a lament

Restore Some Beauty
by Andrew J. Schmutzer

Creator of Life,
      Maker of Perfect Memory,

            restore precious moments to our waning days;
            interject tasks of more eternal meaning;
                  we need them desperately.

Like the Laments of old,
      teach us both pain's honesty
         and the vigor of praise.

So, between pain and praise,
      restore some beauty that nurtures.

Too long have the painful memories hounded us:
      What we've done,
      What others have done,
      What we're afraid may return.

Overwhelm our burdened minds with:
      Glimpses of beauty ~ images not our own.
      Angelic friends ~ insights gifted to us.
      Hope of healing ~ sheer release
            from the toilsome cares outside Eden.

Then, fed with
             healing, wisdom, and beauty,
      chart us a new course of
             caring, mending, and building.
For any healing you bring is really beauty restored.

Dock us in deep waters of brokenness,
      So we may be agents of comfort,
            as we too, have been
                   comforted,
                   named,
                   and restored.

We pray in the name of our Broken Savior,
      Whose name we love,
            fragrance we feel,
            and beauty we share.

                                                     AMEN

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This is one of my favorite laments I have ever read. Dr. Schmutzer is an amazing Professor at Moody with an profound testimony of restoration. I'd highly recommend the book The Long Journey Home: Understanding and Ministering to the Sexually Abused which is edited by Dr. Schmutzer himself and contains dozens of laments he has written, including the one posted here. Have you lost something or someone you need to lament today? Lament literally means "a passionate expression of grief or sorrow" and in our fallen world there is much to lament because there is much that we loose everyday. In our busy lives we tend to not recognize loss, or simply ignore it. Yet, we may still need to lament those things for healing to take place in our lives.

A personal example that may sound silly is loosing "our norm, our routine, our life" as we know it, in preparing to move to California. I have been grieving the loss of our home in Chicago for months in big & little ways, such as photographing everything I don't want to forget, staring out our windows thanking God for giving the best place to live that's been perfect for us, taking in all our surroundings and paying attention to everything we see on our walks even on the colder days. I know God is leading us somewhere new, and new chapters in life are exciting! Very exciting, especially when they involve SoCal. But ignoring the pain of what we leave behind holds us back from making the space in our souls for what's new. Change is hard & change is loss. So I process. And, I hope you will too. To make a way for the beauty, for life, for the new. And may the love, hope, joy & strength of Christ dwell so deeply in our lives that in Him we breath.

*photos by fabianephotography.com