Finding our way to The Way one situation at a time. I don't know how great it will be, but I expect it will be interesting, and I look forward to it going on past all reason because wonder is just that way. Are you coming or not?
Roaring Fork Falls 09/01/2012–Pisgah National Forest, Little Switzerland, North Carolina
We pick up and go on anyway, nevertheless, even so. And that is as close to forgiveness as we need to get. Grave transgressions against us change things forever. It will never be as it was.
"A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted, because they are no more." (Jeremiah 31:15 f)
Rachel has been scandalized. Betrayed. Appalled. Outraged. Who is going to suggest to Rachel that she should forgive the great wrong and get back to tending her business? That would add to her burden!
It takes time to get our feet back under us. To recover some sense of balance and harmony. Laughter may return on its own, depending on the severity of our loss. But our goal need not have "returning to normal" be a part of our restoration. It is enough to step forward to meet another day. Where it goes from there is day by day.
The Wailing Wall is not for nothing. It is for the duration. That will have to ease in its own time. In the meantime, we grieve the lost spring to our step as we carry on, carry on, though we may need to be forgiven if we forget "just why."
I'm retired, and still finding my way--but now, I don't have to pretend that I know what I'm doing.
I retired after 40.5 years as a minister in the Presbyterian Church USA, serving churches in Louisiana, Mississippi and North Carolina. I graduated from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, in Austin, Texas, and Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, Louisiana. My wife, Judy, and I have three daughters, five granddaughters, one great granddaughter, and a great grandson on the way, within about ten minutes from where we live--and are enjoying our retirement as much as we have ever enjoyed anything.
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Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy 