Tears for Japan

It's one of those early risings.  I cannot sleep so I finally give in and get up.  It is often during these unexpected stirrings that I find my heart is heavy and I finally take the time to tune in to find out why.  I tune into my heart to learn it is Japan.


So onto the laptop I go to do something I know I need to do...face "it."  Make myself slow down to take it in.  Look at their pictures; read their stories and allow myself to feel what it is I have been putting off.  Grief and anguish surface; the tears begin to fall.


There is so often such a compelling contrast with life in one place to life in another.  Never is this more powerfully seen than when something the size of a devastating earthquake and tsunami force it into our realities.  And yet I find it is somehow easy for me to close it off, box it up, leave it "there" and it just feels so wrong...because it is.    


So this morning, I lean in, make myself look, allow the feelings to come.  The images are so heartbreaking.  So much pain, so much loss, so much still yet to be known.  Where does one start with devastation and loss of this magnitude?  How does one hope in the face of such utter despair?  Where does Japan go from here?  Where do I?  While I can choose to look away, the people of Japan have no choice but to face what is directly before them.  What they are experiencing brings such fresh perspective to the comparable insignificance of my problems.


I find I'm at a rare loss for more adequate words and platitudes at a time like this are really not helpful.  So instead I just let my prayers and tears speak for me today......prayers and tears for Japan.

Words

It strikes me how easy it is to overlook the power of our words.  Written or spoken...words are the incredible conduit which help us take that which is in our hearts and our minds and share it with others.  We should never underestimate our power when speaking words to another, or to ourselves, as it is precisely in our word choices that we elevate a word from simple letters to something actively heard...and felt.

The Bible itself is referred to as the Word; God's Word.  God uses this instrument to provide for us all the instruction and guidance to live our lives to the fullest; and also how to treat each other in the process.  It is within the pagesof the Bible that some of the most profound truths related to the use of words are found.       

Some examples of the good...


~Job 4:4:  "Your words have supported those who stumbled; you have strengthened faltering knees." 


~Proverbs 16:24:  "Gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones."


Some examples of the not so good:

~Psalm 64:3 "They sharpen their tongues like swords, and aim cruel words like deadly arrows."

~Proverbs 12:18: "The words of the reckless pierce like swords."

In the confines of just one week, I've experienced the light and hope that the words of another brought to my heart, or the heart of someone else.  Today I feel weighed down by the exchanges I witnessed in which the words that were delivered were hurtful and discouraging.  

To make matters worse, the very people who were recipients of the word-cruelty of another are some of the most loving, generous and kind people I have the pleasure I know.  Sadly in one case, the person who aimed cruel words like a deadly arrow is one that many people actually admire.  You can probably guess such admiration is not the result of her words. 

Luke 6:45 says tells us that "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks."  Pause and let that sink in.  What is abundant in your heart?  What is abundant in mine?  Further, what do we do with that abundance?  May we all examine our hearts, daily, minute by minute, and never underestimate that a word once spoken can never be retrieved, but rather lives on in the recipient forever.