The deep rays surrounded her, burning deep into her skin. Her tears were flame, paths of umber scoring her cheeks. She screamed at the sea below, at the calm waves whispering against the rocks. Her hands trembled on the railing, knuckles white and stiff against the gray wood.
Where was the peace promised? Where were the crashing waves swallowing the cliffs? Where was the roar of raging wildfire on the horizon? A silent disc floated on a raft of molten gold, bathing in her pain. The roar inside her soul grew, tinting the gently waving leaves with its inferno. Her eyes ignited in the sun, searing the tears from her mind.
The memory of his hand was a phantom on her shoulder and she whirled to empty air. Flame faded, leaving black emptiness. Charred and crumbled, she lay staring into the fading glow of stone that cooled but never turned to ash.
The dried up, decomposing vines brushed her skin, tendrils of the darkness that protected what was left of her soul and crushed the breath from her lungs all at once. The candles in front of her flickered, pitiful against even the promise of wind in a trembling leaf at the edge of vision. Only three. How had three broken candles been all she had to offer for a shattered life?
Hot wax rearranged itself drop by drop into the shape of glass cups, insulation to prevent fire. As if she wasn’t already burning, endlessly unconsumed but raw. As if it had been her skin stolen from her instead of… instead. How many days since she had been able to breathe? A week? Two?
Orange globes peeking from a sea of green. Teeming life. Life on the edge of death; the smell of rot was more appropriate. Death for death. Orange flickered with the flame, mocking, demanding. Only three candles.
People did light candles for death, didn’t they? The trembling leaf released its hold, a moth fluttering to burn, disintegrated, forgotten. No. Never that. How can a chasm be forgotten? There should be stars. If there weren’t enough candles there should at least be stars. Where were the stars? Grieving. Maybe they would die, too; that would be fitting. Stars dying for loss of her Star.
Goosebumps rose under her fingers. Vines whispered. Flames guttered and fell. Only three broken candles.
Color surrounded her, the brilliant yellows and reds and greens of summer in the garden. The sky glared blue overhead, and she glared back at its near cloudless face. Her hand closed around the nearest white spray, twisting involuntarily, the crushed petals releasing their nauseatingly sweet scent as they fell from her fingers.
She took a shuddering breath, her chest aching as if with vacuum. The fountain nearby was as dry as her eyes; she resented it’s deathly emptiness. Perhaps the red that surrounded it was the remains of the bloody tears of its untimely end, an irrevocable stain on the land. She pressed her fists into her eyes until they ached, silently screaming for a single drop of relief.
A hand touched her shoulder and she flinched. “It’s going to be alright,” someone said, and the hand caressed the black of her sleeve like flame licking at tempered steel. Her arms fell nerveless to her sides and she walked away without a word.
The blast zone was eerily quiet. Sophie walked slowly over the dead ground, footfalls crunchy in the charcoaled remains of the world she had known. Her heart thudded, as loud as the sobbing breath heaving in and out of her lungs.
Already long shadows fingered the valley, shades of glory made barren. The time between first light and sunrise was pitifully small, but it was her only chance at leaving the Settlement. The Conclave allowed no one into the Barrens. First offenses meant time in the brig; second offenses meant one ration per day for a month and exclusion from assembly for a year. This was her third.
They had thought the plague would be the end of everything. It was the reason the Settlement had formed, deep in the mountains with rules designed to prevent infection and preserve a pocket of humanity. Sophie herself had spent a month in quarantine outside the border after plague took her parents. They had remained on their own land in the shadow of the monastery, cared for the sick and frightened, but with them gone there had been nowhere else to turn.
She wished she had stayed; Hell had arrived within weeks of their deaths, ending the suffering of all outside the Settlement. Leaving her alone. For two years on the Day of Purification she had snuck away to their ruined graves, her tears the only memorial left to give. For two years she had been caught by the Conclave and ostracized. This year they would Purify her in the square, though nothing remained to be cleansed, her soul as empty as the excoriated land.
When God called Moses from the burning bush, Moses already knew God. He had already felt a calling to help his people, a purpose greater than himself. Because his early efforts had failed, what he did not feel was equipped. He pleaded to be excused from the task because he did not think he had the tools to do it. God sent him anyway.
When Jezebel put a price on Elijah’s head, Elijah already knew God. He was a wanted man because he had taken a stand for God in the face of powerful retribution. He didn’t flee and hide because he didn’t believe in the cause, but because he felt discouraged. No one stood with him, and he could see nothing but lonely failure. God fed him, let him rest, then sent him back to stand again anyway.
When Saul’s entire focus bent toward killing David, the future king already knew God. Saul hated him because his great trust in the Lord had brought victory and respect of which Saul was unworthy. David didn’t flee Israel because he rejected God, and even in self-imposed exile he tried to help God’s people. He fled because he was tired and afraid. Not only was he in danger himself, but his entire family and thousands who supported him stood to lose their lives. God reminded him that danger was everywhere and sent him back to keep fighting anyway.
When Jesus sat in the garden facing death in the morning, He was God. He wept and trembled, not because He didn’t believe in His plan, but from the pain and grief of knowing what the people He loved would do, the suffering that was necessary for them to cause Him before they would understand His love. The angels comforted Him and He faced the cross anyway.
When the storm threatened the disciples’ ship, they already knew God. He was in the boat with them. They panicked, not because they weren’t aware of Him, but because they weren’t used to relying on Him. They thought they had faith because they believed He could save them. Jesus said they had none because they didn’t believe that He would.
So often we run – from the storm, from the task, from the danger. Perhaps we feel unequal to the challenge, think we lack tools needed to be successful. Perhaps we feel alone and cannot see how one person could make a difference. Perhaps the enemy is so massive that we see no other option but to hide, to pretend we are something other than we are. Perhaps the cost is so high, the loss so painful, that we must weep and tremble for a while. Perhaps we really do believe that, although God exists, we are still on our own.
It’s time to let God send us back to stand. Trust that He is equipped whether we are or not. Know that whether or not any human stands with us we are not alone. Shine against the pain of the world’s betrayal of our God. Let His peace still the storm.
Very often in the circles labeling themselves as Christian we find evidence of the idea that emotions have nothing to do our walk with God. It may be expressed as the noble sentiment that our actions should be ruled by reason, which is true but only to a point. The human brain is an incredibly complex organ, created with the capacity for both reason and emotion, so what is the godly view of emotion?
Think of a newborn infant. No longer automatically receiving sustenance through the bloodstream, it’s body experiences need for the first time. Physical discomfort awakens fear and sadness expressed by crying. When the baby is fed the need is filled, awakening happiness and contentment. No longer surrounded by warm, quiet darkness, the baby experiences cold and light for the first time, those discomforts awakening loneliness and anger. When the baby is snuggled in its mother’s arms it is warmed and sheltered, awakening love. As the child grows, those emotions will become tools for teaching reason and relationship. When the early needs of a child are not properly met, only certain emotions are awakened, and the child’s reasoning will be lacking some of the tools needed to form a complete picture of the world.
God created the human mind to develop in this way, to exhibit both emotion and reason, to require both. So what role does emotion play in the life of a person who bears God’s name? What do the scriptures have to offer about feelings?
Deuteronomy 16:15 (CSB): You are to hold a seven-day festival for the Lord your God in the place he chooses, because the Lord your God will bless you in all your produce and in all the work of your hands, and you will have abundantjoy.
Galatians 5:22 (CSB): 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
Nehemiah 2:3 (CSB): and replied to the king, “May the king live forever! Why should I not be sad when the city where my ancestors are buried lies in ruins and its gates have been destroyed by fire?”
Ezra 10:1 (CSB): While Ezra prayed and confessed, weeping and falling facedown before the house of God, an extremely large assembly of Israelite men, women, and children gathered around him. The people also weptbitterly.
Ecclesiastes 3:3–4, 8 (CSB): 4 a time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance; a time to love and a time to hate;
John 11:33–35 (CSB): When Jesus saw her crying, and the Jews who had come with her crying, he was deeply moved in his spirit and troubled. 34 “Where have you put him?” he asked. “Lord,” they told him, “come and see.” 35 Jesus wept.
Numbers 12:9 (CSB): The Lord’s anger burned against them, and he left.
Ephesians 4:26 (CSB): Be angry and do not sin., Don’t let the sun go down on your anger,
1 Kings 3:25–26 (CSB): 26 The woman whose son was alive spoke to the king because she felt great compassion, for her son. “My lord, give her the living baby,” she said, “but please don’t have him killed!”
Colossians 3:12, 14-16 (CSB): Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and dearly loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience,… Above all, put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. And let the peace of Christ, to which you were also called in one body, rule your hearts. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell richly among you, in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.
The above scriptures hold just a handful of examples of emotion playing a central role both for God and for His people. One could even say that emotion is the driving force behind God’s interaction with, even His creation of, His children. His love for us, the deepest emotion we recognize as humans, is the source of our being and our salvation. What emotion do we offer in return?
She closed the door slowly, keys slipping from her fingers to the entryway table with an absurdly loud clatter in the silent house. A light showed dimly under the kitchen door and her feet moved automatically in that direction.
Her hand slid across the door as she pushed it open and a broad swath of light broke the endless night of the hallway. The overhead lamp blazed above the breakfast table, showing off the place settings for two ready for the next morning’s date. She touched the edge of one plate, fiddling with the paper napkin hanging slightly over.
She squeezed her eyes shut and sighed heavily before looking to the center of the table. Pink roses lay in no particular arrangement around a tiny cardboard box tied with brown cord. Her hand shook as she reached for the box, and nerveless fingers bent the edge of the note stuck beneath the knot.
He should have been the one to open it. He should have been waiting for her as they had planned. It should have been the beginning of the rest of their lives. It wasn’t fair. A panicked urge to flee backed her into the door that had swung shut behind her, and she slid to the floor with the box crushed against face, dissolving slowly in unheeded tears.
The Cafe was still there, tucked away in its remote little corner. The structures surrounding it had grown even older and more drably brown with time, a stark contrast to its bright colors and neat facade. In the afternoon light it almost seemed a sun unto itself.
The evening rush had not begun, and the sidewalk tables and chairs stood against the wall as if starched and ironed into perfection. The walk itself gleamed, so freshly scrubbed that dust had not had time to mar its brilliance. I smiled. Old Lydia would probably frighten the dust away anyway.
The cafe door opened and Lydia herself emerged from its dark interior, white linen towel and scrub bucket in hand. “Wouldn’t do for the tables not to gleam as brightly as the sidewalk!” I called, a wide grin spreading across my face.
The old lady nearly dropped her scrub bucket, the strongest testimony of her surprise I could ever ask for. She would have died of mortification if it had fallen or splashed onto her precious walk. “Nico!” She carefully set her cleaning implements onto the nearest table and opened her arms wide to welcome me. “How long has it been?”
“Too long, Lydia,” I admitted as I returned her embrace. Beneath my arms her shoulders, though as broad as ever, felt frail somehow. “Too long to be away from home. But with Sofia gone…” I pulled away and looked down at her. “Where else could I go but here to remember her? This place was her soul.”
The old woman’s eyes filled, and she patted my arm. “Come inside, Nico, we’ll make a cup. Sofia’s blend. She will be here with us.”
Nevaeh blew through the wand, her breath white in the crisp air. I shivered, wishing I had taken the time to grab my coat before following Nevaeh out here. Despite skin the color of chalk and deep hollows in her cheeks she seemed unbothered by the cold.
Moving ever so slowly, she touched her bubble to the icy railing. The tiny feathers of ice that crept around it’s circumference seemed to be drawn from the chunk of ice filling my chest. They mirrored the blue lace of veins marking my daughter’s bare skull, the chill reminder of a fragile life.
Nevaeh laughed with innocent delight, for the moment forgetful of weakness. She clapped her hands and I wondered at the normal sound. I could almost have expected the clacking of bone, but not yet.
She stretched one finger to gently touch the feathery surface, only to see it crumble beneath her hand. Her sigh seemed to deflate her like the bubble, her strength gone like that of a frost fairy in spring. She wrapped her arms around herself and shuffled back inside as a single frost feather brushed my cheek.
Nevaeh blew through the wand, her breath white in the crisp air. I shivered, wishing I had taken the time to grab my coat before following Nevaeh out here. Despite skin the color of chalk and deep hollows in her cheeks she seemed unbothered by the cold.
The Word Worker 