I wrote The Tears of God in the days following my mother’s death, four years ago today. I wrote The Mirror this year. Both pieces have a similar theme – struggling with feeling abandoned, even betrayed, by a God I have trusted with my life.

This struggle left me angry with God – an anger, I must admit, I still struggle with at times. But when that anger threatens to break me down, the image of God suffering with me – of His very tears being sown on my pain – has brought great comfort.

God may ask us to walk difficult roads, but He does not require that we do so alone. Indeed, He walks them with us. He feels our pain, suffers our loss, bears our burdens, and weeps when we weep. Weeps not for us, but with us.

These pieces are an expression of that image. I hope that perhaps they can bring others some of the peace they bring me.

 

The Tears of God
Jerod Jarvis, 2007

The young man lay facedown in the dirt, shuddering, crushed.  Blood pooled around him, most of it his own.

Pain throbbed through his body, waves of agony that first shook him from his stupor and then numbed his mind back into it, a vicious cycle.  Breath came reluctantly; what blood there was left in his body seemed to be choked with sand, forcing its way through his veins.

He was beaten.  He knew he was beaten, had known it long before the battle had even begun.  The bleakness of the situation had been, strangely, his only source of hope—surely, God would not allow such a thing to take place.  Surely, his Lord had been merely planning a miraculous riposte, a glorious appearing that set all things right.

But no.  No.  The young man did not know where God was; only that it wasn’t here. He was alone; alone in his pain, in his defeat.

Taking a deep, shuddering breath, the young man pulled his arms and legs underneath him, surprised to find that they were all sound.  Bruised and bleeding, screaming with raw agony, but not shattered.  Beaten, but not broken.  This thought gave him little comfort—he was not at all sure he wanted to survive to fight another day.  Better to die here, perhaps, then to face his undefeated enemy again.

Slowly, he pulled himself to his knees, each movement pain, every joint begging him not to move.  After a moment, the intensity subsided, and the red cleared from his vision.

His shield lay several yards away, dented and pierced by arrows.  His armor was largely intact…his belt still wrapped snugly around his waist…boots firm…helm still secure.  Examining his breastplate, however, he found two or three gaping holes, gaps the enemy’s blade had opened.  One lucky arrow would finish him.

Glancing down, he saw his sword lying in the dust.  He reached for it, grasped its hilt, and tried to lift it, only to find that he lacked the strength to do any more than shift the blade’s position by an inch or two.  He pulled again, straining to lift his weapon, then gasped in pain as something in his shoulder gave.

The young man was a warrior, strong, accustomed to hardship, but even the strongest of warriors has limits.  Stranded, alone, defenseless, unable to even lift his blade, the young man found his limit and collapsed back to the dirt, sobbing.  His body trembled, wounds new and old reopening, announcing their return with flashes of pain, as if someone was now flailing his broken body.

But the physical agony was not what brought the man down to the ground—physical pain was bearable.  But the deep sense of hopelessness that now filled his soul was nearly enough to drive him from his sanity.  He had been beaten before—defeat was nothing new.  But now he was abandoned.  In his time of greatest need…abandoned.

The cry that burst from his lips was terrible to hear, pain tinged with anger fueled by betrayal.  His voice was mangled from days without water, his words altered by a mouthful of shattered teeth.

“Oh, God…Oh, God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

For a moment, there was no answer.  And then, like a death knell, a peal of thunder broke the silence, low and rumbling, as if the sky itself was groaning.  Rain began to fall, large drops, splashing down, spraying the dry dirt where they landed, soaking the young man.

He shuddered, drew within himself.  “Is this your answer?  Into my pain you add a storm?”

The tears fell freely now, the tears of a broken heart and a shattered spirit. The rain continued to fall, finding the cracks in his armor and seeping through, soaking his skin.  Dimly, the young man realized that it was warm.

Slowly, but steadily, the young man realized something else—the pain was easing.  His eyes opened, taking in the rain-soaked earth.  The blood was gone, either diluted by the rain or washed away by it.  He sat up, dimly surprised at the lack of pain, cupped his hands and let the rain pool within them. Lifting his hands to his lips, he tasted the warm liquid.

Warmth and strength seemed to flow through his members, the life-giving water healing his wounds from the inside out.  The young man watched in astonishment as a deep gash along his wrist disappeared, healthy flesh filling in the wound, leaving only a scar to mark its presence.

He tasted the water again.  Not water, he realized, letting the healing liquid run down his throat and through his wounded spirit.  Tears.

The young man’s eyes filled with tears of his own as comprehension washed over him. He was not abandoned. God had not left him to suffer alone; He was there, bearing this pain with him. His savior’s tears fell from the sky, pregnant with empathy, weeping not for him, but with him.

Reaching down and lifting his sword from the mud, he rose and retrieved his shield. He rose, shakily at first, then steadily. Having found his feet, he lowered himself once more, this time to one knee. Tears of his own streaked his face as he gazed at his own reflection in a pool of rain – a reflection that was somehow more him than he felt himself to be.

“I will praise You in this Storm, my God.  I will live to fight for You another day.”

God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.

–C.S. Lewis

The Mirror
Jerod Jarvis, 2011 (revised 2014)

The mirror stands before me
I stare into my eyes
I watch me fall to my knees
I watch me as I cry

The mirror pierces, peels away
The layers and the masks
The walls I have erected
Sealing off the past

Looking close I see the scars
There, and yet unseen
Hiding underneath the things
That I wish to be

As I gaze into the glass
I wish that it was clear
Why is world this way?
Broken, full of fear?

A deeper question rises now
Uttered with a moan
Why, when it hurts this much,
Do I always feel alone?

Then within the mirror’s glass
An oddity I see
A figure stands reflected
And the figure isn’t me

Wounds and scars so like mine
Eyes filled up tears
I recognize my weary frame
There within the mirror

The man within the mirror
Has walked the road I’m on
The man within the mirror
Has been where I have gone

It’s only then I realize
What I stand before
Not a mirror, but a window
Not a wall, but a door

A mirror’s only comfort
Is cold solidarity
Reflecting, not refining
Misery’s company

But the window shows a man
Who’s been there all this time
Seeing, feeling, weeping
His pain the same as mine

My savior gazes back
Eyes filled with empathy
I do not walk this path alone
And that is everything to me