August 19, 2025 – Sorrow & Joy
I was pleased yesterday when the ER doctor (who is a fellow under the head doctor that I saw on Fri), who had taken care of my left eye two weeks ago, came into the exam room. Pleased, that is, until he reclined my chair and brought out the prod which he called a spatula. (On Friday, the head doctor checked and lasered me while I was sitting up and didn’t use the spatula.) It reminded me of a little tool that came with some eye cream I bought recently. I used my spatula to gently dot cream around my eye and tapped with my ring finger (as I was taught to do ages ago since the ring finger isn’t as strong as the others, typically, and won’t hurt the delicate skin around the eye).
I wonder if he was maybe poking the part of my brain that doesn’t think well during stressful moments (if ONLY it had lasted for just moments) because it took me a good long while of trying to not cry out (at least not loudly) before I remembered to pray. Though prayer released some of the tension that had built up, it didn’t stop the pain and extreme discomfort (I really do mean extreme). It’s just not normal for you to be told to look in one direction so someone can slip a metal spatula in the opposite part of your eye and then tell you to look where you feel that spatula pressure. Even talking about it makes my eye hurt!
Still, though, I was glad (very glad) that he was thorough (and kind) and was able to give me peace of mind that everything is ok so I can fly to DC Friday without wondering why my cheek and brow bones are hurting and what the squiggly circle is in the lower left of my eye. It’s like those blinking circles you see during that Vision Field eye test, if you’ve ever taken one (people with good vision, like Don, don’t usually have to learn about those ‘til later in life), in which you click a button each time they appear all over the screen. The doctor said what I’m seeing is really in the upper right of my eye because we see the opposite of where something is (didn’t know that) and that the upper right is where the tear was that he worked on quite a bit; so, he figures I’m seeing the scar tissue (and maybe some of the residual blood – yuck) or something like that. OK. I’ll take that.
And, today, when my chiropractor was working on the left side of my neck (“oh yes this is “out”, she said, referring to the occipital something), she said the left side of my neck is hurting because of the tear in my distal right supraspinatus tendon. (I had to look on the MRI report to be able to write those words she rattled off so easily. Makes me think of the very good book I just finished listening to by Lisa Harper, A Jesus-Shaped Life. She uses somewhat confusing seminary language at times and then explains it in a very engaging way.) My chiropractor said my right shoulder is lower because it is weak; so, the left side of my neck is working (too hard) to compensate for the imbalance (or something like that). Then she asked if I’d been having headaches. YES (which I don’t usually have – as well as cheek and brow bone aches). She said those are due to the neck being out of whack. Goodness. I could never have been a doctor having to know how everything in our bodies interconnect. Ya know, if you don’t ask (about health concerns), you don’t get (peace of mind and/or solutions). God tells us to ask Him too.
Anyway, after writing all of that I’m thinking back to my time with God and my devotion book friends this morning and realizing that the theme that sort of emerged was about the co-existence of sorrow and joy (sorrow – the exam hurt, and joy – my eye is healing.)
Max – What a great picture Max painted about our sin nature. He ended with “the heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart. Each one of us has entered the world with a sin nature. God entered the world to take it away.”
Power – “If we truly believe our words are filled with life or death, why wouldn’t we choose what we say more carefully?”
JA – “Rejoice in your dependence on Me….Your foundation will be more than sufficient to support you during life’s storms,” but also, “…when the skies of your life are calm….Relying on Me involves staying in communication with Me.” Matthew 7:24-27 – “…like a wise man who built his house on the rock….”
Prevail 231 – Larson concludes each day with a prayer and here’s today’s: “Lord, forgive me for being so wrapped up in my daily affairs that I forget about the day to come. Help me to live ready and to help others live ready too. Amen.”
JC – “As you increasingly find fulfillment in Me, other pleasures become less important….If you feel any deficiency, you need to refocus your attention on Me. This is how you trust Me in the moments of your life.” And it is how you live with joy despite the circumstances (as it’s said in 1Thessalonians 5:16-18).
Streams – 2 Corinthians 6:10 – “Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.” Cowman tells an allegory about Sorrow and Joy wanting to be friends but for many reasons couldn’t, until they “became aware of someone standing beside them….a kingly Presence, and suddenly a great and holy awe overwhelmed them.” They each saw, through Him, the opposite of what they each are and realized “then we are one in Him….to follow Him through storms and sunshine…to be ‘sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.’ “
Utmost – “Self-consciousness is the first thing that will upset the completeness of the life in God…. Self-consciousness is not sin; it may be produced by nervous temperament or by a sudden dumping down into new circumstances….Anything that disturbs rest in Him must be cured at once…by coming to Jesus Christ….ask Him to produce Christ-consciousness, He will always do it until we learn to abide in Him….Nothing is so important as to keep right spiritually.”
(Note: Is it an ADD thing that leads me to use so many parentheses interrupting my thoughts with another one? Honestly, I was going to ask that in the first paragraph but I think it would have been one too many distractions to the supposed flow of the sentences.)
