Captivating: Chapter Six

Chapter Six: Healing the Wound

Therefore I am now going to allure her;

I will lead her into the desert

and speak tenderly to her.

-Hosea 2:14

We Find Our Tears:
Part of the reason why women are so tired because we are spending so much energy to "keep it together". So much energy devoted to suppressing the pain and keeping a good appearance. "I'm gonna harden my heart," sang Rindy Ross. "I'm gonna swallow my tears." A terrible, costly way to live your life. Part of this is driven by fear that the pain will overwhelm us. That we will be consumed by our sorrow. It's an understandable fear -- but it is no more true than the fear we had of the dark as children. Grief, dear sisters, is good. Grief helps to heal our hearts. Why, Jesus himself was a "Man of sorrow and acquainted with grief" (Isaiah 53:3)

Let the tears come. Get alone, get to your car or your bedroom or the shower and let the tears come. Let the tears come. It is the only kind thing to do for your woundedness. Allow yourself to feel again. And feel you will -- many things. Anger. That's okay. Anger's not a sin (Eph. 4:26). Remorse. Of course you feel remorse and regret for so many lost years. Fear. Yes, that makes sense. Jesus can handle the fear as well. In fact, there is no emotion you can bring up that Jesus can't handle.

Let it all out.
---
As Augustine wrote in his Confessions, "The tears...streamed down, and I let them flow as freely as they would, making of them a pillow for my heart. On them it rested." Grief is a form of validation; it says the wound mattered. It mattered. You mattered. That's not the way life was supposed to go. There are unwept tears down in there -- the tears of a little girl who is lost and frightened. The tears of a teenage girl who's been rejected and has no place to turn. The tears of a woman whose life has been hard and lonely and nothing close to her dreams.

Let the tears come.

--Captivating; John&Stasi Eldredge