Letting go...

I am weary. Deeply so. The back of my eyes burn, shed and not shed, the tears there fallen and waiting to fall.

How can so much grief come from this well. Never worn dry. Never stopped up. Shadow - this grief follows me. In grief, I feel alone.

I get up in day, go through the motions. Do the things that are absolutely necessary. Go places, continue in the small groups, the studies, care for my home. I laugh, I talk, I carry on. Yet, a part of me has detached. This part processes, constantly processes. How can I do this thing. This separation. This ending.

The pain of it pulls me down, down, down. I am, also, angry. It angers me that every one agrees, that they think this thing must be, should be done.

My hands clutch, heart to self. How to rip out my heart. How to leave it there, beating on the ground.

I know I must open hands, must give this gift – give this child. I must let him go. Some days I see myself arms reaching out, screaming in panic. The world crusted hard shell, hard shell, steel around his heart. Unreachable by reason. He - locked in his own pain. Crushing it, or attempting to by picking up the bricks of habits that bash him repeatedly, leaving him wounded more, life just draining, draining away.

I cannot choose child from child. Somehow, I must. The one cannot suffer the deeds of the other.

All of us now, dis eased, broken. Husband, wife, child, child. The symmetry of family wildly out of whack.

Time and again, I have laid my Isaac on the altar. Time and again, I take him back. This I must do no longer.

Each time I, utterly sincere, lay my Isaac down. I look, search, for the ram. God will provide. He has promised.

In the abyss that is now my heart, I know the possibility. There are no guarantees. Death could come, through his own choice or through some other tragedy torn from headlines.

When I let him go, I free him, to bear his life. The life he has chosen. His choices, mine repudiated. He chooses his very own life.

When I let him go, I free him, to face God. To find his Creator. To accept or reject Him.

When I let him go, I free him, to hit bottom. I, cushion no more. Soft pillow to fall, removed.

When I let him go, I free him, to face reality. Home, that sheltered, even enabled. Home, no longer here.

I supplicate in anguish, agony, wailing, keening for mercy, for God to find this son. I, Hagar, now let this Ishmael go, lost in the desert. I am reminded, He, my God, is called ``El Roi``, the God who sees.

He the Alpha, the Omega. He knows, He sees, the beginning and the ending. He is the Great Shepherd, who leaves the ninety and nine and goes searching, searching for that one lost lamb.

Surely, the Shepherd of my soul and of his will find this lost and wounded lamb, lift him in His arms and bring him home. Home where he belongs, where ever, and when ever that will be....

He is who is Faithful, will do it - for He is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

1 Thess. 5:24

2 Pet. 3:9