My shoulders are so tight lately, is it because I’m trying to carry the weight of the world? The darkness they carry into the clinic, that of trauma, torture, and persecution- it weighs on me. I try to carry it, but it’s too much. I give them a pill, but they keep coming back because the hurt in their stomach is more than the tests can reveal, more than any medicine can mend. It’s the pain of their broken souls, the pain of their hearts aching inside of them. The pain has to get out somehow. And if their mouths don’t confess to the trauma they have experienced, then some part of their body will.
They’ve witnessed family members killed before their eyes. They’ve been raped and beaten and tortured. But they can’t talk about it, it’s too shameful, too difficult. And they don’t think I would understand anyway. So it comes out in their abdomen, in their bones, from their head- these pains that can’t be healed by our pills because we are looking at the wrong place, asking the wrong questions, giving the wrong medicine.
She comes in time and time again, and I haven’t asked the question. But today I do. I ask “have you been a victim of trauma or torture?” And she replies “yes, too much to talk about.”
Do I really have what it takes to be in this profession? That’s the lie my counselor dispelled years ago in college. She said, “you have what it takes, but you believe you don’t”. She said those words and the lie shattered to a million pieces, coming out in the form of tears of gratitude as I replaced the lies with the truth. I was healed from my panic attacks due to the simple replacement of a lie with the truth.
Is now the statement in my soul not “I don’t have what it takes” but “God doesn’t have what it takes?”
Is God really enough to heal? Is he enough to redeem all this brokenness into beauty? Are the wounds of his Son really powerful enough to heal this deep darkness and pain? Maybe THIS is the weight I am really trying to carry around- not am I enough? or are the counselors enough? but is HE enough?
God met me a million times in this question last week. He met me at the King’s Kaleidoscope concert, he met me in a podcast, he met me at the park, he met me in a book, he met me in a magazine article, he met me in my husband, in my friends, in a spoken word poem, in the worship songs at church, and he met me in the red letters in my bible.
Don’t be afraid of the questions. Ask the question, then seek the answer. But more importantly, seek God. Last week, I learned the value of asking the question. I sought to answer the question. More than an answer, God revealed HIMSELF to me. I kept my eyes open and tried to collect the moments that God presented pieces of truth to me. A million things he threw my way may not come to a perfect and complete answer today. They may not wrap up in a pretty bow to conclude this blog post.
BUT, asking the question, and capturing the moments of truth God placed in my path helped me remember that I can’t forget Him, I can’t lose hope. I can’t forget that He is here, and He will answer me when I call. Remember: He is near, He will speak to me, and in time, will reveal Himself. In time, He will reveal His truth to me. I may just have to wait on him. Wait and trust.
“All the bad brokenness in the world begins with forgetting- forgetting God is enough, forgetting what he gives is good enough, forgetting there’s always more than enough and that we can live into an intimate communion with Him. Brokenness can be healed in remembering. Remembering our union, our communion, our koinonia, with Christ. Remembering heals our brokenness.”
-Ann Voskamp
Ask, Remember, Wait, Trust.
Rachel I am in love with your words and so thankful you have started this blog! Thank you for the simple yet deep reminder to ask, remember, wait, trust!!! Love you sweet lady!