I sit and glance through photos. My heart is filled with a mix of sorrow and gladness. It is a bittersweet thing and I am not sure I like it or want to continue looking and endure it all.
Now I realize I am still healing from much brokenness, but pictures (and videos) have been a big part of my life. I could be called the historian of the family. I love capturing memories with the cameras and we have been a home that has viewed family videos over and over. It is now intermixed with a sorrow that I believe will remain and grow as I continue to journey on this earth.
I have journaled so many things I am going through in my heart just this morning. I think things are surfacing more as they have been so deep for so long. I can barely keep up with it all at moments. As I look through the photos that is what begins to happen. I am overwhelmed with floods of emotions from one extreme to the other. I see longings unmet or destroyed. I see faces that I can't call up or hug anymore. I see relationships that have deteriorated due to life choices and I just set the photos down.
I learned a word this week and I have it written on my mirror in the dining room- it is "panpharmacon." It means the medicine for all wounds or diseases. I have read it over and over again and have meditated on the meaning. Jesus is our panpharmacon. He isn't like most medicines we take. He doesn't disguise the pain or temporarily relieve it. It is a process because He heals from the inside out. It is at times more painful than you think medicine should ever be. We want the quick fix. We have become the fast food society- the fast pace techno people. God forbid we sit through a commercial on tv anymore- we want to skip through it. And those darn red lights when we are driving! ha! So annoying. So yes, when our Physician seems to be worsening our condition- it is hard to take in. It literally is hard to breathe in at times. For it seems there is no pain reliever in this all consuming medicine.
Maybe we learn more when we feel the pain. Maybe the pain is exactly what we need, to be more like Him. He suffered tremendously for us. So as we face the coming seasons we all will, inevitably, face. Let's remember that Jesus is the one medicine we need. He is our panpharmacon. It may seem like and hurt like hell, but He is there with us- even when we can't feel Him. I am convinced of this though, personally, I have not felt Him near very often these past two years.
Love hurts. It is what drove Jesus to Calvary for you and for me. It hurt to hang on that cross. It hurt to have a time of separation from God Almighty, His dad whom He knew from the beginning. He didn't allow the pain to stop Him. It was love that drove Him there. Lord may your love drive us to do the things you have for us to do. May your love and the hurt that comes with it not make us bitter, but better people. May we allow you to be our panpharmacon. May we turn to you and you alone.
