Foundation Shifting

“So then, brothers and sisters, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by our letter.” 2 Thessalonians 2:15

I officiated at the burial of the cremains of my dear friend, Ray and his wife.  Ray has been a signpost in my life, guiding me and encouraging me in ministry.  I walked the journey with both of them into Heaven.  As the taps were played and the American flag was folded, I felt the closure of Ray’s life on earth.  His body was now contained in the urn as ashes, and it returned to the earth.  My foundation of life feels stronger knowing Ray’s body is part of this earth, but his spirit and love are added to my heart and spirit.  My foundation is firmer with each saint I release to Heaven.

While the sadness of loss is intense and inevitable each time, I am thankful to have loved and connected with dear saints.  I am beginning to understand that who I am and the strength and confidence I have is based on all the people who are part of my foundation.  Their love, legacy, and influence mixes within me, and I stand firmer in the face of life. 

After the burial, I visited the cemetery where my husband, Dave is buried.  As I stood beside the grave, I realized the sadness had turned to thanksgiving.  He is part of my firm foundation of life.  I know I will never sink because of his love and influence that has made me a stronger and more confident person.  I also visited the grave of my dear friend, Ruth, who instilled in me independence, a strong voice, and a joy for life.  My foundation is stronger and more resilient because of Ruth.  I miss each one but give thanks for their life.  Therefore, the sadness of my grief has turned into the joy of thankfulness.

As I mourn and give thanks for one life and released him to Heaven, I received the call that two other friends from my years in ministry are beginning the journey to Heaven.  I also have begun the grief journey with several who have recently lost their spouse.  My view of grief continues to evolve and change over the years of experience.  Grief is the emotion of loss.  The intensity of grief changes through the journey.  As we release our loved one and allow them to be part of our foundation of life, the grief transforms into thanksgiving.  We give thanks for the privilege of our loved one being in our life and adding to the meaning and purpose of life.

As our foundation is filled with all this love from those who have touched our lives, we begin to take steps into life having a sturdy foundation to support us.  I find myself willing to try new adventures because of this firm foundation of love and support.  I know I am never alone.  Those who have poured their life and love into me have also had Jesus as their foundation which has drawn me even close to Jesus.  Jesus is the solid rock upon which I stand.  My foundation for life is firm and rooted deep in Jesus and in all those whom I have loved.

Grief turns us upside down, and it feels like we are sinking with no sure footing or foundation.  Nothing feels right.  Nothing is normal.  It seems too difficult to take steps each day so we exist in the same place.  As reality of life gets clearer and we begin to accept that life will be different, we can begin to live in this different.  As we do, we take a step and feel the foundation of love that was always there but now is firmer because our loved one is now a part of this foundation.  We see it clearer and am willing to take steps into living.  We begin to build a new and different life on this love foundation.  Grief is turned upside down and we have a firm foundation with Jesus and the love of all those who have influenced and poured life into us.  Begin walking forward on this foundation of love.

Grieving Into Hope

“But we are hoping for something we do not have yet, and we are waiting for it patiently.”  Romans 8:25

My niece texted me and asked for my Grandma’s Pineapple cookie recipe.  Immediately, I could smell and taste those delicious morsels, and they always had her special touch – her homemade glaze.  The day was beautiful with a blue sky and white fluffy clouds as we walked the park.  I gazed into the sky and the cloud above me looked like a dog lying on its back with its feet in the air, and I thought of my mom and how she taught me to look for shapes in the clouds.  I read the obituary of a Sturtz cousin and felt her love and the legacy she passed on to everyone she touched.  She made a difference in this world. 

All of these memories filled me with hope and made me smile.  While I miss my mom and Grandma, I no longer feel the deep pain of loss and grief.  When I think of them, I feel their love and recognize their influence and the foundation of my life that is built on their faith and love.  The legacy of their lives is reflected in my life.  Their lives have given me hope.

In the journey of grief, we have moments we lift ourselves out of the depth of sorrow and loneliness and revealed to us is a hope of a hope.  The cloudiness of grief parts for a moment and we see a possibility of hope.  We may not feel hopeful at that moment, but we know someday hope will come into our life.  Someday we will look forward to living moments with meaning and purpose.

As the journey continues, we deal with the stuff of life and our loved one’s possessions.  We may create a memory box of little treasures from our loved one’s life.  These mementos remind us they lived, and we experienced life with them.  We also have an emotional memory box filled with so many feelings.  These come out of the box at times from the triggers of life.  This box is filled with layers of sadness, the past, grief and lined with loneliness.  It is a box we live in for a period of time.  The box has no hope.  It just pulls us into a deep longing for the past.  It creates an emptiness within us.  All the emotions in the box define the intensity of grief.  The emotional box defines us for a period of time.  It is familiar and how we believe we keep our loved one alive within us.  We stay stuck here and exist as if this is all there is to life.

Then we get a glimpse of a moment of hope – a moment where we see life could be different.  That hope of a hope emerges as we attempt to go through grief and leave it in the past.  But how do we get through the darkness and depth of grief and experience light and hope?

For me, the only way has been to walk closer to God each day.  It is trusting God is with me even when I do not feel His presence.  It is believing God is comforting me, giving me rest, and re-focusing my life.  It is beginning to take steps into living.  It is seeing that life can be different and still have meaning and purpose.  It is releasing my husband to live in Heaven and closing the emotional box of pain.  I know there will be moments of emotion the rest of my life, and the box will be opened but just for moments.  I no longer exist in the past but live in the present with hope.  It is finding who I am now.  I am further down the path of life because of those I have loved who have influenced and poured into me.

I am beginning to comprehend that the opposite of deep grief is hope.  Hope is looking forward to something I expect to happen.  I now expect God to walk with me each day and help me live in the present.  Life is different.  I do not need to stay in the intensity of grief and despair.  I am not betraying my loved one.  I am acknowledging a completion of life and a change in location to Heaven for my loved one.  I am getting out of the emotional box of grief and focusing on the hope of life.

Whispering The Sound of Silence

“It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.  Let him sit alone in silence when he has laid it on him.”   Lamentations 3:26, 28

My morning run is my prayer time.  I talk and listen to God in this quiet time.  Last week God gave me a song.   A song I have not thought about in years nor have I listened to in a long time.  It was “The Sound of Silence” by Simon and Garfunkel.   The first verse states –

“Hello darkness, my old friend

I’ve come to talk with you again

Because a vision softly creeping

Left its seeds while I was sleeping

And the vision that was planted in my brain still remains

Within the sound of silence 

Silence – the absence of sound.  It is the avoidance of mentioning or discussing something.  Silence is the state of standing still.  Grief is filled with silence.  Our lives have been silenced to what we have known and desired.  It feels like we are standing still as we grieve because nothing seems to change or get better.  We still miss our loved one.  We still feel the sadness and aloneness.  Avoidance surrounds our silence.

The darkness of grief becomes familiar like an old friend.  We do not like the darkness that grief brings into our lives, but it connects us to our past life.  Darkness becomes easier to tolerate when we exist only in the past.  Soon it becomes a familiar friend – the place we retreat to each day as we attempt to remember our past life and recreate the memories.  We exist in this darkness not knowing there could be light.  We silence all our emotions except for sadness and pain.  We just exist in the emotional darkness.

The song states “no one dared disturb the sound of silence.”  This is the journey of grief that is difficult to navigate.  How do we disturb this silence?  A silence that has become a friend but no longer is comforting.  The whispers begin within us.  How do we communicate what is really going on inside of us and move beyond what we think we are supposed to feel and be or what others think  and admit to ourselves who we really are and what we now desire in life.  The sound of silence is our lack of communication with ourselves.  The whisper that is deep within our souls.

We hear sounds around us.  People voicing their opinions and suggestions on how we should think and feel and live.  We listen to others on the journey and hear the words of wisdom and experience, but how do we disturb our own inner silence? 

There is a vision within our souls that remains through grief.  A vision of hope amid the darkness and sadness.  A hope to live again.  We silence this hope because it seems impossible to experience life without our loved one, but the dream remains.  We exist through days of loneliness, emptiness and rehearsing over and over again our past.  The memories remain.  The life we lived is completed.  We desire to live into this different life.  We see other people living and enjoying life but to disturb our inner silence seems impossible.

Then an inner whisper is heard – “there is more to life.”  I believe God’s Spirit whispers in our souls and brings light into our darkness and hope into our sadness.  The whisper calls us to rest in God’s presence.  The sound of silence is a rest from the pain and grief and a gentle whisper of hope.  The whisper comes from within us.  It has been planted in our brain from God that there is more to this life.  Listen to the sound of silence within you.

Too Close The Same

“If anyone belongs to Christ, there is a new creation.  The old things have gone; everything is made new.”   2 Corinthians 5:17

In my recent updates of my condo, I chose paint colors based on the name of the paint and how it would accentuate my furnishings.  Recently, I was looking through pictures of a previous house, and I realized I had chosen close to the same colors of paint.  It was familiar and comfortable before and it continues to be what fits my style.  When I went shopping, I tend to purchase clothes at the same stores and about the same color and style. 

When I began the grief journey, I found it easier to go to the grocery store and buy the same items each week and eat the same meals over the first several months.  It was mostly healthy foods.  I did not have to make any decisions.  It was familiar and I was fine eating the same thing each day.  I found myself trying to keep the same routine and lifestyle.  It kept me close to the same life I had known.  It was familiar.  The familiarity made it feel like my husband was still with me and I was attempting to live in the past in my present life.  Our grief desires to stay close to the same life we have always known.  This only leads to even more emptiness and pain because no matter how much we try; nothing is the same.

As I have journeyed further down the road, I have come to realize that trying to keep my life too close to the past brings so much more pain because I can never recreate it.  I have learned that different is not bad, it is just different.  My life will never be the same, and I have come to accept that fact.  I also have come to realize I do not want to live close to the same.  When I experience something too close to the same as it was with y husband, it feels like I am betraying the relationship I had.  He has enhanced my life and helped me become who I am now, but the path with him is complete.  I am no longer walking that same path.  I have turned onto another path on this journey of life.

In developing new relationships on this journey, you cannot take one out and insert another and do the same thing.  It will not work.  It will cause frustration, pain, and heartache, and you will feel uneasy and uncomfortable.  Feelings of jealousy may also enter the situation.  It is creating a new and different life and going down a different path.

When we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we become a new creation as Paul states in 2 Corinthians.  The old has past, and we are made new.  We cannot stay too close to the same or we will revert back to our old way of life and Jesus will no longer be the center of our lives. 

Therefore, on our grief journey as we attempt to live into life, we need to try new experiences, adventures, and relationships.  When it is too close to the same we compare, feel like we are leaving out our loved one, and we place guilt on ourselves for even trying a new life.  Give yourself permission to be a new creation.  You will never be the same so why not take a step into the different and live a new life.  Your loved one is part of who you are.  God will walk beside you.  When you get too close the same, you will know that you want to treasure that experience and not repeat it.  Take a step in a different direction and try living in today not the past.

Permeated With Peace

“The Lord gives strength to his people; the Lord blesses his people with peace.”  Psalm 29:11

This past week I ran in the rain.  It began as a gentle rain, but then turned into a downpour part way into the run.  I was already soaked so I continued running.  I heard the thunder in the distance and as I arrived home, I saw the lightning on the horizon. It was quite the storm when I looked outside my window.  I was thankful to be home and to make it safely through the storm.  It was a choice for me to run, but not a choice to encounter the downpour.  It was just a part of the journey.  My clothes were soaked, and the dampness permeated through to my skin.  It took all day for my shoes to dry. 

As I was running, a song was playing in my mind – “I Can See Clearly Now” –

“I can see clearly now the rain is gone

I can see all obstacles in my way

Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind

It’s gonna be a bright, bright sun shiny day.” 

I wondered why God had given me this song amid the pouring rain.  As I pondered this, I knew the rain would end sometime in the day and the sun would shine again.  It reminded me of the journey of grief.  Grief permeates our souls and soaks through every fiber of our being.  Every part of our lives is affected by this deep loss and pain.  The cloud of darkness blinds us to living and having any hope of a normal life.  We attempt to follow our old routine, and all the obstacles get in our way.  We feel overwhelmed.  It feels like the clouds will always be present without any hope of a bright, sunny day within our souls.

Sometimes we need to allow the rain of grief to permeate our souls and feel the pain and loss.  It will soak through our body and fill us with fear and a lack of focus.  The idea we will ever be happy and find hope and brightness in life, seems far beyond our reach. We will just be soaked in the sadness for the rest of our lives.  Give yourself permission to feel the grief and loss and sadness.  Allow it to permeate your soul.  You have loved deeply and been given the gift of experiencing love.  The love has soaked through you, and you have absorbed this love into the foundation of your being.  It is a part of who you are.

Now, on the journey you begin to recognize that the clouds and fog of grief are beginning to lift, and you are attempting to see life beyond the obstacles and hurts and intense pain of being alone in your grief.  God is permeating your soul with His love and His peace.  You long for peace – a contentment in the life you now have.  Peace does not mean everything is fine.  Peace just means you allow God’s Spirit to “soak” you with His presence amid the uncertainties of life.  Peace is changing your focus from the pain and loss to God’s presence.  It is attempting to live in moments.  To live in the present knowing God is with you.  It does not mean you forget the gift of love and the memories.  It just means you allow God’s presence and peace to run through your life.  This is the life you now have.  Allow God to walk with you and fill you with His presence and peace.  Your life is different now and how you feel and see life is different.  Find peace in this difference.  Allow the peace of God to permeate your soul.

Thoughts At The Beach (Copy)

“GOD called the dry ground land and the gatherrdnwatersnhe called seas. And Godmsaw that it was good.” Genesis 1:10

As the sun rises in the east, the sky is filled with the glory of God. A new day has begun - a day with potential. Our attitude and outlook determine the day. Life is different and not what we expected it to be. This is the day that God has made and to rejoice in it means a change of focus. We cannot change the past and what has happened. We can only strive to live into today.

The beach has brought reflections to my soul. I have watched the waves crash on the shore smoothing the sand. Some waves are stronger and come quickly, while others come more gently, but they still come. Life keeps coming no matter what the storm. Life does not stop even though the storm of loss and heartache has occurred. The waves are always a part of the ocean just as grief and loss are a part of life. We just learn to accept it as part of love and life. We accept that waves will always happen because of the wind and the tides. It is part of what makes the ocean and beach. So if we accept grief and loss as part of life, we learn to live in it and through it. I watched the little birds run frantically up and down the beach trying to avoid the waves while searching for food. They seemed to be in such a hurry. Sometimes as we try to find our way, we attempt to keep so busy rushing from one thing to another, hoping it will fill the emptiness of our hearts. Sometimes we just need to slow down and rest and give ourselves permission to grieve, to refocus and to change the direction of our lives. Sometimes we need to take care of ourselves and make ourselves a priority. As I walked the beach, I encountered people sitting in beach chairs, under umbrellas not aware of me at all. Others were walking and passed by me or were coming toward me. Still others, mostly children and parents, were playing at the shore line where I was walking. Many of the children said hello and smiled and we had a moment of connection at the beach. This reminded me of trying to find a connection in this different life. Some people just go back to their own lives and ignore your struggle. Some people move farther away from you not knowing what to do or say. Others see you, acknowledge your loss and try to hurry you through it so that they don't have to feel the reality and hurt of loss. But others in their childlike care, provide a smile and kind word and connect with you for a moment on the journey. The sunshine has warmed my body and soul. Just as God's Son, Jesus, walks with us on the journey filling us with His presence and connecting with us in our present moment. The Beach speaks of God's presence and beauty in the storms of life. God walks with us as we leave our footprints in the sand and in life. Trust as the waves move in you that God is with you in this day and moment. Look for thr beauty in the memories and in the life you now have. Live into this different life.

Living Into Life

“This is how God showed his love to us:  He sent his one and only Son into the world so that we could have life through him.”    I John 4:9

I shared dinner with my siblings this past week, and we talked about memories of growing up.  We each had different memories and our perspective on events had a different slant, but we laughed together as we shared these memories of our childhood.  I was asked by a friend this week what were my earliest memories of childhood.  My first thoughts were of my Grandma and her home.  I immediately could walk in my mind through my Grandma’s house and see everything on the walls, the furniture, her chair with her Bible beside it, all her salt and pepper shakers in her china cabinet, her kitchen and the cookie container.  I could even smell her homemade soap, her cookies, and the smell of spring through her windows.  The memories of my Grandma and her house filled me with happiness and a feeling of comfort.  I loved my Grandma and continue to love her in my heart.  I was living for a moment in these memories, and they filled me with life and joy.

Oh, the memories that flood our souls as we think of our loved ones.  We remember life with them, and the challenges shared that created this life.  It was a life, and we were living in it believing this would be our life forever.   Then life changed.  Our hopes and dreams were shattered.  We will no longer live that life. 

Our grief slows down our living, and we exist and survive moment by moment for awhile.  It takes everything within us to just make it through the day and complete the necessary tasks of life.  We are walking an unfamiliar path without focus and purpose.  We feel alone wondering haphazardly through the maze of each day.  We are surviving barely without meaning and purpose, but we have a routine to follow and think that should be enough.  We are existing.

In this journey, we begin to believe just existing in survival mode is not enough.  We desire to live, but all we know is the life we used to have, and it does not exist.  Living to us means the life we had with our loved one.  Living is more than the past; it is also the present.  We need to live in moments, to allow ourselves moments of actual living.  Living means we are present in what is happening around us, and we are present with people and with ourselves.  We can live even if we are alone because we are never alone.  God is always with us.  God is always living in us, around us and goes before us.

As we journey further down the road and ponder the idea of living into life again, we wonder how we take this step.  We have a desire to not just exist in our old routine, but it has become so familiar though empty.  We want to live into life, but taking the risk seems so overwhelming.  We may even begin thinking about things we want to do and places we want to visit and people we want to see.  It is like a “bucket list” toward living the life you now have.  It is not the life you chose, but the memories of the past can still fill your heart with joy.  These memories are alive in you.  They give you life and hope and joy if you allow these memories to focus you forward not just back into the sorrow and loss.

Living into life means taking steps no matter how small to experience this different life.  It is moving toward new opportunities and challenges.  It is holding God’s hand as you navigate a new path in life.  It is taking the memories and experiences of your life with you as your foundation and building upon them.  Living into life will take you in a new direction and God will lead you.  Just take His hand. 

Feeling In The Memory

“Remembering that you cried for me.  I want very much to see you so I can be filled with joy.  I remember your true faith.”    2 Timothy 1:4-5

She shared that her memory is not what it used to be, and that her husband was the one who remembered all the specifics of the events of their lives.  Now that he had passed, she was afraid that she would forget the joys of their life together.  She was trying to remember.  He spent his days reviewing his past life and remembering the details of the life he lived with his wife.  He wrote down what he remembered out of fear if he forgot, then he would be forgetting her. 

Some of us have great recall and memory.  We remember our childhood, our school days, our vacations, our life together with our loved one.  Others of us, struggle with memory and the details seem allusive especially in our grief.  Grief causes a cloudiness in our minds and the fog of loss prevents a clear view of the past and the present.  We fear we will forget, and so we spend so much of our time in the past trying to remember all the events and special days with our loved one.  We believe we need to live in the memories to keep our loved one alive.  While memories are wonderful, living in the memories constantly causes us to exist only in the past and never fully live in the present. 

I have some wonderful childhood memories of my grandma, my parents, my siblings, and my extended family.  While I recall certain events, I do not remember all the details of growing up.  What I do remember is how I felt.  I felt loved and accepted into a family.  When I think of my grandma, I remember her cookies, her house, her faith, and I feel such warmth and joy that she was my grandma.  I feel her as part of my foundation of faith and love.  When I think of my mom, I feel a sense of peace and hope.  She instilled in me a trust in God and a hope.  When I think of my husband, Dave, I remember details of our life together, but those events are no longer my focus.  My emphasis in more on how he made me feel.  I felt loved and safe and secure, and I believed in love and laughter and good.  I felt challenged to grow, and I gained confidence in my abilities and who I am.

As I remember, I have come to believe it is not so much the details of our past that are so important, but how those we loved made us feel.  Our memories of how we felt when we were with them stays within us.  These feelings are integrated into who we are now.  So, when we think of our loved one, we feel within us their love and who we were with them.  It is such a part of us that we do not need to focus on the details of the events.  We just need to remember how we felt with them.  These feelings never leave us.

We also remember our sadness and grief with our loss.  We remember how we felt and the intensity of our emotions.  At first, we want to remember all the details of the death and relive it over and over again.  We stay in these feelings and the weight seems unbearable.  We feel the memories of the pain.  Existing in these feelings keep us stuck in the grief.  We remember our tears and wonder if these feelings will ever change.  It is transitioning these feelings from pain and sadness to feelings of memories of how we felt with our loved one.  These memory feelings fill us with a sense of meaning that our loved one gave to our lives. 

Allow yourself to feel, to remember how you felt with your loved one.  Those feelings are still within you.  You felt them in the past and you can feel them now in the present.  These feelings are your foundation and give you strength to live in the present.  The feelings will always remain a part of who you are and will give you strength to live in today and truly begin to live the life God has for you now.

Laughter In The Soul

“He will yet fill your mouth with laughter, and your lips with shouting.”  Job 8:21

I had dinner with a group of widows this past week, and the evening was filled with laughter.  They said how good it felt to laugh and not focus on the loneliness.  For a few hours, life was filled with joy and their souls overflowed with laughter.  I talked recently with a woman whose daily life is chaotic, but she shared an evening with her closest friends and laughter filled the room and her soul.  The daily life of each of these ladies had not changed, but they each had moments of joy and laughter.  I have laughed more recently with a friend and my soul feels relaxed and free.

Laughter and grief are rarely partners.  Laughter is good medicine.  It has been documented in medical studies that people who laugh daily and focus on happy moments tend to recover quicker from surgeries and illnesses.  When we laugh, our whole body feels the moment of good.  Mixing grief and laughter seem contradictory.  Joy and sorrow need to mingle together and provide balance in our daily living.  It does not mean we forget; it just means for a moment we experience life at its fullest.

When we live only in the pain and sorrow of our grief, we forget the joy of the relationship we had with our loved one.  We need to remember the laughter we shared together.  My husband, Dave, would begin to tell a story, and get tickled about the story and begin to laugh before he could share the entire story.  I would begin to laugh not at the story, but how he got tickled and laughed at himself.  It still brings a smile to me.  Our memories have so many happy moments.  The bad fads and the good remains.  We remember the difference our loved one made in our life and the impact they made to those around them.  We remember the feeling of being with them.

Laughter comes from deep within our souls.  It is a feeling of inner joy in a moment.  People have all different types of laughter.  The sounds of laughter can be loud and bold or muffled and quiet, but it still comes from deep inside our souls.  When we express the laughter, it releases the tension and anxiety and brings a sense of peace and contentment.  Laughter is a vital emotion that brings hope and healing.  When it is not a part of our grieving process, we do not give our souls a sense of relief and release from the intensity of pain and sorrow.

We are on the journey to figure out how to live and not just exist in life.  We exist in the past memories and are trying to live in the present.  What can assist this transition is to remember some of the joys of the past.  What made you laugh with your loved one?  What makes you smile when you remember?  Focus on those feelings and allow yourself to smile now as you remember.  Then find friends who are willing to laugh and cry with you at the same time.  Watch a funny movie or show.  Read an elephant joke book.  Look in the mirror and attempt a smile.  These are all moments to add to your journey.  Allow the joys of the past – those feelings to mingle with who you are today.  Find moments to laugh and give yourself permission to feel good for a moment.  Your body needs a break from the sadness. 

Laughter is a gift from God.  It reminds us not to take ourselves so seriously and to laugh at ourselves.  Laughter reminds us we are alive even in the sadness.  Laughter replenishes our soul.  Laughter expresses the inner joy of knowing God is with us on this journey.  Our loved one remains in our heart.  We are loved and released to find joy in the life we now are trying to live.  Today, laugh.  Laugh at yourself and allow the laughter to fill your soul.

Changing Focus

“Why are you looking for a living person in this place for the dead?  He is not here, he has risen from the dead.”     Matthew 24:5-6

The women cam to the tomb on that first Sunday morning after Jesus had been crucified on the cross.  Jesus was dead, and they saw his body laid into a tomb.  The women had walked with Joseph when he had laid Jesus’ body in this tomb.  They had rested the next day on the Sabbath, and now they had come to the tomb on Sunday.  They came in sorrow and grief but were told Jesus had risen from the dead.  Their focus was on death as they walked, but now their focus changed from death to life.  They were confused.  They wanted to believe in life, but their hearts were filled with sorrow and death.

In our grief, our focus is on death and loss.  Our hearts are filled with our own sorrow and pain.  We focus on the emptiness and loneliness of our lives.  Nothing is the same.  This leads us down the road of negativity and despair.  Hope and meaning are allusive.  The plans and dreams from our lives have faded.  Any happiness has been shattered and our hearts are broken.  Our focus is on the past and what we had.  Life will never be the same. 

We can choose to remain in the box of grief.  Grief will always be a part of us.  The loss never goes away.  The memories remain in our minds and hearts forever.  But grief does not need to remain the main focus of our life.  The box of grief is filled with memories, but also sometimes we focus on reviewing every event leading up to the death and the actual death itself.  We stay in the pain and intensity of the loss and continue to focus only on what life once was.  It seems impossible to exist in any other way.

When we change the focus of our lives, it does not mean we deny the grief.  We just begin to focus more on living and finding meaning and purpose in the life we now have.  It is intentionally living into life.  Sometimes grief becomes comfortable and familiar.  It is all we know since our loved one has passed.  Staying in the familiar is not what we really want but taking a step into the unknown seems impossible, too.

Where is your focus today?  Do you focus on what you no longer have and the life you wanted to continue?  Do you focus on the inability to change the reality of your life?  I have learned to focus on what I have, not on what I do not currently have.  My focus is first on being thankful.  I thank God for the foundation of my life, the relationships I have had and the difference they have made in my life and who I am.  When I focus first on being thankful, I begin to see the blessings of life.  It is not that I deny the loss and grief and pain, but it is not my first focus.

Society focuses on the negative and the problems and the brokenness of the world.  We all see it and hear it daily especially if you turn on the news.  This will feed your grief and pain.  Change your focus.  Read God’s Word first.  Give thanks for what you have and who you are.  It is not that we are denying the pain and heartache.  It is not making it your first thought and focus.  You cannot deny the loss and how your life has changed.  You cannot change what happened.  It is what it is, so how do you live into the life you now have? 

Easter is a time of hope.  Jesus died for our sins.  He was laid in a tomb, but that is not the end of the story.  Jesus is alive.  His resurrection gives us hope of eternal life with Him in Heaven, and it gives us hope for our current life.  This hope allows us to focus not only on death but on life.  Life will be different but different is not bad, it is just different.  Start changing your focus to Jesus and the hope of life He gives. I am changing my focus.  I am focusing on the good and finding moments of peace and joy.  I am focusing on what God has for me, not on what others think or expect.  My focus is Jesus and me.

Turning Toward Life

“Jesus said to her, “Mary.”  Mary turned toward Jesus and said in the Jewish language, “Rabboni.”  (This means Teacher).”     John 20:16

My garage is half full of the items the previous owner did not want.  I agreed to store them until the “Trash to Treasure” sale at the Church, but they are becoming overwhelming to me.  It is time to purge them from my home and all the items that I do not want or like and clean the garage.  It is time to start over and create my space into something different that defines me in this season of life.  I even went through my closet and asked myself on each item, “Do I like this?  Do I even wear it?  Does it make me happy?”  If not, it went into a bag to donate.  It is time to let go.

The stuff of this world can control us and keep us from taking steps into life.  It may seem overwhelming, and you have no clue where to begin.  I believe it is difficult to deal with the stuff when we do not know who we are in this chapter of life.  We do not know what we like, so how can we decide whether to keep something or donate it?  We first, need to figure out who we desire to be.  In grief, we recognize we are different.  Life has changed.  We look at life differently and therefore, look at what we possess in a new way.  We also, look at relationships differently.

In our grief, we have tried to live in the memories of the past.  We treasure possessions to keep these memories active and alive.  We sit in our husband’s favorite chair.  We smell our wife’s perfume.  We stay surrounded by our past hoping it will bring comfort to our pain and loneliness.  It takes time to grieve.  We need to remain in the place of comfort until it becomes uncomfortable.  Until we desire to live and experience more life.  How does this even seem possible?  How do we turn toward life?

I believe in our sorrow and grief it is difficult to see Jesus standing before us just like Mary Magdalene did not see Jesus.  Mary was grieving at the tomb and did not expect Jesus to be alive.  But when Jesus called her name, she turned toward Jesus and truly saw Him.  Do you see Jesus in your grief?  In your daily life?

We do not expect Jesus to walk with us on our grief journey.  All we see and feel initially is pain, sorrow, heartache, and hopelessness.  We feel that our life has ended.  This is when Jesus calls to us to turn toward Him and allow Him to comfort us and be our companion on the journey.  And like Mary, we will find life if we turn toward Jesus.

To turn toward life is to find a new purpose and meaning to your life.  It is finding who you are and that life does move forward.  It is believing that God is still good, and God still loves you and wants you to live.  It will not be the life you thought it was going to be, but it will be a life in which Jesus is present.  Turning toward life is an intentional decision.  It is choosing to live not exist, to hope and to believe that a new chapter of life is possible.

Turning toward life involves a release of the life we had when we felt whole and complete.  It is a closure to making any more memories in that chapter of life.  It is embracing that love and life as our foundation on which we can now develop a different life.  It is turning to Jesus and allowing Jesus to walk us through into this next chapter of life.  Turn toward life and begin living in moments.  Live in the present.

Trust In The Darkness

“Trust the Lord with all your heart, and don’t depend on your own understanding.”  Proverbs 3:5

I walked into my office without turning on the light.  I trusted that I remembered where everything was, and I would not trip over anything before reaching the lamp.  I was in the dark only a short time before turning on the lamp.  Darkness.  We experience the darkness in the evenings when the sun goes down.  We experience darkness when the electricity goes out.  We need darkness to see the stars and the moon.  In all these, we trust and believe light will come – the electricity will be restored, and the sun will come up again in the morning.

Trust is a firm belief, an acceptance, a confidence and a certainly.  Trust is earned but can also be destroyed in a relationship.  The moment you know you trust someone is a moment of certainty.  To trust is to take a risk and accept what we believe is actually true.  I have trusted people in my life.  Sometimes they were not who I thought they were or they did something that broke my trust and belief in them.  Then there have been people in my life I have trusted completely from the moment I met them or remember them coming into my life and they never broke this trust.

When grief enters our world, it feels like trust is destroyed.  We trusted that our loved one would always be with us.  We trusted God to take care of our loved one.  We trusted that life would be good and fair, and that love would be forever.  But darkness came and took away our trust.  With this darkness came an empty, lonely, and overwhelming feeling.  It seems that grief becomes more intense when the sun goes down and the darkness of the evening surrounds us.  This may have been the time we spent each day with our loved one enjoying the evening together, and now we are all alone.  We can allow the darkness to consume us, or we can trust God in this darkness.

In these evenings over the years is when I have reached out in the darkness and trusted that God was with me.  It was in these quiet and lonely moments that I gave myself permission to grieve – to cry, to get angry, to yell, to curl up in a fetal position and sob, and to just be still and numb.  We need the darkness that grief brings to express these deep feelings and emotions that we hide from the light of day.  This is a place we try to avoid but is needed in the grieving process – to actually release what we build up inside of us.  It is trusting that God hears our hearts in the darkness and cares.  In these dark evenings, it is spending time drawing closer to God.  It is taking Jesus’ hand and just being in His presence.  Words are not needed.  Jesus listens to our hearts.  Just trust that God is with you in the darkness of the evening and the darkness of your soul.

Do you trust yourself?  In grief, I realized my decision-making was not as sharp and clear at times.  My mind was cloudy and sometimes I made decisions without thinking through every aspect of the choice.  When I depend only on my own understanding, I do not make the best decisions.  Proverbs states that we need to “trust in the Lord with all our heart.”  In our grief and steps toward life, we want to trust God but are not always sure God is there.  We feel the darkness surrounds us, but we want to trust that God is somewhere in the darkness of our days.  It is trusting God in the darkness of our souls even when nothing feels right.  It is trusting even when we do not believe until we believe.

God has been faithful.  God is faithful.  God will always be faithful.  I am learning to trust.  I need to trust just for today.  Just in this moment.

Checking Off Grief

“Crying may last for a night, but joy comes in the morning.”   Psalm 30:5

I write a “Things To Do” list most days.  It always feels good to cross something off my list especially things I will not need to do again.  I feel a sense of accomplishment and my day has purpose when I mark things off the list.  Some of the “things to do” are routine like “do laundry” but other things like “write the talk for my Lenten Lunch Speech” are just a onetime event.

In grief, we wish a checklist could be followed.  We could go through an emotion or feeling and be done with it and never revisit it again.  We could mark it off the list and feel our day was productive and we were moving forward.  There never seems to be a completion to the grief and the emotions surrounding it.

I have been pondering my own grief especially my journey over the past seven years.  The loneliness and intense sadness were overwhelming in the first part of my grief.  I kept busy with work but felt empty because I did not have my person who made life fulfilling and complete.  The grief for my mom was more intense because I did not have her for support.  I had to figure out who I was now.  Relationships felt empty.  Then I tried something that did not bring fulfillment.  I felt like I checked that off my list.  I tried, and it was not what I wanted or needed so it never needed to be on the list again.

While we would like to check off grief and all the emotions and feelings that come with it, and not have to walk through it again, that is not how grief works.  We grieve each relationship and who we were in that relationship.  We experience different emotions at different steps on the journey.  Sometimes, those feelings come back and we revisit them over and over again, and sometimes we work through them.  We may come to an acceptance of the reality of life.  We cannot rush through nor deny the grief, but also do not need to stay stuck in the grief.

If we begin to use the checklist as a marker for growth and taking steps of living, we sometimes feel we are leaving behind our loved one.  That is why we stay in the past memories and grief.  It is familiar and comfortable remembering but it is also empty and unfulfilling.  We do not accomplish anything but exist in the pain and heartache.  We will always remember and tell the stories.  We are who we are because we walked the journey of life with our loved one.  They are part of the foundation of our life.  We lived because of them and can live because of them now.

I have begun to see our grief list not so much as completion of the past, but as things to attempt and try on this journey of life we now have.  It is not so much a bucket list, but a living not existing list.  How can I live today?  What can I do to live in a moment today where pain and loss are not central?  It is recognizing who you are in other relationships.  I recognized I was still an Aunt, still a sister, still a cousin, still a friend, still a counselor.  While I am different because of loss, and I interact differently, I still have these relationships.  So my checklist became how can I live in these relationships?

God has walked with us in the deep grief and crying, and God knows we will have moments of these emotions throughout our lives.  God also gives to us joy.  Joy does not mean everything in life is now perfect and good.  Joy is an inner peace and contentment in the midst of the trials and troubles of life.  Joy is our reliance on God to bring good out of the bad and to find moments of joy in the pain and sorrow.

Signpost To Heaven

“And when I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”  John 14:3

This past week, my dear 98-year-old friend, Ray, took the journey home to Heaven.  Ray has been my dear friend for over 30 years.  Ray was in a share group with my husband, Dave for many years.  I first met Ray through the Emmaus Walk and one of the churches I served.  Ray was a gentle man and a gentleman.  He lived his faith in how he treated others and how he responded to the trials of life.  After my husband, Dave, died and Ray’s wife, Dottie died, Ray and I had a bond of grief and faith.  Though Ray was my elder, he looked to me for guidance on the grief journey.

Ray was a storyteller.  His experiences of life were vast and made an impact on his direction in life.  Ray talked often about the signposts of his life.  He regarded the people who had given him guidance and direction along the path of life as signposts.  A signpost tells us where we are and how far it is to the next location.  Ray recognized that relationships with others was the key to life.  What path you took, depended on who you followed and who you listened to on the journey.  Ray found people who guided him along the path of life and enhanced his life.

Ray and I had a mutual respect for one another.  I have always respected my elders and learned from their stories, experiences, and wisdom.  But because I had walked the journey of grief with the loss of my husband, Ray turned to me for support.  And in these past months, Ray and I spent many hours talking about Heaven and what that journey would be like for him.  We talked about many of the people who had strengthened his faith and been a signpost of growth for him.  We talked about those who are now in Heaven waiting for him.

As I walked the path of dying with Ray, even in his strong faith and belief in Jesus, anxiousness occurred.  We believe and trust, but we do not know exactly how the transition from this world to heaven occurs.  God has blessed me with an understanding of the spiritual dying process and the ability to comfort others.  In Ray’s words, God uses me as a signpost to guide others to Heaven.  Jesus prepares the place – Heaven - and comes to take us home.  We need a guide to direct us to Jesus.  Ray wondered who Jesus would bring to be a signpost of guidance to Heaven.  My response to Ray was that I hoped it would be my husband, Dave, who would come with Jesus.  Ray smiled at that possibility.

As we reflect on our loved one’s transition to Heaven, we wonder what they saw and who guided them on this path.  I believe Jesus took their hand as they breathed their last breath on earth and took their first breath in Heaven.  And as your loved one like Ray, entered Heaven, they heard the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant.  Enter into the joy of your Master.”  After they were hugged by Jesus and worshipped him, I believe they saw the people who had been signposts for their lives – those who had guided them along the path of life that led to Heaven.

Ray has been and will always be a signpost for my life.  His positive attitude toward life and never focusing on the negative, has helped me to change my focus.  His love and belief in me and God’s calling on my life has encouraged me to be bold in God’s strength.  He has reminded me that the most important part of life is relationships – our relationship with God and with one another.  I will always treasure my friendship with Ray.  His love will live in my heart forever and become part of my foundation for living.  Ray challenges me to be a signpost for others and guide them on this journey of life.

Grief Releasing to Life

“The Lord sent me to comfort those whose hearts are broken, to tell the captives they are free, and to tell the prisoners they are released.”  Isaiah 61:1

I visited the wildlife reserve center in Punta Gorda last year.  The facility has birds of all types that have been injured and nursed back to health.  Sometimes the birds are released back into their natural habitat while others never fully recover enough to be released.  Some injuries like a missing leg or a damaged wing are beyond repair and prevent the birds from surviving in nature.  They need to remain in the safety of the wildlife center where they are given tender care the rest of their lives. 

I have been pondering the word “release.”  To be released means to allow or enable to escape from confinement, to be set free.  In grief, we feel the burden and confinement of our feelings and emotions due to loss.  The loneliness and emptiness of our lives confines us – keeps us stuck.  We feel like we are just going through the motions of the dailyness of life and attempt to find a routine in it.  It is something and the basic tasks of life get accomplished most of the time.

We fear taking steps forward.  We are afraid we will leave the memories and love of our loved one behind.  The grief has been consuming, but we just do not want to keep reliving the pain and heartache.  We know we will never forget our loved one, but we would like the grief to be over.  We are not sure how to live, but we know existing in the grief continuously is overwhelming.

As we attempt to keep close to God on this journey, we know God will not bring back our loved one.  We accept that they have been released from the suffering and pain of this world.  They are free of the burdens of earth and now dwell in the peace of Heaven.  When we release our loved one to Heaven, it takes time to release living constantly in the past and the grief.  We want to remember.  We always will remember them because they are a part of who we are.

On this journey, we release ourselves to live.  We desire not to dwell in the intensity of grief.  This is just existing in the past.  God wants to free us from the guilt, pain and sorrow of the past.  This release is a freedom to live again and maybe love again.  The release is to be set free from the confinement of existing.  It is actually living in the present.  Living in the moments of each day.  It is attempting to find who you are now.

It is also a release of the guilt feelings that occur in our grief.  The guilt that we get to live and begin a new life and our loved one died.  We forget that our loved one is living a new life in Heaven.  Therefore, if they are living, we need to live too.  Guilt sneaks into our hearts too when we try taking steps into living and into relationships.  It whispers, “You will forget your loved one if you take this step.”  Tell guilt it is a liar.  Your loved one is part of your foundation that holds you up.  The relationship is complete on earth and therefore, we can build our lives on the foundation and legacy of that relationship.  It does not hold us back but gives us a firm footing to take steps into life.

Grief can become a prison.  Like the injured birds, we stay in the familiarity of grief.  The pain and sorrow have become our way of life.  The desire to be set free is in tension with the pull to remain in the grief.  This tension keeps us from being released. Our release comes through the Spirit that dwells in us.  God takes us by the hand each step and many times brings others to comfort us.  God works through other people to see hope and life.  Living and finding meaning and purpose in what you now have is the hope of the journey.  This hope begins to emerge as we release the grief and step into the path of living.

Stepping Into Life

“Don’t be afraid because I have saved you. I have called you by name, and you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you…when you walk through fire, you will not be burned…” Isaiah 43:1-2

During my college years, I was learning skills to be an adult and function on my own and making my own decisions.  But when I went home for a weekend or a break, I reverted to my childhood ways with my parents.  To them, I was still their little girl, and I allowed my past to be my present.  At first, I resisted and wanted to tell them all I was learning and how independent I was becoming, but they just wanted me to be who they assumed I had always been.  As I matured, I learned to step back into their world, and then back into mine.  Throughout the life of my parents, I stepped in and out of that life.  Eventually I learned to just be me in both places.

In our grief, we tend to live at first in the past.  We desire our old life back and live in how life used to be.  We are afraid to begin to heal and not live in the intense grief.  We connect grief to our loved one.  If we are not grieving, we think we are forgetting our loved one.  So, we focus on the pictures, the cemetery, the possessions, and not wanting to change anything out of fear of losing our loved one again.  It feels more comfortable to step back and stay stuck in the memories of how life was with our loved one.

We go back to who we were in the past.  We step back in what was familiar.  So, we exist in the grief.  It is all we know.  We even trick our mind into believing life is the same, but in reality, life has dramatically changed.  We are different too.  We know it but have no clue how to take a step into a new and different life.  Just one step seems impossible alone.

When we step into the past but try to live in the present, we are overwhelmed with the intensity of the pull of grief and living.  It feels like if we stay only in the past memories and feelings and focus on our loved one, it will sustain us and give purpose to our lives.  It does for a while.  The love and memories are wonderful.  We reflect on how good life was with our loved one.  Then a yearning begins in our souls for more – more meaning, more purpose to life.  Because just living in the past and the grief creates an emptiness in our souls.  We just exist and go through the motions of life.  We have changed and the past self no longer exists.  We are existing in an empty shell of ourselves.  For when we step back into the past, we are unable to step back into our old selves.  That person no longer exists.  Grief has created a new person – a person no longer content to live completely in the memories of the past.

I have been observing a friend navigate stepping from the past into the present.  It has been a recognition of the completion of a relationship that influenced and help make the person into who he currently is.  But the relationship is complete – no adding to it.  The love will always remain.  Love never dies.  The love becomes a part of you not necessarily distinguishable as individual persons.  You give thanks for the love and the memories are stored forever within you.  But the past cannot be restored.  It is no longer giving life.   It begins to create an emptiness and unfulfillment.

You have passed through the water and fire of the past.  It has shaped you and defined you and left scars, but it can no longer give you life. God tells us in the book of Isaiah, He has saved us, and we are His.  He has brought us through the trials of life and calls us to step forward into life.  Grief will be a part of our lives while we are here on earth.  Grief though can mix with life.  Grief alone is existence.  Grief and steps forward is living.  We do not walk this journey alone.  God promises to walk beside us and take our hand.  No step is easy.  But each step forward is trying to navigate life and find meaning and purpose in this different life.  Take a step.

The Commotion of My Soul

“My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.”    Mark 14:33

Commotion – “a state of confused and noisy disturbance.”  This describes the journey of our grief.  We feel confused, cloudy, numb, unable to focus and unsure of the next steps.  So many people – most well-meaning – give us advice, guidance and try to make us feel better.  Sometimes it just feels overwhelming.  It is a constant noise without meaning and purpose.  Our normal, content lives have been forever disturbed by loss.  Nothing is the same.  Never normal again.

Then as the days pass on, you feel something deep down inside you that says, “You need to live – not just go through the motions of life.”  You have tried to rely on God in the deep hole of your grief.  Your soul has been empty, but you have been clinging to the hope that even in the emptiness, God has been and continues to be in you and with you.  Your soul, that deep inward part of who you are, has been attempting to develop and grow again.

The conflict of not wanting to forget and seeing a way forward brings feelings of guilt that you are leaving behind your loved one and still knowing deep inside you there could be life again.  The longing in your soul creates a commotion of confusion.   It disturbs the grief and the shrine you have made to your loved one.  A different life feels like a letting go and forgetting though you know you will never forget.  So, the commotion inside continues.  It feels like you are fighting with yourself to find a peace and purpose to life.

Some of you may still have anger or resentment toward God.  God is a God of miracles and power.  God could have healed or prevented the tragedy.  The One who did not give us what we wanted is also the One who will walk with us through it all and never leave us alone.  God is deep down in our soul in the commotion wanting us to release the misery and intense pain of our stuckness to Him.  God is not asking us to forget the grief or our loved one.  God just wants us to close the door on existing in the misery.   God wants us to turn toward living.

This is where the commotion – the confusion is most intense.  We see the desire and hope to live but have no clue how to take steps toward a different life.  We see the need, but the emptiness and aloneness are so overwhelming.  Where do we even begin?

We begin with Jesus.  As he prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane before his crucifixion, his soul was overwhelmed with sorrow.  The commotion in His soul was to do God’s will but the human desire was to be delivered from the pain.  Jesus walked through the pain and suffering knowing His Father was with Him.  He fulfilled His purpose.  And after His resurrection, Jesus’ first word spoken was “Peace.”  Jesus found peace in the commotion of His soul by surrendering to His Father.

We long for peace in the turmoil of grief.  Peace does not come from any external source.  It only comes from within our soul as we wrestle with the commotion.  A soul that is grounded in Jesus not in the situation around us can find peace.  We may find peace that our loved one is no longer suffering and is healed in Heaven with Jesus.  But we never resolve that life, our life, has peace without our special person physically present.  This is where the commotion of the soul begins to resolve the confusion and disturbance.  Our loved one has completed their life on earth.  The chapter is closed on making any more memories.  They made a difference, and their love is what continues.  That love is in our soul, and it mixes with who we now are to create the one we become.  The love is part of our foundation.  It is not separate, but all mixed within the foundation. 

We need to cultivate that love and mix it with who we are becoming and create something new.  Life and relationships will be different.  They need to be.  Give your soul – the core of your being – permission to live again.  Your foundation for the new life is those you have loved.  All that love is mixed together.  It does not look the same and neither do you.  You cannot separate it either.  The commotion will one day settle into a peace.  A peace that says, “I like who I am now and my soul is at rest beside God who walks with me.”

Loving Together Separately

“nothing above us, nothing below us, nor anything in the whole world will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”   Romans 8:39

The past week has been a focus on love.  The week began with the Hallmark holiday of Valentine's Day.  I witnessed little pre-school children with their Valentines boxes.  That is my first memory of the day – the creation of the special box to sit on your desk in school.  Classmates would put cards in the box and hope someone would add a piece of candy and write something other than their name.  It has never been a holiday I celebrated in my head or heart.  This year I tore up carpet in my bathroom for my remodeling project – a total avoidance of the day.  Sometimes in our grief, the healthiest way is to avoid and not go down the path of heartache and pain in some situations.

This past week would have been my parents’ seventy-fifth wedding anniversary, and they celebrated it in Heaven.  My own hope of celebration was dissolved months ago.  This past week my oldest brother got married.  Both he and his bride had lost a spouse, and now they found each other and have loved again.  To see my brother happy and enjoying life again brought me peace and joy.  Even in sorrow, love endures.

I also officiated at a wedding this past week for a beautiful young lady who had been in my youth group.  It was an amazing wedding filled with love.  The couple was surrounded by the love of their parents, family, and friends.  They wrote their own vows and in the bride’s vows she said, “I vow to be the person you can lean on when life is hard.”  This couple understands that life will have difficulties, but they promise to be support to one another – to stand together as they face the world.

In our grief, we recognize the gift of love – the unconditional, self-sacrificing, willing to be there for you love.  Some of us experienced it, and others long for someone to care that deeply.  The hurt is that we had our person to lean on when life was hard and now that life is hard and painful and filled with uncertainty, we cannot lean into life with our person.  We will always love them.  Love never ends, but the physical separation overwhelms us at times.

When a couple promises to love forever, there comes a time when physical distance seems to break this bond of love.  But when this separation occurs, we each love separately, but we still love.  When we lose a spouse, a child, parent, friend, extended family member, the love we have endures forever, but a separation has occurred.  We have the desire to feel and touch and experience the love again. 

God promises that nothing separates us from His love – not even death.  God’s love extends across all boundaries and has no limitations.  In Heaven, our loved ones are surrounded by God’s eternal love.  They are loved and nothing separates them from the all-consuming love and power of God.  We have the love of God in our hearts, and trust God is with us in all of life.  Our loved ones and we, ourselves, are loved by the same God with the same love.  The love is the same, we just love together separately.

Rushing The Process

“I waited patiently for the Lord.  He turned to me and heard my cry.”  Psalm 40:1

After the recent winter storm that dumped ice and snow on a huge part of the region, I have heard the statement, “I am done with winter.”  Many have posted on their Facebook page how many days until Spring.  When it is Spring, people will be tired of the rain and want Summer.  Then the countdown to Christmas.  We never seem to be content in our present season or situation.

Even in doing a project, we jump ahead without completing the necessary steps and must go back and follow the procedure to finish the task   I was told by my dad to slow down and wait many times.  I was getting ahead of myself.  I tend to anticipate what comes next and want to be prepared.   

I have been updating my condo.  The major projects like painting are complete.  The flooring is in process. My desire to have it all done has been slowed due to outside circumstances.  My past thought pattern was to hurry and complete everything in the shortest time possible.  I am trying to put more thought in the process and in the decisions – not just fill the condo because there is an empty space.  I am attempting to enjoy the pondering and waiting for inspiration.

I have always been a person who thinks ahead and am already in the next task in my head before I finish what is in front of me.  I am trying to change this thought pattern by telling myself, “Finish this current task completely before going to the next one.  One and done.”

But there are tasks in life like laundry, dishes and cleaning that once completed, I know I will need to do them again soon.  I have been learning to just focus on completing it today.  I cannot rush and complete it for the future.  That is impossible.

In grief, we desire to rush through the process.  Grief is more like laundry and dishes.  You go through some of the same feelings over and over.  The issue is we do not allow ourselves to complete the feeling and accept that it is OK to feel this way.  It just hurts too much.  Therefore, we need to give ourselves permission to feel the emotion in the moment.  It will come back another time – that is the process of grief.  Each time it comes back we can go a little further with the feelings.  Stop when reality becomes too much.  Just like we need to stop when tasks and chores are too overwhelming, or we are too tired and come back to it at a later time.

We would like to rush through the process and not have to feel all this pain, hurt and intensity.  We think it will get better and life will return to some type of normalcy.  We want to come to a time where we do not have all these overwhelming feelings.  We really just want our old life back.  We want to rewind the clock and live the life we once enjoyed.

Our minds feel jumbled and lack focus.  It is even hard to figure out what needs to be done, let alone complete the task.  In my grief, I have learned to ask God, “What do I need to do next? What is really important?  What can wait?”  You cannot rush the grieving process.  So let us slow down.  Feel what we feel.  Distract and escape for periods when it gets too intense.  But come back to it, and slowly take the steps to feel and heal.

In grief, waiting and being patient are important ingredients.  As we slow down, God hears our crying and feels our tears as they drop from our eyes.  Slowing the grief process is not what we desire. It is hard, painful, and emotional.  It is not where we want to stay, but it is the journey we need to go through in our own time.  God will take our hand and walk us through. 

Understanding My Tears

“I am tired of crying to you.  Every night my bed is wet with tears; my bed is soaked from my crying.”   Psalm 6:6

Just the other day, I was thinking about buying some house plants for my condo and thought I needed to check with my mom about what was best, and then it hit me, wait, she is in Heaven.  Even after all these years, my first thought on so many things is to call my mom.  A friend from the Highway Patrol called me last week and my first thought after I hung up was to share it with Dave, but he is in Heaven.

Then life happened.  I was frustrated.  Something made me sad.  I felt broken and the only people I wanted to share my hurt with were in Heaven.  As I talked with a recent widow and heard her brokenness and pain, I remembered feeling this intense hurt and the only one who could help me was the one I was grieving.  This is truly the definition of grief.  We are grieving the one we love more than anyone else and that person is the only one who we want to give us comfort and help through the pain.  When we realize this, that is when the intensity of the loss overwhelms us.  Nobody else can give to us the comfort we desire.  Our tears flow as we face this reality of grief.  The one who completes us and gives meaning to life and purpose to living is the one who brings these deep emotions because they are gone.  They are in Heaven.

A photo from eight years ago just appeared on my Facebook memories.  I am usually prepared for pictures of Dave and my parents knowing they will be filled with memories and emotions.  But this was a photo of my dog, Annie destroying a toy.  What brought me to tears and sadness was the carpet.  Now that sounds ridiculous even as I write this, but those who grieve will understand.  The carpet was in the house Dave and I purchased together.  It represented our life, our foundation, and the familiarity.  The triggers in grief catch us off guard.  We expect the big events and dates, but not carpet.

Finding an unexpected voice mail of his voice breaks open the well of tears.  Hanging the quilt of his neckties catches your breath and floods your mind of pictures of him wearing each tie.  The anniversary of her funeral service and reading through the words of her service makes your eyes moist.  Listening to his favorite song and remembering how he smiled and hugged you when he heard it, quiets your soul to cry within.  And the list goes on and on of the tears that come on the journey of grief.

Tears are necessary to cleanse our souls.  They come in waves.  They come often at times or for some, seldom.  They are outward sometimes, but mainly the tears flow within our hearts.  We tend to keep them hidden from others, trusting only a few to see them, but sometimes it is impossible to control the valve of emotion that pours from our eyes.

We do not understand our own tears.  We wonder what triggers the waterfalls and why we do not cry at some of the more intense memories.  Other people do not seem to understand why we are still shedding tears after all this time.

I believe tears flow inward and outward and define the emotions of grief.  Tears express what we cannot put into words.  They break forth when we have tried to keep the emotions bottled up inside of us.  Something needs to be released, so the tears begin.  God gave us tears for a reason.  He knew we would experience pain and heartache in this broken world.  He gave us a way to express the hurt.  God understands our tears.

The Isaacs sing the song – “He Understands Our Tears.”  The chorus states –

“He understands when all I do is cry

He feels the hurt that no one can see down inside.

And when the words get in the way

I know He still hears

For He understands my tears.

The words get in the way when we try to explain the feelings inside.  God understands our tears.  He accepts them and feels the hurt that is deep inside.  God understands when no one else on earth does.  The one who would understand is with God now in Heaven.  So as God feels our pain, our loved one is beside Jesus who receives our tears.