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The Pain (a revision of something I think I’ve posted before)

Lord,
the pain wraps around us,
throbbing,
throbbing,
like the rhythm
of a beating,
like metal on iron
of the hammer fall hitting nail,
piercing flesh,
going deeper
until it lodges in wood.

The pain,
oh the pain,
a woman crying out in the night
as her loved one is slain,
a man standing in grief
in the bombed storefront rubble,
a child shocked at the blood
from a slashed parent,
the armwrenching agony
as they hauled you with ropes,
arms nailed to the crossbeam
up up to the drop,
white pain electric
tearing through shoulder and arms
as the beam found the mortise,
like the pain of the tortured
screaming beneath their captor’s hands,
crying out as the voltage
streams through their bodies,
throbbing the pain,
through heart and through body
the pain of being stripped here in public
of everything but the pain
and the stares of the gathered
as they gambled,
and witnessed with tears and with laughs,
waiting for the blood to fall
for the last breath to finish
like guards who kept watch
at a starvation ward
waiting for thirst to still his voice,
make an end to end his praying,
like nurses piling blankets high
to dehydrate the damaged
in the name of mercy killing.

The pain,
o the pain,
throbbing,
throbbing,
with each beat of your heart,
each hard sought breath,
like the pain of the deserted,
lost in the wild lands,
aching,
bereft,
afraid to stir out in the day,
afraid of what men would do,
victims they cower,
victims of terror,
victim of rape,
victim of hunger,
scurrying out quick by night
seeing their children die
with no way to stop it,
like your mother in pain
standing there
watching each breath you take,
afraid of the last one,
dying inside
watching your death.

O Lord,
the pain,
O the pain,
you wrapped yourself around it,
accepted it,
tasted it,
drank it down to the last dregs,
and bore all the burden
of man’s too willing evil,
of man’s dark inhumanity
down to the pit of death,
walking each step with us,
walking each step along with us,
and accepted that last, lone breath,
that would shatter the chain.

Lord, in our grief,
hold us,
and tell us
as we unite with you,
as we live for you
you live for us,
and when the pain,
the last ache,
the last throb
is over and done,
you will take us
to where pain is banished.

Amen.

BTTT

Bump

I received this via US Mail today -

You Are What You Eat
What to Feed Your Soul So that You Abound in Hope
We are hope-guzzling machines. We consume hope every day. If we run out of it, we become desperate. We must have hope. All the wonderful things that have happened to us in the past will not fuel our hope if our future looks bleak. We can be grateful for the past. But we must have hope for the future. It's what keeps us going.
When we're hopeful, the world is full of wonder and possibilities. We have drive and curiosity. We want as much life as we can get. We take on challenges and see adversity as something to be overcome.
But when we lose hope, the world becomes a fearful, threatening place, full of chaotic futility. Hopelessness saps us of energy and desire. It robs us of interest and appetite. We just want to curl up and protect our soul. We call it depression. The Bible calls it hopelessness.
So what do you do when you lose hope? Note the psalmist's prescription for his depression:

Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.
~Psalm 43:5

Hope in God. Three simple words, but what exactly do they mean? This verse gives us a clue:

It is written, "Man shall not live by bread alone,
but by every word that comes from the mouth of God."
~Deuteronomy 8:3, Matthew 4:4

God created us with bodies and souls. Both require sustenance for life. What energy is to the body, hope is to the soul. When our body needs energy, we eat food. But when our soul needs hope, how do "eat" God's words? We eat God's promises.
A promise is a pledge of a good or better future for us. God's promises are what he pledges to be for us, do for us, and provide for us. Here is a powerful example of a promise God has used to feed saints throughout the ages and give them hope:

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord,
plans for welfare and not for evil,
to give you a future and a hope.
~Jeremiah 29:11

Jesus Christ is the ultimate fulfillment of God's promises for "all the promises of God find their Yes in him" (2 Corinthians 1:20). He is the very Word of God (Revelation 19:13), which is why he called himself the Bread of Life (John 6:35) for "whoever feeds on this bread will live forever" (John 6:58). Jesus is the Source and Sustainer of our hope because without him we would not have a future.
What could possibly give more hope to our sinful souls than Jesus' promises of complete forgiveness of our sins, the removal of all of the Father's judgment and wrath against us, to always be with us (Matthew 28:20), and give us eternal life in God's presence with full joy and pleasures forever (Psalm 16:11)? Nothing!
Now these are the "precious and very great promises" (2 Peter 1:4) that our souls are designed to be nourished by. However, our souls will actually digest any promise we feed them and try to convert it into hope. And here's the danger: the world and the devil are very aware that we feed our souls promises.
Have you noticed that every advertisement and every temptation to sin is a promise of happiness? If we eat them, we hope they will bring us the happiness they promise. But they are "junk food promises." They can never deliver the happiness our souls crave because we are designed to hope in God's promises.
What are your promise-eating habits? I mean, junk food promises are everywhere. They are often convenient and usually alluring, especially when you're hungry. They ruin your appetite for real promises. They deliver a fast buzz of false hope, but always disappoint because the buzz is followed by a hope-plunge into guilt, share, or emptiness.
The only way to break the habit of eating junk food promises is cultivating a taste for rich, nourishing, long-lasting, deeply satisfying, and true promises. And God freely gives us such promises to eat because he wants us to abound in hope:

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing,
so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
~Romans 15:13

...
We are, or will become, what we eat - what we feed our souls. We must take greater care in what we feed our souls than we do our bodies. Much, much more is at stake. Let's eat the bread of life so that we will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. For "he who promised is faithful" (Hebrews 10:23).
Feeding with you on God's precious and very great promises,
Jon Bloom
Executive Director
Desiring God Ministries

As the Lord will have it, the brooks I've been visiting lately have spoken the same message to me. God is always speaking. May we always listen to his still, small voice, amen.

“you will take us
to where pain is banished.”

Rev 21:3 And I heard a great voice out of Heaven, saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God with men! And He will tabernacle with them, and they will be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God.
Rev 21:4 And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. And death shall be no longer, nor mourning, nor outcry, nor will there be pain any more; for the first things passed away.
Rev 21:5 And the One sitting on the throne said, Behold! I make all things new. And He says to me, Write, because these Words are faithful and true.
Rev 21:6 And He said to me, It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the Ending. To the one thirsting, I will freely give of the fountain of the Water of Life.
Rev 21:7 The one overcoming will inherit all things, and I will be God to him, and he will be the son to Me.

Amen.