Writer's Nest Topic: Something Squishy by Susan L.

  John 11:35
 
  It's a hard old world: hard knocks, hard times, hard rows to hoe.
  Yup. It's hard all right.
  Trials, tribulations, tears, fears, and woe don't you know.
  Losses, tyrannical bosses, crime all the time...
  Jesus wept.
  Disasters, calamities, storm torn roofs, winter chill, can't pay the bill,
  High prices creep higher while everything else shrinks except life expectancy.
  Death, divorce, murder, suspicion, anger, hate...despair... it's all there, every single day, every hour, every minute.
  Twenty-four hours news casts offer a macabre display bookended by commercials to buy this, need that, you're nothing without...
  Gloating, boasting, scheming, thieving, coliseum thumbs down are what pass for entertainment. Is this really reality TV? The worst of the worst of human traits displayed for all to see and pick a victor from a line up of what's supposed to be the world's best.
  Hard as nails prevails.
  Jesus wept.
  Sickness, aches, pains, drains on energy, do more demands on days that never seem long enough.
  Yup. It's hard all right.
  Lotteries prevail yet pale in the hidden truths of losses, of bankruptcies, of gambling addictions. "Winner! Gangon!" her melodious voice cries out. Bells and whistles draw the dollars in.
  Cradle fold to age old we're taught money can buy happiness.
  Jesus wept.
  Iron will is a term of respect. No quarter given or even a nickel to the homeless, the poorest of poor. Only contempt is generously spent on the needs of the needy.
  Assumptions, presumptions, other's shoes cast aside in distain. There's a willful wisdom that knows better all the time. There's a pride that derides anything less than perceived perfection.
  Too fat, too thin, too tall, too small, too light, too dark, can't win. Too old, too young, too much of too but what can you do? Give up? Surrender? To render a life unlived before it's even began by a hand that held such promise but couldn't see beyond this...
  Jesus wept.
  It's a hard, old list but hear this: there's something softer, lighter, kinder, brighter than anything that was or ever will be.
  Jesus wept His tears to wash away the fears, the pain, the strain, the angst, the stain of being human in a hard, hard world.
  His heart is something squishy and soft and forgiving giving, not hard or iron clad or mad. It's just sad because His love for us has made it so.
  And the squishy heart that He gave me lets me weep alongside Him for those whose lives I've lived in the time when hard was all I knew. I know in my once hardened heart what it means to be away from my heavenly Father, Son and Spirit. I will say life is much better with Them.
  In letting go of my own iron will, in learning to be filled and thrilled with joy because of this unimaginable love, I've learned life doesn't have to be so hard,
  And in the face of it all, big and small,
  Jesus laughs with me.