Alone

silence and lies
definitely safer
you were struggling
later, I asked
'how are you, how has it been?'
shrug of the shoulders
'oh, okay'
like everything is fine now
and there never was a problem

you asked me
'how are you doing?'
'not well'
stupid answer
now I know
it would be better to say nothing
look strong
pretend to be strong

and this is how we create
a community
of lies and silence
where the pain
cannot be spoken
the hurts
are never healed
and we are all 
alone

(from an earlier time...) For years I have been disturbed that the church is often not the place where we love and help each other come to Jesus in our weakness, with our struggles. The 'leaders' and 'stronger' want to be strong, so don't share much of their real and current struggles, but somehow expect the younger ones to share. Eventually the younger ones also learn to stuff it, hiding the hurts. "Maturity" comes to also mean a certain level of falsity. "I'm fine," we say so quickly. Often I've chosen to be real anyways, share it like it is, turning to God in it, open before others about the reality. But even I, with my (in my thinking) super-high "willing to be open and vulnerable threshold," have sometimes discovered and feel--it's just not worth it, better to be fake, better to hide. God help us! May we learn to believe You love, may we learn to really love and create safety for others coming to You. How else will we find the healing that we need? How else will "love one another" be true among us?