Waiting. And more waiting. And trying to dodge the negative images that attempt to have their way in my mind. Waiting in a home far too quiet and empty of teenage-boyhood magnifies the waves of fear that wash over me. I so realize today that I am still very much in the first stage of grief here. Having taught death/dying/grief for over 30 years, I have a fair intellectual knowledge of the process. But when you are thrust inside of it, any perspective about it is gone. This first stage of numbness and shock is still very alive. I have cried a pond full of tears, with a seemingly endless amount in storage ready to burst forth at any moment.
I long for a sense of peace again, even if it means peace about the worst report. I need to grab hold of the faith that I know I have inside of me and FEEL it. But I know that that does not appear easily to most people in these first days, and it is true for me.
Tomorrow we will hear test results.
In the 1950's, I believe, there were several well-known missionaries killed in Africa, one of them being Jim Eliot, another Nate Saint. Nate's son Steve not only survived his father's death, but later, the very sudden and tragic death of his teenage daughter. His words about his daughter's death are haunting me today. It is the place I need to get to....the emotional place that I seek to embrace.
If God is all powerful and all knowing, none of this is happening without His knowledge and permission. This had to tbe the part of the story God was writing with our lives. It was an excruciating chapter in our story, but I suddenly found I believed that this terrible trauma would eventaully and mysteriously prove to be a cornerstone of God's plan for our lives. If I asked God to change things and He gave in to me, how would my change alter the rest of the plan? I did not want to ask God for what I desperately wanted in the short run, only to find it had cost us what God wanted for us in the long run........and ask Him to give us the courage to accept it until we see why He wanted it this way.
I am praying tonight that I can accept with grace what God wants for my life in the long run, no matter how painful that may be.
2 comments:
You will accept it with grace. I am sure of it.
Not having peace is the worst thing of all. With God beside you and peace in your heart all is well, no matter the storm outside.
I've been thinking of that old hymn, "It is well with my soul." The man who wrote it had just lost his wife and 3 small daughters in a drowning accident...and he was watching the waves as he was travelling back across the ocean to bury his family. And even in the midst of that He could say, "It is well."
You will get there, you will see it, you will say it.
Love you.
I'm so sorry to hear of this news, it's terrible at best. I can tell you without knowing you...the peace will come. I was 18 when my Mom moved to a place beyond the pain, the place we all long to go 'someday'...Heaven. Although days were hard for each of us, I watched God give her peace long before He called her home.
I think in the beginning it is hard to even grasp the concept of the news you've been given. I have and will continue to be praying for your peace.
(Rach's friend, just so you don't have to wonder who on earth I am. =))
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