Walking Wounded

The other day I was talking with a lady that I had known for almost a year. She and I worked on an annual conference that is held at my church. The interesting thing about that conversation is that I found out she is married. She often spoke of her children, but never did she mention her husband until the other day. Unfortunately, her husband NEVER attends church with her or anywhere. She is one of the many women who faithfully attend church while their husbands faithfully stay away from the church.

Her life story is full of disappointments, frustrations, defeats and periodic bouts of loneliness and hopelessness. (She sounds single, doesn’t she? – smile) But sad to say, her story (which is not all bad) is not out of the ordinary. Many of us have stories we could tell about how we made it through that rough time in our lives or how we are currently facing a situation that we don’t know how we are going to overcome. But, most of us remain hopeful that God will once again come to the rescue.

This post is in tribute to the many walking wounded among us. Without knowing your stories; I commend you for still getting up every morning, doing well on your jobs, maintaining a decent grade average at school or continuing your faithfulness at the various church or civic groups you are a part of. There were days you wanted to pull the covers over your head and sit out that particular day. And if that person who specializes in working your last nerve had crossed your path on that day, well let’s just thank God that you are not what you used to be!

My prayer for all of the walking wounded out there is that you will master the art of taking life one step at a time. (You may not want to admit it, but all of us have been or will be walking wounded at some point in our lives.) If you can make just one more step, then maybe you will have the strength to make two. And before you know it, you will look back and wonder how you got over. But that really won’t be a secret, will it? You made it because of He who was wounded for our transgressions. By a living example, Jesus is showing that there is hope for the walking wounded. My prayer is that the efforts put forth by our Lord and Savior will not be wasted because we succumbed to our fears and egos.