Where there is Pain.

Tonight, I drove the mountains close to where I live. My family used to travel these roads quite frequently, on the way to a church where my dad was pastor at the time. This is the same road where friends who never experience motion sickness are suddenly overcome. A wide, sloping, gentle curve to the left suddenly becomes a narrow, hairpin to the right, then to the left. To one side is an overhanging rock face – mountain blown away decades ago by TNT and the labor of mountain men – and to the other is sheer drop into a tangle of brush, trees, leaves, and God knows what else.

From my present perspective in the driver’s seat, I recall the many trips as rear-passenger through those mountains. At this point this song on this CD would be playing, that is where I could feel my guts pushing forward while the rest of me and the car banked to the left. Memories of those days flooded my mind, each seeming to last forever but passing in an instant, always moving forward.

I kept chasing those memories, jumping from age 15 through this very night. So much joy. So much pain. For some reason people I’ve lost, love I’ve given away, time I’ve wasted seems to linger in front of my mind. There’s a connection between this foray into the mountains, but I can’t quite put it together…

I have a song on repeat… Surely we can Change, by David Crowder.

“Where there is pain, let there be grace…”

And the pain lingers… much like when a wound has partially healed over, but a careless bump reopens. Before, all this remembering would bring on a certain sense of condemnation. A feeling of inadequacy. Look what you’ve done… you’ll never be loved, you’ll never amount to anything.

But… this is different. The song repeats again.

“Surely we can change. Surely we can change…”

And then that Old Familiar Whisper stirs within. This is not for you, I feel him say. This is not for you, Brandon.

He says:

Your pain has been noticed, and I have felt it alongside you. The sound of your tears falling have captured me. I have turned my heart toward you. Your cries reach my ear each time they are uttered.

I have not forgotten you. I know the struggle you face… your daily frustration. Don’t let them control you. You have my power. I give you my grace. Be at peace.

And the song still repeats…

“The whole world’s about to change. The whole world’s about to change.”