I am thankful for Brene Brown.
She has helped me put words to my feelings, helped me see a way forward when I felt there was none and helped me own my story even though it is hard.
I keep her quotes around to encourage my heart and remind me that I am brave.
This is one of my favorites:
Bifurcate: 1. to cause to divide into two branches or parts; 2. my life.
Before Dominic ran ahead to heaven I led a fairly unified life.
Our family was unusually close, our goals closely aligned, we shared the same faith, had developed routines and even all liked creamy peanut butter.
That changed when Dom left us-suddenly I was forced to live with one foot HERE and one foot THERE.
I didn’t get to choose, it was decided for me.
Paul’s words took on new meaning and great relevance:
We know that if our earthly house—a mere tent that can easily be taken down—is destroyed, we will then live in an eternal home in the heavens, a building crafted by divine—not human—hands. 2 Currently, in this tent of a house, we continue to groan and ache with a deep desire to be sheltered in our permanent home 3 because then we will be truly clothed and comfortable, protected by a covering for our current nakedness. 4 The fact is that in this tent we anxiously moan, fearing the naked truth of our reality. What we crave above all is to be clothed so that what is temporary and mortal can be wrapped completely in life. 5 The One who has worked and tailored us for this is God Himself, who has gifted His Spirit to us as a pledge toward our permanent home.
2 Corinthians 5:1-5 VOICE
Groan–YES!
Deep longing can only be expressed with low, gutteral sounds-there are no words!
I am in this earthly tent but want desperately to be free of it and clothed with the eternal-where joy unspeakable will reign and sorrow and death will be no more.
So this Lenten journey is helpful to me-it acknowledges the struggle between flesh and spirit. It encourages my heart to walk by faith and not sight, to grab hold of that which counts forever and let go of that which is doomed for destruction.
The truth is, all of us who follow Jesus lead a bifurcated life.
It’s simply that some of us can ignore that truth. Until death touches our bodies or our families, we can pretend that the earthly tent’s not so bad, that it might be somewhere we’d enjoy staying quite awhile.
I am not at all thankful for Dom’s death. I will never be thankful my son left us in the prime of life, full of promise and without saying good-bye.
But I am thankful that I am unavoidably confronted with the truth that this life is fleeting, this world is only a moment and this body temporary housing for my eternal soul.
Paul goes on to write:
In light of this [our understanding that our life here is temporary], we live with a daring passion and know that our time spent in this body is also time we are not present with the Lord. 7 The path we walk is charted by faith, not by what we see with our eyes. 8 There is no doubt that we live with a daring passion, but in the end we prefer to be gone from this body so that we can be at home with the Lord. 9 Ultimately it does not matter whether we are here or gone; our purpose stays fixed, and that is to please Him.
2 Corinthians 5: 6-9 VOICE
My eyes see one thing, but my heart knows another.
The news goes out over Facebook, over phone lines, over prayer chains and everyone shows up.
Crowds in the kitchen, in the living room, spilling onto the lawn.
It’s what you do.
And it’s actually the easiest part. Lots of people, lots of talking, lots of activity keep the atmosphere focused on the deceased and the family. The conversation rarely dips to deeper waters or digs into harder ground: “Where was God?”; “Why him?”; “Why do ‘bad’ things happen to ‘good’ people?”
But eventually the busyness and noise gives way to stillness and silence.
That’s when the harder part starts.
The long hours of nightime darkness that invite questions that demand answers. The quiet hours of daylight that insist on playing a home movie of the years that went before. Forcing me to wrestle. Tossing me in the ring of trying to reconcile this tragedy with my worldview.
And many people turn away from the spectacle.
Even good, loving, Christ-following friends find it hard to stick around and watch.
Because it challenges their worldview too.
It makes them wonder if what they have always believed about God is true. It makes them fearful that if it could happen to my son and to me, it could happen to their child and to them. Ir raises questions, they’d rather not answer.
And they don’t have to answer them-YET-because their lives haven’t been turned upside down and inside out.
So they run.
They stop calling, they stop coming and they keep their distance in public spaces.
It hurts.
A lot.
It’s human nature to avoid pain. No one marches headlong into suffering. Empathy requres energy. Compassion demands opening your heart to the hurt hiding inside someone else’s.
I understand, truly I do.
If I could find a place where sorrow and longing couldn’t find me, I would stay there forever. But I can’t. I have to carry this load, I have to face the tough questions, I have to work hard to give my heart a chance.
It is so much easier when others come alongside. I feel so much stronger when others choose to call courage to my broken heart. I find great comfort in knowing that someone is willing to risk their own comfort to bear witness to my pain and struggle.
Please don’t lower your eyes and hide. Raise them and help heal.
I know it’s hard and you don’t have to, but please don’t turn away.
Reading through the Sermon on the Mount, it’s easy to feel defeated.
Jesus ripped off the Pharisees’ masks. He gave people a peek behind the curtain-unveiling the sin that hid beneath a facade of outward obedience and seeming righteousness.
Jesus also strips away any pretense that I can follow the “rules”.
Sure I may not murder anyone, but hate and malice-how am I supposed to get through this life without calling someone “fool”?
Line after line of impossible standards-righteousness that goes way beyond the Ten Commandments!
I am hopeless and helpless.
Jesus makes just that point-on my own, in my own strength, dependent on my own efforts, I’m lost.
That’s what makes the Gospel the Good News!
God in His mercy and grace has offered the only true hope–the righteousness of Christ, the Perfect Sacrifice and atonement for sin.
When I walk into church and pretend I “have it altogether”, when I refuse to display my brokenness and my need for forgiveness, I obscure the beauty, value and truth of the Gospel.
I raise a barrier between those who need rescue and the very means by which they may be saved.
We are all broken.
We are all lost.
Our only hope is Jesus.
May we be bold enough to be honest.
Every time the headlines scream death and destruction, my heart stops.
When it’s YOUR child, husband, mother, cousin you can’t change the channel or route the conversation to lighter topics.
You just have to bear it.
Read the rest here: Not What I Had Planned
I wake before the morning light. Every. single. morning.
I get my coffee, sit in my chair and wait for sunrise.
I never worry that today it might not happen.
I’m never concerned that after all these years of faithfulness, this day may be the one where daylight fails to make an appearance.
There is no fear in this darkness because I know it will not last forever.
Morning is coming.
Morning. Is. Coming.
And that’s the hope I cling to in this longer darkness of the Valley of the Shadow of Death-no matter how many years it may be, the Valley has an end.
The same God Who keeps the earth in orbit around the sun has ordained that death will not have the last word.
Light will triumph.
Darkness will have to flee.
I look forward to heaven, where everything that the enemy has stolen will be redeemed and restored.
I’ve been reading The Jesus Storybook Bible-it is a remarkable way to re-imagine and re-engage with God’s Story.
My very favorite part is a paraphrase of Revelation 21:4:
“And the King says, ‘Look! God and his children are together again. No more running away. Or hiding. No more crying or being lonely or afraid. No more being sick or dying. Because all those things are gone. Yes, they are gone forever. Everything sad has come untrue. And see-I have wiped every tear from every eye!’”
An eternal morning is coming.
Morning. Is. Coming.
A grainy picture is all I have left of that last Christmas together.
I first wrote this in 2013 before our circle was broken:
Eighteen days to ponder the coming of God’s great Gift.
We know the end of the story which can make us jaded and impatient.
If for a moment we can recapture the desperate hope that was in the heart of Israel longing for Messiah and then in the next remember that He has come, we will be forever changed.
I can’t characterize many things in this grief journey as “gifts”.
But there is ONE thing: I am desperately longing for the coming again of Jesus the Christ.
The longing hope Israel felt is so much stronger in my own heart.
I understand in a very real way how much Israel hoped for His first coming. I feel it in my bones.
I wake every morning thinking, “Is THIS the day?”
Hope is what I hold on to.
It’s my lifeline.
Father, I have stopped asking for miracles.
My wounded heart has lost the faith it once had for hoping You might step in and make something out of nothing.
I still believe in YOU. I still hope in YOU.
BUT I am resigned to a life of waiting to see redemption and restoration in Heaven, not here.
In the waiting I ask only two things: Mercy and grace.
Please, please show me mercy, Lord.
Incline Your ear, O Lord, and answer me, For I am distressed and needy [I long for Your help].
Psalm 86:1 AMP
Please spare me even greater pain and sorrow. Please don’t pile more burdens on my broken back-I don’t think I can make another step if You do.
And I beg You to overwhelm my hurting heart with Your grace.
He said to me, “My grace is enough to cover and sustain you. My power is made perfect in weakness.” So ask me about my thorn, inquire about my weaknesses, and I will gladly go on and on—I would rather stake my claim in these and have the power of the Anointed One at home within me.
2 Corinthians 12:9 VOICE
Let me feel your Presence, let my spirit be strengthened by your Spirit, give me grace to accept what You’ve allowed and the strength to carry it.
Amen.
My children grew up surrounded by life and by death.
On our small farm they got to see puppies, kittens, goats, sheep and horses take their first breath. We watched turkeys and chickens hatch-struggling in that last great effort to throw off the shell.
And we also witnessed life’s end.
Every. time. it feels wrong. Every. time. it feels like defeat.
And it is–we were not made to die.
God didn’t create this world to be full of endings. He made it to be full of life and fellowship and love and for His glory.
But we live in a broken world.
When the first man and first woman looked away from their Loving Creator and embraced temptation, death came in through sin.
That longing we have, that sense that death is WRONG-that death is not the way things SHOULD be-that’s the spark of God’s Spirit speaking to us.
It’s the Father’s call to our hearts to turn to Him.
God the Father has made provision for eternal life with Him through Jesus the Son.
Yes, this world is full of death-it has touched my life in a very personal and awful way.
But my heart and God’s Word tells me that death is not what we are meant for-that there is MORE.
We who have known only futility, decay, homesickness, and exile, have found strong encouragement to hold fast to our hope because we are no longer helpless and alone. He’s already gone before us, trail blazing straight through exile and death into life as our Captain. Yes, I know this is true. I can hope even in the midst of doubt.
Through his death and resurrection, he has flung open the gate, torn the curtain that divided us from God’s presence, and done it all as the incarnate Son of Man. God has not forever abandoned his creation. Mankind is still his good work. In the body of Jesus, Man has gone into the presence of God, to his throne room, to the company of myriads of angels dressed for a party (see Hebrews 12:22). I’m in a form of exile now, but exile doesn’t mean abandonment. Jesus has made sure of that.
~Elyse Fitzpatrick, Home
As we move toward celebration of the birth of Christ, I pray we look also to His life, death and resurrection and the promise of hope He has placed in our hearts.
I no longer have to imagine the worst thing that could happen in the life of a mother-I know exactly how it feels.
And if I allow my heart to ponder that too often or too long, it consumes me.
So I am learning to take those anxious thoughts captive, learning to make them live in only a small corner of my mind instead of taking it over completely.
It takes effort and discipline, but it’s possible.
I don’t have to live the rest of my days a quivering mess- afraid of every sunrise, every phone call, every mile my family travels:
Because, really, that’s all any of us has.
thelifeididntchoose 