomi loses both of her sons and her husband, and she is brutally honest with how she feels (Ruth 1:20-21). She states that the grief she has faced is too great, and she feels forsaken by the Lord. This paints a picture for us today, a picture that says we can be honest.
Ruth 1:14
“…at this they wept aloud again,”
They wept…. again.
Again.
It doesn’t matter if it is year 20 and you find yourself sitting in your car with tears streaming down your face. It doesn’t matter if it is a normal day and you just have a moment. You have the complete freedom to weep, and then to weep again.
Though there was weeping, the direction in which they wept is what truly matters. Ruth and Naomi wept, but they wept forward. You do not have to choose one road to walk down, you can be not okay, or you can be okay, but you have to keep putting one foot in front of the other. You cannot let the weeping stop you – do not let it stop you from continuing to pursue the Lord.
I babysit for the same family every week. I am there so much that I have caught on and can tell what the baby’s cry means. I know when it’s a fake cry. I know when it’s a “I want more food’ cry. I know when it’s a “just pick me up” cry. I think about the fact that a parent knows their child’s cry way better than a babysitter does. A father knows their child’s cry.
A Father knows their child’s cry.
That is the thought that I am pounding into my heart this Father’s Day. The thought that I still have a father who hears me. A father who sees my tears and hears them. A father that knows exactly what they mean and knows exactly what I need.
He will turn your mourning into dancing, but He allows you step off the dance floor. But just know, He never stops playing the music. Tune back in when you are ready. So today, cry all the tears, wipe them, feel them, but don’t let them stop you. It is possible to cry and walk at the same time. Walk straight down whatever road you need to be on today. Jesus will meet you right where you are.
xoxo,
A girl who took a dance break today
