Pain, darkness, hurt, sadness, fear, brokenness. I am not going to lie, this has been real & near to me recently. I just feel a weight of the brokenness of this world we live in in a way that I never have before. I’ve seen many heartbreaking things & heard of so many more.
The war in Ukraine & the suffering that is being endured there: the families being torn apart, the lives put in ruins, the homes destroyed.
The people I see at the dump, searching through the trash for things to sell & make barely enough to live on.
The kids that came twice a week in Honduras for a meal who were so tiny & had to worry about where food would come from.
The hold that sexual sin has on this world.
The little girl we prayed for here in Nicaragua who has kidney problems at 10 years old & no medical solution.
The broken families I see in every direction.
The church having false teachers & seeing the name of Jesus disrespected & used for selfish gain.
So. much. brokenness. It is never-ending.
But…
There is also light, beauty, healing, freedom, hope, joy.
A ministry like “Reap Granada” where my team is this month, where they have established a community based on showing the love of Christ through relationship & discipleship.
My little brother getting married in less than 4 months & the excitement we all have for the wedding.
Classical music played on a grand piano in a destroyed home in Ukraine.
Hearing that friends I grew up with are getting engaged or announcing pregnancies & starting their own families.
A sweet friendship with a little toddler named Liam in Honduras.
The fullest feeling after a beach day of soaking up the sun & swimming in the ocean & eating good food.
Facetime that makes this world a smaller place and family & friends that are far feel closer.
The moon, the stars, sunsets, sunrises, clouds, blue sky.
See? There is the good too.
Let me tell you what I have been learning. First off, I think that J.R.R. Tolkien understood this better than anyone, so I will use his words to explain. There is a scene in “The Two Towers” that I remembered in reflecting on all of this.
Sam says:
It’s like in the great stories Mr. Frodo, the ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were, and sometimes you didn’t really want to know the end because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end it’s only a passing thing this shadow, even darkness must pass. A new day will come, and when the sun shines it’ll shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you; that meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think Mr. Frodo, I do understand; I know now. The folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn’t. They kept going because they were holding on to something.
Frodo: What’re we holding onto Sam?
Sam: That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it’s worth fighting for.
J.R.R. Tolkien also wrote:
“The world is indeed full of peril and in it there are many dark places.
But still there is much that is fair. And though in all lands, love is now mingled with grief, it still grows, perhaps, the greater.”
Another author named B.J. Brawner said:
“It’s always both/and, in these days: both hope and heartache.
Both laughter and tears.
Both beautiful and broken.
Both life and death.
Both peace and war.
Both contentment and longing.
Both joy and sorrow.
All held in tension, until the day.”
These 3 quotes have brought me a lot of clarity & have helped me to process this contrast of good & bad that I see on an everyday basis. We cannot deny that there is indeed good in this world, even though it is often drowned out by the horrible, terrible, heart-breaking things we witness. And we have a duty. A duty to fight for the good & let the good grow & remember the good.
And from these reflections, I have been so clearly reminded that the only reason there is any good & the only reason we have any hope is because Christ came. He left heaven’s perfection to face the brokenness of this world & give us a way out. He lived a sinless life, then died at the hands of the very people he came to save, to give us hope. We can hold onto this hope.
Psalm 116:8-9 says:
For you have delivered my soul from death,
my eyes from tears,
my feet from stumbling;
I will walk before the LORD
in the land of the living.
He saved us from death. He saved us from a hopeless life. And he promised eternal life with him to those who believe.
