Dominic – Page 203 – thelifeididntchoose

No Harm?

It’s so easy to take Bible verses out of context. Our modern rendering of the Word of God broken into chapter and verse lends itself to lifting a sentence or two and ignoring the surrounding words.

Sometimes it doesn’t seem to matter much-the verse CAN stand on its own.

But sometimes it is devastating. Especially to those who find themselves in a situation that seems to clearly contradict the promise.

Jeremiah 29:11 is a popular verse plastered on posters, coffee cups, graduation cards and lovely Christian wall hangings.

It’s a hard one for me to swallow the way it’s usually dished out.

Death feels pretty much like harm to me.

I can spiritualize the verse and say, “Well, God’s ultimate plan is to give me and Dominic a hope and a future”.

That is absolutely true.

But that’s not what Jeremiah was talking about. He was speaking to a specific people at a specific point in time.

The original context of the Scripture was just for Israel-a promise that the nation would not be utterly destroyed or left bereft in exile. A promise that God would fulfill His covenant with Abraham and keep for Himself a people to declare His faithful love to the nations.

I think we moderns take it out of context when we apply it to individual lives.

Many Jews died in exile and not all who could return, chose to return when Cyrus issued the order.

The Scripture that speaks to my heart in this Valley of the Shadow of Death is this:

And I am convinced and sure of this very thing, that He Who began a good work in you will continue until the day of Jesus Christ [right up to the time of His return], developing [that good work] and perfecting and bringing it to full completion in you.

Philippians 1:6 AMP

Here is my HOPE. Here is MY promise of ultimate redemption and restoration.

God is still working to bring about His purpose in and through Dominic and in and through me “until the day of Jesus Christ”.

I don’t know how it works but He’s doing it.

He Who is Faithful and True has promised.

There’s No Place Like Home

Dominic’s Heaven Day fell right in the middle of Holy Week this year-Wednesday, April 12th marked three years since he entered Heaven and left us here.

And every day since then I’ve been homesick. Homesick for what I used to know and homesick for what I know awaits me when I join him there.

I can’t say that I handled this awful anniversary any better than the previous two but I did handle it differently. This year I was determined to create space for both mourning and dancing.

I cried a lot from Palm Sunday through his Heaven Day and into Resurrection Sunday morning. I found new wounds that needed attention and realized some old ones weren’t as patched up as I thought.

It was costly in terms of personal and relational energy but for the first time since Dom ran ahead to heaven, I was able to reclaim a holiday gathering.

And it was beautiful.

I missed him, of course, but things flowed and people loved one another and ministry happened and laughs floated through the air.

Everyone left with extra food and smiles on their faces.

This used to be my house every holiday, almost every Sunday. It hasn’t been that way since Dom left.

But for a few hours it felt like home again.

Repost: Resurrection: Reality and Reassurance

“The worst conceivable thing has happened, and it has been mended…All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” ~Julian of Norwich

I’m not sure when I first read this quote, but it came to my mind that awful morning. And I played it over and over in my head, reassuring my broken heart that indeed, the worst had already happened, and been mended.

Read the rest here: Resurrection: Reality and Reassurance

Longer Than Three Days: Waiting for Resurrection

It is tempting to forget that there were three long days and nights between the crucifixion and the resurrection beause the way we observe this season rushes us past the pain to embrace the promise.

But it’s not hard for me to imagine how the disciples felt when they saw Jesus was dead. It was neither what they expected nor what they prayed for.

Read the rest here: Living Between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection

Repost: Remember: Why Good Friday Matters as Much as Resurrection Sunday

“On the one hand Death is the triumph of Satan, the punishment of the Fall, and the last enemy. Christ shed tears at the grave of Lazarus and sweated blood in Gethsemane: the Life of Lives that was in Him detested this penal obscenity not less than we do, but more.
On the other hand, only he who loses his life will save it. We are baptized into the death of Christ, and it is the remedy for the Fall. Death is, in fact, what some modern people call “ambivalent.” It is Satan’s great weapon and also God’s great weapon: it is holy and unholy; our supreme disgrace and our only hope; the thing Christ came to conquer and the means by which He conquered.” C.S. Lewis, Miracles

Bury a child and suddenly the death of Christ becomes oh, so personal. The image of Mary at the foot of the cross is too hard to bear.

Read the rest here: Remember: Why Good Friday Matters as Much as Resurrection Sunday

Fragments

I recently heard a young woman describe a Chinese grieving ritual on an NPR broadcast:

At her grandfather’s funeral, his oldest son was tasked with demonstrating the depth of grief and pain the father’s passing left behind. He stood before the casket, raised a clay bowl above his head and smashed it to the ground while loudly wailing.

The bowl was shattered into fragments too small and too fragile to be put back together in any semblance of what they once represented.

When I heard the story, my heart cried, “YES!!”

Why can’t we do something like that? Why can’t we have a dramatic outburst at the edge of death that burns an unforgettable image in the hearts and minds of those who join us to say good-bye?

I honestly wouldn’t change a thing about Dominic’s Homegoing Service –except for it to be unnecessary.

We had a beautiful video full of photographs provided by friends and family. There were praise songs chosen to remind us of the brevity of life and the eternal hope we have in Jesus.

He was placed under a giant Tree of Life that had been constructed in the sanctuary as part of the Palm Sunday/Easter celebrations of that week. Even as we planned the service I remember thinking, “Only a DeSimone could leave earth when some wild thing like this was available to mark his passing!”

And our Pastor/Shepherd/Friend who had spent many quality hours with our children gave the message. The sanctuary was filled with people from all walks of life, all faith traditions and all ages-many hearing the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus for the first time.

It was as good as it could have been.

But if I could go back-I’d add this element:

I would raise a clay bowl over my head as high as I could and I would smash it with a loud wail.

Because in the end, that’s what child loss does to a mama’s heart. It shatters it into pieces so tiny and so fragile that simply to gather them into a pile takes oh, so much time.

And the pieces never fit again. They never make a whole. There are always gaps and the vessel remains fragile and easily broken.

I am still gathering pieces.

Still looking for the ones that slid under this edge out of sight or got kicked farther away than I thought they could be.

I’m placing the ones I recognize back into what seems the proper setting.

I’m finding some that look like they don’t belong anywhere and will have to wait to see if I ever figure out where they should go.

I’m beginning to look more and more like I’m whole.

And in some ways, I am. But in many ways it is an illusion-a trick of the eye-a turning of the ugly broken toward the wall where you can’t see it.

I’m still missing so, so much.

The Day Before It All Fell Apart

Friday, April 11, 2014:

Julian and I went to a college honors banquet and came back to the house to find Fiona home for the weekend. I called Hector and texted with James Michael.

I turned out the light and went to sleep.

No warning shots across the bow of life rang out to let me know what was coming.

But that Friday was the last day I spent misunderstanding the awfulness of death and the absolute uncertainty of life.

Those were the final 24 hours when I indulged in silly chatter, playful planning and the mundane tasks that used to take up most of my time.

That Friday was the last night I fell asleep thanking God that all my family were safe and secure.

It was the last night I COULD have called Dominic, but didn’t because he was coming over Saturday morning.

The sun rose for us, but not for him.

I will never forgive myself for not talking to him one last time.

I woke up in the still-dark morning to a deputy knocking on the door to tell me Dominic had been killed.

And my world fell apart.

It’s been [eleven] years and it is not yet put back together. Pieces have been picked up and tacked into what remains of the outer shell.

I can function.

I can even laugh.

And I am so, so grateful for the family I have still with me. Together we are working hard to make it through.

But there are no words to help those who have never buried a child understand the depth of the pain, the sorrow and the ongoing struggle to live each day.

I miss my son.

I miss the family we used to be.

I miss the old me.

I miss being blissfully ignorant of exactly how awful death is.

I will not live long enough for this to stop hurting.

My son is gone.

He is GONE.

He is still gone.

And even [eleven] years later, I can barely stand it.

Repost: More Time

The other day I needed to get something in the room where we have Dominic’s things stored-not the boxed-up-not-dealing-with-them-now things-but the personal things that bear his scent, his mark, his personality.

And the warm spring air had concentrated the odor that is him just behind the doorway. It caught me by surprise-that I could still smell him, still feel his presence, still be so certain that he had just passed by this very spot.

My mama heart cried, “More time!”

Read the rest here: More Time

Living Without Answers

We are a people who love a good mystery as long as it leads to a good ending-bad guys vanquished, questions answered, motives revealed and a tidy resolution.

But real life is rarely so neat and squared away.

Just consider your average doctor’s visit. Diagnosis is often a result of trial and error when a simple blood test or throat culture is unavailable to confirm or rule out a particular malady. Yet we blunder forward, trying this and that until something either works or the illness runs its course.

Relationships are even trickier. We stand toe-to-toe with others hoping we understand what they are saying or not saying, feeling or not feeling-all the while forced to act and react in the space between. It’s a wonder we aren’t all at war with one another.

And then there are the big “What ifs?” and “Whys?”

The cosmic questions that rock our world and threaten to undo us.

These are the questions that filled my mind and kept me awake at night after burying my son. Questions I was free to ignore before they took up residence in my soul and echoed in my head with every thump, thump, thump of my beating heart.

It took a very long time for me to learn to live with them unanswered. And there are still moments when I scream aloud and raise my fist to the sky, demanding an accounting.

But most days, I can rest in that space between the asking and the answer-if not exactly at peace-then at least in a state of suspended animation.

And that may really be all God expects of me this side of heaven.

Job never did get any answers.

He stood before God speechless and in awe.

That’s pretty much where I am right now.

I don’t have to like it.

I don’t have to understand it.

I only have to be willing to admit that He is God and I am not.

Job answered God:

“I’m convinced: You can do anything and everything.
    Nothing and no one can upset your plans.
You asked, ‘Who is this muddying the water,
    ignorantly confusing the issue, second-guessing my purposes?’
I admit it. I was the one. I babbled on about things far beyond me,
    made small talk about wonders way over my head.
You told me, ‘Listen, and let me do the talking.
    Let me ask the questions. You give the answers.’
I admit I once lived by rumors of you;
    now I have it all firsthand—from my own eyes and ears!
I’m sorry—forgive me. I’ll never do that again, I promise!
    I’ll never again live on crusts of hearsay, crumbs of rumor.”

Job 42:4-6 MSG

Is My Son My “Guardian Angel”?

It’s really hard to wrap my mind around what exactly Dominic is doing now that he’s not here with me. Sometimes I try to create a narrative or a scene or a story line that gives me something to hold on to.

It’s not easy though.

So I absolutely understand why some parents think of their missing child as their “guardian angel”. But that just doesn’t correspond to what Scripture tells me about what happens after death.

I firmly believe that there is a heaven and that my son is there, in the presence of Jesus and the saints that have gone before.

We are confident, then, and would much prefer to leave our home in the body and come to our home with the Lord.

I Corinthians 5:8 CJB

He’s not an angel nor has he been assigned to look out for me down here with some kind of supernatural power to intervene and make things happen-either good or bad.

He is worshiping with other believers at the feet of Jesus, the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world.

And honestly, that brings me more comfort than the thought that he is watching me suffer his absence down here.

Dominic loved me-still loves me, I believe-and if he were aware of the deep pain his absence causes it would be torture for him.

But in the presence of Christ there is only joy.

You teach me the way of life. In your presence is total celebration. Beautiful things are always in your right hand.

Psalm 16:11 CEB

So he cannot know my pain.

It would break his heart.

It is great consolation in this journey to realize that he is beyond ALL pain and sorrow.

I am deeply thankful for that.

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