In my post, Emotions–True or False, I mentioned how after a couple of years of trying to fix my hurting emotions by correcting my thinking, I began to cry out to God to touch and heal my emotions directly. One of the people He used was Ruth Bell Graham. Her poems spoke me to me in the places I hurt. The pain and beauty she expressed spoke to me and answered questions I hadn’t even been able to put into words.
Here is a favorite poem I have returned to recently.
They say
I must not care so much,
or feel so deeply.
I shouldn’t study
or read depressing books
like Under the Rubble,
or China Today.
Rather, I should play,
read Agatha Christie,
and relax.
Which would mean
bottling up my
deepest concerns,
turning off my mind,
and growing bored.
But heart and mind have
no faucets—“Hot” and “cold,”
no switch for“on” and “off.”
Cannot one live
with concern,
read deeply,
and still relax?
Concern, undergirded
with confidence,
knowing that God
is in control?
(From Ruth Bell Graham’s Collected Poems, p. 192. This is one of my favorite and most dog-eared books.)
I thank God for how He continues to use Ruth Bell Graham’s life and words to encourage and strengthen me. Although I only knew her through her poetry and a simple biography I read of her, I admire what I saw: a beautiful and dignified (but not stuffy) lady who loved deeply, hurt deeply, rejoiced deeply and trusted God deeply.
My prayers and thoughts are with her family and friends as they grieve and miss her.
