“God of heaven, we are people of earth.
You know this, and you dwell among us,
No stranger to our sufferings.
The Psalmist says that you deliver us
“From the valley of the shadow of death”
Which is beautiful poetry,
Cross-stitched on a couch pillow
But a painful path to follow
A long march over the sharp edges of our broken dreams
The Valley of the Shadow of Death
Is dark as death
Cold and breathless as the moon
Heavy as lead, and just as poisonous
As forsaken as a cross
Our feet drag
Our hearts, slug slug slug, holding on to life
Our minds grow weary
Replaying our fate, over and again
We feel we cannot go on
And we wish we wouldn’t
Yet, as the Psalmist says
“You are with us”
Comforted, carried
By Love
In the valley, in the darkest shadow
Somehow, mysteriously
Hope, it blooms
Like a beautiful flower
In the cleft of a rock
Grow it here,
Among us,
Today “
Amen