DESCRIPTION:
Free song: http://www.reverbnation.com/play_now/12128164

On February 11th, 2011, the morning after my little sister, Aly, passed away, I woke in a hotel room with the first verse of a song playing on repeat in my head as if I’d known it for years. "Man of sorrows, weep with me. Both acquainted now with grief”…

What? Where was this coming from? I had never heard this song before.… The lyrics gripped my heart and my eyes welled with tears.. then…"Your tears mingle with my own, for every anguish You have known.." came seemingly out of nowhere. I wrote down the lyrics and sang the melody into a voice memo and didn't think about them much more as I spent the next few days wandering around in shock. My loss wasn’t quite ‘real’ yet.

Then came Aly's memorial. It was standing room only, a joyful celebration of her life. So many people streamed the service online that the servers crashed multiple times. Her story was in the local paper. And for weeks our family was flooded with stories of how Aly had somehow touched their lives. We were in awe of what God was doing, and covered in grace like bubble wrap, softening the impact of the blow.

Inevitably, the weeks wore on and reality set in, as it tends to do. I eventually had to go back to work. I sat in my office and stared at the wall, eyes glazed over, heartbroken. I tried to focus, but work projects seemed so meaningless. I missed my sister. My best friend. I usually called her on my drive home from work. But on these days, I stared at her name and number in my phone, not having the heart to delete it.

After a few months floating in a grief-stricken fog, I picked up a camera. Aly had been the photographer in the family. I was the musician. But I was desperate for a way to feel connected to her, so I started taking pictures. It helped me see through her eyes. It gave me joy. Within two months, I had quit my office job and was doing photography full time.

Late one summer night while driving to East Tennessee for a photo shoot, the gravity of all God had done in my life suddenly floored me. He had wept with me in my darkest moments. He had held me. He empathized with me losing my closest companion. He had also opened the doors for me to do what I loved, and to see His beauty through a camera lens, the way my sister did. It wasn't about just "surviving" any more. I was starting to heal.

That's when the rest of the lyrics poured out of me. I barely had to think, they just flowed out. The power of the lyrics shook me. "Comforter please send your peace. Stop the bleeding, start to heal…For only One who's been cut as deep, could begin to weep with me." Tears once again filled my eyes, as they had when the first lyrics came. Only this time, the words were so much more real. I had felt God's comfort over several months, rather than one day. I had to spend some time experiencing the truth of the song before it could be complete.

That was five years ago. I still miss my sister every day. But in the darkest, loneliest moments these words still remind me that I do not experience this sorrow alone.

My hope is that this song will speak to others the way it spoke to me, and that it might be a turning point from hopelesness to "grieving forward." From feeling abandoned by God, to a sense of being deeply understood, intensely loved and held by Him.

You can download the song absolutely free here. And please share it with anyone who might need to hear it.

http://www.reverbnation.com/play_now/12128164



Ps: Huge thanks to Kyle Aaron for engineering and instruments, Mike Proctor for mixing and keys, and Phoebe Cryar for lovely harmonies.