Seven Statements from the Cross • Week 4 • Saturday
Statement IV • Week 4 Wrap-Up
This week was a hard one to write. Not because the stories were hard to imagine. Because I have been one of those people at some point.
I have been Tom, picking the wrong fight with the wrong person because the real grief was too heavy to say out loud and the real question felt too raw to aim at God. I have been Caleb, coming home carrying something I was too proud to name and taking it out sideways on the people who deserved none of it. I have been Jeff, going quiet when I should have gone to God, and letting the silence become something my family had to absorb instead.
And I have been Renee, carrying a quiet grief for a version of life that did not come together the way we planned, holding it alone because saying it felt like betrayal, letting it slowly change me in ways the people closest to me could feel but not understand.
What I keep coming back to this week is the image of Jesus on the cross, three hours of unexplained darkness already behind him, crying out with a loud voice: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
He did not sanitize it. He did not wait until he had a more faith-sounding version of it. He took the rawest, most unanswerable thing he was carrying and aimed it directly upward. That is the model. Not quiet stoicism. Not venting at the people in range. Aimed, intentional, honest prayer to the only one who can actually hold what we are carrying.
I am still learning this. I do not always get there before I have sent the bill to someone who did not earn it. But I am getting better at recognizing the moment, that flash when I feel the weight looking for an exit, and asking: is what I am about to do going to help, or am I just looking for a target?
If this week identified someone who has been absorbing what only God can hold, that relationship deserves a conversation. Not a long one. Just honest. “I have been sending you something that was never yours to carry. I am sorry for that.”
And then take the real question where it belongs.
This Week’s Truth
Aim your hard questions at God, not at people. He is not avoiding the question. He is waiting for it.
See it from God’s seat. He is not avoiding the hard question. He is waiting for it. Stay in step with the Spirit.
— Lance
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