Here is a video by recording artist Kirk Franklin

Imagine Me

Read Linda’s poems for the survivor on Author’s Den.

Songs in the Night

Soul Tears

Invasion of the Light

Runaway Brokeness

Like a Little Lamb

Broken Angel

Stepping Now

Eyes of Love

Do you ever feel alone in your pain? Like God wasn’t there to protect you or hear your cry?

We all feel that way sometimes. But He is always there - and never leaves our side. 

Read ‘Cry of the Wounded Heart’ a poem by Linda Settles. 

A Personal Note From Linda

Are you still sad, my friend? You have written so poetically and with acute honesty. I respect you for it. Your words are bearers of wisdom. They help others identify with multiple thousands of peers who have experienced the same losses, the same wounding. But tell me my friend, are you still sadly normal? I hope that help and healing have brought joy. Joy that overcomes the sadness. I know it will not remove it–nothing will ever be able to do that. But joy can overwhelm our sadness. Being overwhelmed by joy is like cool waters overflowing a desert basin. The desert is still a desert–but it will blossom and bring forth fruit. I hope that you are overwhelmed by joy today.

Linda Settles has published new poems at AuthorsDen.com!

The Deep Magic

Words that Prance on Sands of Time

Also read her new poem at LindaSettles.com:

Ode to Jesus Lover of my Soul

Why do we do the things we do? Why are our emotions often like a shotgun with a hair-trigger, easily set off and utterly destructive? The answers to these questions often lie in the murky mysteries of our past.  There is something inside us that is wounded, something that wants to hide–and to be known at the same time.

When we sense these dynamics at work, there is a choice to be made. And we will make it. If not deliberately and consciously, then we will choose by default. Choices by default are rarely wise and most often create more of the same kind of hurt that sent us into hiding in the first place.

We can choose to proactively examine every bit of evidence that presents itself to our conscious mind, evidence of past disasters and present pain. We can bravely face the truth about ourselves, significant others in our life, and our delima. The delima of living well in a world filled with pain, with sorrow, and with sin. A world that is dying–every day.

What will our honest assesment do that is so important? It will take our head out of the sand. It will force us to use our wings and soar above the grit and the grime that has sullied our feathers and kept us earth-bound! It will show us the potential behind the pain and the promise in the process. For process, we must, if we would recover from the hurts, habits, and hang-ups that afflict us.

Everyone who is not in recovery is in denial. Did you stop and consider that statement? Did you make a self-application? This world is, as I have said before, the “great abuser.” No one escapes its predatory pursuit. Those who see themselves as above the fray are in for a sad awakening. The ancient writer, Job, proclaimed, “Man is born to sorrow as the sparks fly upward.” Before he found himself sitting in the sand, scraping his boils with a piece of broken pottery, Job would have told you that if you live a good life, use your resources responsibly, and love God, you will surely prosper. He was in for the sad awakening. He did all of the things I just mentioned, and yet he found himself penning the words, “Man is born to sorrow…”

Let’s be brave. Let’s take (as they say in AA) a fearless moral invetory of our life. Let’s find out where our path diverged into a shadowed wood and left us at the mercy of the thieves who waited in the darkness to steal the glory of our soul.

We can overcome the bitterness of violation, the humiliation of addiction, and the drudgery of living out of duty rather than the abundant life promised by the One who came to redeem us from the power of the curse–the destiny of death that accompanied the first man’s fall from grace–the first woman’s decent into disobedience to the Creator who had fashioned her for His glory!

What is the source of our sorrow and discontent? We can deal the death blow to the power that trauma or loss holds over us if we focus on the source of our freedom.  Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of human kind, left His home in another realm to come to earth and die so that we might live.  Abundantly!  Freely! Victoriously!

Jesus Christ is truly my Higher Power–and the only source upon whom I can depend.  Though mankind will fail us–and we will fail others–there is One who never fails.  If we look to Him as the Source of our Life, nothing–absolutely nothing–can rob us of our freedom and our joy.