It is the day after Christmas, and all is {finally} calm in our house.

The busyness and anticipation is over, and we are settling back into normal. There is no rushing around today. The kids continue construction of Legos and practice with skateboards. New books will be cracked, movies will be watched, and we will re-learn how to slow down.

The whole world moves on today, but I am stuck on Christmas Eve.

We live fairly close to The Morse Museum, which houses the largest collection of Tiffany stained glass anywhere in the world. On Christmas Eve, I drug our family to the Morse for 30 minutes of culture and a four-piece string ensemble.

During our quickly-paced tour, we passed by one window I found beautiful but somewhat common. The youngest asked who it was, and I guessed maybe Abraham and Isaac? We moved on to see other pieces but came back around as we were looking for the exit. That is when I saw the title.

“Christmas Eve.”

Christmas Eve window, c. 1902
Mable Nast Crawford house, New Rochelle, New York, c. 1911–present
Leaded glass
Tiffany Studios, New York City, 1902–32
Designer: Thomas Nast Jr., 1866–1943

The power of the depiction fell on me heavy with awe and ache. It is the night before Christmas, and God the Father is holding the son in which he has great delight. He is savoring a last few precious moments before sending him into the world. The Father knows what awaits. He know the suffering the Son will endure.

My heart breaks.

Never have I thought about the ache of the Father on Christmas Eve. We experience Christmas with such incredible joy and anticipation. And surely those were true for the Father, as well. But not one time have I thought about the pain of sending his son.

And so, as Christmas moves past and normal returns, I linger. I linger in this moment where a father holds his son and looks at him with a full recognition of the separation to come. I feel the delight of him holding his only child in his arms while also anticipating the pain of the moment when he will have to send him away.

The love of the Father overwhelms me. In this picture it is not sterile. It is not distant or stuffy. It is tender. And it hurts.

On this first day post-Christmas, I am praying we continue to be struck by the very real and powerful love of a Father who would send his son to be flesh. I am praying I remember the tenderness of a moment captured in stained glass far longer than our tree stays up or the tinsel hangs around town.

A belated Merry Christmas to you, friends. May the awe of what happened on that first Christmas continue to move your heart. And mine.

It was a week ago today I got the text.

“It doesn’t look like he’s going to make it.”

A few hours later came an even harder one. “We’re getting ready to say goodbye.”

My breath was gone. I couldn’t seem to process what I had just read. No. This was a horrible mistake.

Then the sobs came. Deep, heaving sobs. My kids all rushed to me, and I could barely get the words out.

“He’s gone.”

It might be the first time my kids have seen such devastating grief. They knew our friend too, but time had lessened their pictures. It had not lessened mine. They were so sweet to sit with me as I wept and pray with me for our friend to be ushered into the Kingdom with fanfare and rejoicing and love. We prayed for the very first time he would see the face of Jesus.

Plans were made, and 36 hours later we were on a plane headed to be with a grieving wife and kids. We wanted it all to be a bad dream, but if it wasn’t, we would walk through the unbelievable alongside the family who had shared three years of our lives. We had created so many beautiful memories together. We would walk thru the hard too.

We landed in a bustle of planes, in the middle of a city swirling with life. I watched families gather their bags with anticipation. I saw a workforce moving like any other day.

And I wanted to scream, “Don’t you know our friend just died?!?”

I wanted the world to stop.

I wanted everything to stop and recognize the loss of a deeply good man. A husband. A father. A friend.

How could the world still be spinning as usual? It had all come to a screeching halt for us. I was mad life was carrying on like normal for so many.

We spent two and a half days in the sacred reality of death. We held a family tightly. We spoke words that often aren’t said until moments like this. We looked at pictures and remembered so much good. We laughed.

We played cards and waged Nerf battles with precious kids who are far too young to be without a daddy. We listened, and we loved.

We wept. We wept for our own hearts, and we wept for those were left with a devastating new normal.

And then we honored a life very well lived. It was an incredible privilege.

The world did not stop. It kept whirling around us, and it will keep on going.

My world is different now though. It is sweeter, and it is deeper. My heart hurts so badly, and yet I would not trade it. I am so thankful for the chance to have loved, even if it means we say goodbye.

There was a day not long ago where I would have worked hard to not feel the pain I now know. I would have thought it more than I could handle.

I do not choose that anymore. I choose to feel. I choose to feel deeply in joy and in grief. I choose to feel alive.

We won’t ever forget the days and years we had with a really good guy. We won’t forget the adventuring or the respite he provided. We certainly won’t forget the food and wine we savored together. Love allowed us to share our lives with each other, and it was good. Even now, it is very, very good.

Goodbye friend. We rejoice for the glory you now see. We know there will be a day when we will share wine with you once more. We long for it.

I wish I knew your name, my friend.

You sit down near us in a sea of people, and I am immediately drawn to your story. A tattoo under your right eye jumps from your face, but I can’t distinguish the word it says.

At first you appear a traveler like the rest of us. A heavy olive jacket to keep you warm, a knitted skullcap covering your head. Your large red suitcase showing its years of use sitting next to you.

We sit next to one another at Grand Central in the place where the masses gather to catch a meal or just pass the time. As I blow to cool my tomato soup, you eat too. But you are not a traveler like the rest of us.

Your meal is in a can. Do you eat cold soup tonight? Or are they beans? You eat with gratefulness, and I am grateful with you.

We sit just feet apart, and everything in me wants to ask you your name and listen to what brought you here. How did you get to this place? What is the word stamped on your face? What does it tell of your story?

You turn to your giant red suitcase, the one packed with all you own. Right there, in the middle of Grand Central Station, you had brought your entire life. You rustle for a moment and then seem content to just reorder.

On the night we sit, it is cold outside. Hot soup warms our insides as layers and scarves warm our skin. Your jacket is not made for this weather. Maybe that is why you are inside. You wear well-worn black Asic sneakers. They are old with scuffed leather and look one size too small. You wear them without socks on this chilly night.

Friend, do you have socks? Does your red suitcase carry warmth to cover your feet?

We sit longer still. You because there is nowhere to go and me because I can’t seem to leave your story behind. I wonder what your name is. I want to hear how you got to this place. What pain do you carry on this night?

You suddenly begin an animated conversation. You talk to the empty chair across from you with passion. And you begin to rock.

As you talk and rock, you push up the sleeves on your worn olive jacket. More tattoos are revealed, and you bear scars. Are they the marks of one seeking healing through the highs of a needle?

Does a needle drive you now, my friend? Are you here but lost in euphoria? I see your eyes, and they look present. I think you are here. I think you see the fullness of reality.

You rock and talk and then you seem to disappear. Where have you gone and what madness has hold of you?

I think of where you’ll sleep tonight, and I hope you’ll be warm. I hope the night takes you to a place where you are known.

I pray joy for you. I pray for someone in your life to bear witness to your suffering. I pray you would know the comfort of human touch and the love of someone who cares about your very precious story.

I pray you would know how deeply you are loved by the God of the universe. He sees you, my friend. He grieves the pain written on your heart. You are worth more to Him than all the silver the world can hold. You are so, so valuable.

God knows your name. Not just the one spoken once by your mother but your true name. He knows you fully.

I can delay leaving no longer. I have to go. I won’t forget this night in a train station in a city I do not live. You have not even seen my face, but I am the one who will pray for you the rest of my days. I will not forget your dark, tattooed face. I have seen you.

And I wish I knew your name.

My hope-speaking counselor was at it again this week. Pushing, stripping, freeing.

He does not speak counselor talk. He speaks grace, and he curses. I like him.

For years, I have been told I didn’t feel enough. And that embracing my feelings was the way to health. Oddly, I didn’t think I wasn’t feeling before. I felt deeply. Often feelings swelled to the very top of me and had only paper to spill onto. The problem wasn’t that I didn’t feel enough. So how was I not doing it right? One word broke my spiral of self-defeat.

Inconsequential.

“It sounds like you think your feelings are inconsequential,” said my hope-speaking counselor.

Well, yeah. That’s what I’ve been learning for forty-one thirty-four years. Feel deeply, I hear. But who is there to care about what I’m feeling? Too much life has been sucked from me trying to convince people to care about what makes me most me.

Like the time I called across an ocean weeping so hard I could barely speak. “You need to find someone else,” said the friend who had promised to walk through the ugly with me.

Like the time trauma paralyzed me, and I begged for relief. “Why does it bother you so much when you were complicit?” was the response.

Like the time I begged God to comfort me in the darkness and I heard only silence.

Those feelings labeled health. . . my heart yells at me that they are inconsequential. The line becomes so fuzzy it vanishes. Survival takes over for hope.

The hope-speaking counselor asks about places that hurt. I share with honest words. And then he calls my bluff.

“You have a qualifier every time you share what you’re feeling.” The spotlight on my heart glows bright. I feel its heat bearing down.

He is right. I am completely exposed. I do feel deeply, and then I convince myself it’s inconsequential. I preach to myself what those wounds only hinted.

My qualifiers pass the buck. But my pain is my pain. People hurt me. My fear is real. It grips me to the point I can hardly breathe. I get angry, and I want to curse. Ok, so I do curse.

My hope-speaking counselor tells me I can feel, and it won’t kill me. I think he is crazy. When I felt deeply before, the hopelessness overwhelmed me. The pit sucked me in.

Or did it?

It’s odd the freedom that filled my heart when he invited me to feel without qualifiers. Maybe freedom lies not on the side of passing the buck. Maybe my attempts to survive are what is killing me.