Words

I have a headache.

I have an ache in my heart.

I am bone-weary.

This year, 2020, has been a most exhausting year. I say that having gone through years when I lost several family members and friends, having gone through financial hardships and medical emergencies. This year has really upped the game.

We see and circulate the funny memes about toilet paper and land sharks and level 6 of Jumanji, and we chuckle, but I believe it’s more of a “laugh or we’ll cry” humor.

The tensions in this country have been getting tighter for years. The divides have been deepening. The hatred has been growing. We all sense it, but in general we stick bandages over it all and try to pretend everything is okay. I’m ashamed to say that I’ve been one who has seen it but not spoken, felt it but not acted. It was easier to keep my head down and worry about my own small circle of existence than to speak love into hate, be light in the darkness, scatter salt on the earth.

“Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.” ~John Stuart Mill, address at the University of St. Andrews, 1867

Since March it has been as if the bandage has been ripped off and a gaping wound revealed. It’s a cut to the artery, and if we don’t get some triage soon, we’re going to bleed out.

Fear. Division. Hate. Racial tension and dirty politics. The shaming and grinding into the dirt of those who disagree with the established narrative. All of that is pouring out of that festering hole.

I’m a wordsmith. That’s my talent and that’s my trade. I deal in words. Words to tell the facts, words to inspire, words to spark the imagination. This year I find myself largely silent. I have no words. So much pain to speak to, and so few meaningful words to speak. The feelings and thoughts are too large to capture and contain in words. Besides, there were and are plenty of people scattering words all over the place. Would my words even help, or would they be one more wave in the ocean of chaos that’s threatening to overwhelm us? If I stay silent, am I participating in the lie? If I speak, will my words spark more anger and hatred?

I’m not a doctor or a nurse. I’m just a homeschool mom with an inquiring mind. How do I speak to the fear running rampant regarding COVID-19? What right do I have to talk about survival rates when I haven’t lost anyone to the virus? Why should anyone listen when I say the virus is real, but that power-hungry people have used it as a political tool, and that the panic and division and suspicion they’ve caused don’t have any place here?

I don’t have dark skin. I’m a white girl from a pretty monochromatic rural area. How do I understand or speak to the fears of my friends whose skin is darker than mine? Why should anyone believe me when I say I celebrate the wonderful hues God created in us but refuse to be ashamed of my own skin? Why should anyone listen when I say that violence only begets violence, and someone, someday, has to decide to stop the cycle—or say that I don’t even believe the riots and violence are about George Floyd at all?

So much to say. Yet I feel like my voice has been stifled, partly by those who would shame me for speaking a different message, partly from my own cowardice in not wanting to draw fire to myself.

Yet, here are my words.

I don’t hold to a revisionist view of history. I believe great, God-fearing men and women founded a country that was meant to be a beacon of light. In many ways we have been, but have we been in all ways? People of America, we have much to repent of. Have we committed the sins of slavery and segregation? Yes. Have we acted with violence and arrogance toward the first nations? Yes. Is there still racial division?

Yes.

Those are all sins of which we need to repent. But they are far from the only sins, and they are not contained to one race.

Have we stood by and let the slaughter of 60 million unborn children happen largely unopposed?

Yes.

Have we closed our eyes to violence against our neighbors because of race, poverty, or politics?

Yes.

Have we relinquished our duty to serve the widows and orphans?

Yes.

Have we abandoned the hopeless and the helpless, the addicted and the mentally ill?

Yes.

Have we cowered in the face a sexual “revolution” that breaks down the family and causes moral decay at the very root of our society?

Yes.

When we have spoken up, have our voices been raised in anger and hate instead of speaking the truth in love?

Yes.

I don’t say these things from the sidelines, as a guiltless party passing judgment on those around me. We, America, have much to repent of.

The weight of all that sin is crushing. It seems so bleak, so hopeless. We search for answers to our problems, but in all the wrong places. We will not find relief in politics or policies, though much in that area needs change. The answer doesn’t lie in psychology, or even morality. There is only one truth that can be spoken into all the lies around us.

America, we need transformation from the inside out. We need hearts of flesh instead of hearts of stone (Deut. 10:16, 30:6, Ezekiel 36:26). We need boldness instead of fear (Josh. 10:25, 2 Tim. 1:7). We need to speak love into hate, shine light in the darkness, be salt on the earth.

We need to repent and turn to the author and perfecter of our faith. We need the Spirit of Christ Jesus to pour across this country like a wildfire. We need a soul revival. We need Jesus.

One way. One truth. One life. Maybe my words aren’t necessary. Maybe no words are truly necessary because only one Word matters.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).

I have ended up using a lot of words here, but the message is simple. Only one Word can speak light into existence out of darkness. Only one Word gives us the power of love in the midst of hate. Only one Word can transform humanity from the inside out, like the breath of Aslan turning stone to living, vibrant flesh.

“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb. 4:12).

That’s a Word we all need to speak.