I fear forgetting

I tremble at remembering

I cling to memories

I weep at the same

I want to feel

Even while attempting to evade

How can both of these be true?

How does one make sense of the contradiction?

I linger at the edges of memory

I tetter on the fringes of feeling

Desiring to plunge headlong

Yet finger gripping at the ledge

I yearn to be close, to be near

All the while building a protective barrier

To feel or not to feel?

To remember or not to remember?

Yes.

This is the tension of grief

This is the strain of sorrow

This is the path one must walk

This is the path of joy

Abba, how can sorrow lead to joy?

Seems absurd but it does

12 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version(Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Heb 12:1–2.

The greatest sorrow

The death of the Son of God

Produced the greatest joy

Incomprehensibly so

No sorrow, no grief, no loss

Can surmount the divine tragedy

If this sorrow can be path to joy

Than so can mine

So can ALL sorrows lead to joy

Joy does not come from forgetting

But remembering

And finding an eternal hope

Rooted in the glorious gospel

The tension, the strain

Of remembering or forgetting

Of feeling or not feeling

Is an acceptable struggle

In the remembering

In the feeling

Find comfort in an eternal comfort

Find comfort in a gospel comfort

You are a God of comfort

You are a God of peace

You are a God of joy

There is no sorrow, no grief

No pain, no hurt

That you have not felt

That you do not understand

And Yet,

You exude joy

You ARE joy

You remember the sorrows

Yet rejoice with limitless joy

You herald the pain

And Bask in the comfort of joy

You lift up suffering

As the centerpiece of eternal worship

And all heaven explodes with joy

There is nothing of our experience

That you do not understand

Therefore, I can trust

We can depend on this truth

In my pain

In our pain

You show up

You are near

The gospel assures us of that

So I lean

We lean

Upon your loving breast

And accept the comfort

Of divine arms

And we find joy

In remembering