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Addressing students at Virginia Tech after a shooting rampage that left 32 of their fellow students dead, Philip Yancey said: 'You've heard, "Things will get better, you'll get past this." Those who offer such comfort mean well, and what you feel now you won't always feel...Yet you're a different person because of that day. When three of my friends died I came across these lines: "Grief melts away like snow in May,"... It did melt away, but like snow it came back in fierce, unexpected ways, triggered by a sound, a smell, a fragment of memory.'
Yancey, who was recovering at the time from a car crash continued, 'Pain is a sign of life and love. I'm wearing a neck brace because I broke my neck in an accident. The doctor kept asking, "Does this hurt? Can you feel that?" The answer he desperately wanted was, "Yes, it hurts, I can feel it"; proof that my spinal cord hadn't been severed. Pain offers proof of life, of connection. In deep wounds two kinds of tissue must heal: connective tissue, plus the outer protective tissue. If the outer protective tissue heals too quickly the inner connective tissue won't heal properly, leading to complications later.'
Real healing takes time; it takes place where God's presence, God's peace, and God's people are. Are you hurting today? Turn to God. His promise to you is 'I will...heal your wounds.'
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