The Lymph Nodes of the Soul

I could hear the surgeon’s saw as he cut off my knee joint.  An amputation in that sense.   I also heard the mallet hammer my titanium hinge into place.  No pain, just groggy awareness that somewhere in my lower parts some major surgery was taking place.  It was about a 6 week process of discovery.  

Laying in my hospital bed, my lower leg felt like an unfrozen ice pack; push on it and the indentations remained.  My nurse ordered me to work that trapped fluid out of my leg.  So diligently, I would rub and massage the gel textured liquid down towards my foot.  Two days passed with a growing pain and swelling in my ankle.  I asked my nurse again about it and she was shocked to hear that I was working it down towards my foot.

“It has no place to go down there.  You have to work it up your leg to the lymph nodes in the groin! Otherwise you are at serious risk of blood clotting.”  

What do the lymph nodes do?  They pass the unwanted material out of your body. Sounds logical doesn’t it.  But if you didn’t know that medical reality, the likelihood of you discovering it on your own is doubtful.

When “Love Your City” was just beginning, churches rented our city’s convention centre to host worship services each night for one week.  I remember sitting in my office with a growing desire to attend.  My week had been very full but there remained one window of opportunity, Friday night.  It required a choice between going up into the mountains for the weekend or attending the service.  My conscience quipped that one was a more spiritual decision than the other.   I frankly didn’t care.  I simply wanted to hear God and not miss that chance.  It could have happened in either place.

I decided to stay.  The service opened with a reading from Scripture that God had given to me in a very meaningful way as a teenager.  It followed with a couple of songs that were also deeply significant.  I remember thinking, “Well God, you have my attention.  I know I made the right decision so I’m listening.”  

Nothing jump off the page.  It ended.  “So God, why did you want me to come to this?”  I was actually a little disappointed.

I saw a pastor friend of mine assisting at the front of the auditorium so I thought we could have a word of prayer together before I went home.  He saw me coming.  I was within two feet of him when, without warning, I was literally hit with a wall of grief.  I have never experienced anything like it before or since.  Stumbling, I collapsed into him and he held me.  I began to sob at a gut wrenching level.  He just held me.  My life began to flash across my thoughts like a slide show.  I saw my sin played out in multiple slides.  I relived many genocides; evil things that I had experienced.  So much death and pain and suffering.  It went on and on.  I could hear people come up from behind, asking if I was demon possessed.  

I deeply appreciated his response.  It was quiet and gentle and he simply said, “No, just pray.  He has seen a lot.”

I was struck by the simplistic thinking of people who meant well but who completely missed the point of the situation.  But frankly, the experience itself was far too consuming for me to really care.  I wept for over 45 minutes non-stop.  It took me another 15 minutes to gain some sense of composure.  I will never forget my friend’s words.  He said, “You’re not done.”  I said, “Oh yes I am.”  He said, “No you’re not.”

I said to him, “I just can’t go through any more of this.  It is too much for me.”  He said, “I’ll walk with you.”  I said, “I will do anything you tell me to do.  Just don’t ask me to try to make a decision on my own.  I don’t have any strength left.”  And that began one of the many journeys I have been on as God heals me on the inside while increasing my ability to know who he is and what he is like.   

I have come to know and understand the purging of the filth that clutters the heart.  Without a doubt, tears are God’s lymph nodes of the soul.  Welcome them.  There are periods of time when weeping happens easily.  I used to try and gain control of those moments. They are meant to be the stress relievers of the heart and often cause other people to be uncomfortable around you.  We work hard to stop them, like massaging fluid down into your ankles instead of out of your body.  

Let them flow.  Tears have become a friend that leave me drained yet healthier.  Jesus understood their power.  He used the gift himself when he was at crossroads in his own heart.  In times of grief, sorrow or longing, Jesus allowed the tears to flow.