These past 2 months have been dogged by death. We have sorrowed and mourned the passing of dear loved ones...
A nephew.
A brother.
A cousin.
A friend.
The sorrowing has been a dark trial and the walk has been hard. Each death buried us a little deeper in pain.
To be sure, grief has worn tracks on our heart this summer.
Their smiles shine from the pictures and leave us wanting more time with each one. The love and friendship will not be replaced this side of heaven. And that is something we mourn each day.
There is no easy way to walk this road. We will grieve and miss them the rest of our days.
We have found ourselves quieting in this season. The loss feels too great. Words can't touch the heartache.
And so, we rest on the only truth we know. That God walks with us. He catches our tears and holds us in our sorrow. We do not grieve as those with no hope. And that will be the light for our path when the way is dark.
Our great grief bears witness to a great love. God knows our heart.
Remembering and Honoring these cherished men tonight.
We call today Good Friday. A day where the sun's light failed in grief.
Good Fridays are the darkest days of our faith journey...
It's a time to remember that:
- Grapes must be crushed to make wine. - Diamonds form under pressure. - Olives are pressed to release oil. - Seeds grow in darkness.
So, whenever you feel Crushed, Under Pressure, Pressed or in Darkness...
You're in a powerful place of transformation.
Hold on to that hope, dear one, this pain will not last forever. One day soon, His Glory will shine, and the darkness will give way to a glorious Light led by Love!
She left us a gift in her living... a road map of sorts as we all face our own chaos... in this fiercest of battles, she refused to be defined by cancer, rather she let family and love be the ultimate reward.
In 2007 she shared her thoughts with Sandra Hughes:
"The truth is sometimes you do things because you have to do them. I am sick, but I also have responsibilities. I have a family, I have work, I have to do those things. As much as I was extremely worried by being sick, I also wanted to participate in the rest of my life that I am very attached to."
The tributes have poured in... she was loved by many. In her line of work, words are currency. And these words speak to the life she lived and the people she touched.
We are richer for the life she lived.
When words escape us... may love speak the cries of our heart.
Good Friday... a day so filled with grief that the sun's light failed. Christ hung on a cross meant for me...
"... and darkness came over the whole land until three, because the sun's light failed." Luke 23:44
The dark, all-consuming. A grief that swallows hope.
And until I lost mom, that grief was always fleeting, transient, something to ponder on days like Good Friday.
But walking out our monumental grief had a way of making the sorrow personal. Painful. Real. Perhaps you know that kind of darkness, where the sun's light fails you.
I saw a recent post by Rachel Lewis: She knows grief. She's walked through the despair and anger and darkness too. She captures the feelings of Good Friday from the depths of that darkness and the heart-rending bereavement felt by God the Father... a Father who understands our grief better than we ever knew.
"While it was the Son who died, it was the Father who looked on, no doubt wishing he could change places with his Son.
While the Son felt every physical pain, the Father felt the deepest pain of separation and loss—a feeling he, no doubt, had never experienced to that extent before. Especially when he turned away.
“What keeps me coming back is that God understands my pain.”
While the Son rose after three days, the Father took on the role of a bereaved parent and will forever know what it feels like to lose a child.
While Good Friday used to only point me to the Son, the beautiful sacrifice so we could know the Father—I now look at Good Friday as the day the Father made the even greater sacrifice—letting go of his one and only Son.
On this Good Friday, I remember not only the death of the Son but the bereavement of the Father. Not only did the Son share in our weakness, but the Father shared in our grief.
There is still so much I don’t understand about God or faith. When my friends suffer devastating loss, when senseless tragedies occur, my heart always questions why God allows such pain to exist in the world.
What keeps me coming back is that God understands my pain.
And on my darkest days—the days when I can’t see hope, or light, or goodness—I can go to him and tell him about all I’m feeling. And he knows. Because he’s been there too.
He sits in my brokenness with me, as only another bereaved parent can."
A friend's cancer diagnosis would be bad... yours would be worse.
And finding out it's pancreatic cancer might top the list. We have been there. Those moments, the dark days, are forever etched in our minds and hearts. A legacy we would never have chosen...
Bad news. It might be a financial disaster, a messy divorce, a devastating diagnosis, a lost child... it's the news that shutters a heart... It can color your days and stall your steps.
But what if it doesn't have to? What if there's a way to live life best even in the midst of the bad?
He has been handed some bad news in his life.
In 2008, Neil's world fell apart, as he spiraled from a sudden divorce to the unexpected death of a close friend.
Dark colored his days and nights.
He found a way to turn his gaze from the grief he was experiencing to the joys, however small, he encountered in each day.
Out of his intentionality a movement of sorts was born. Neil began recording his experience at 1000 Awesome Things... finding joy and hope in sweet moments, such as
snow days
sleeping in new bedsheets
roasting the perfect marshmallow
hanging your hand out the window of a car
the smell of rain on a hot sidewalk
... for 1,000 days, Neil jotted down 1 awesome thing every day, no matter how big or small... as a way to jog the heart into seeing the good, the sweet and the hope even in the midst of the bad.
In 2010, Neil gave his first TED talk. It's only 17 minutes long, but it sure struck a chord for me. Perhaps you might find the hope in his story too...
The 3 A's of Awesome... A new way to approach living life well with intentionality.
If you're here, my guess is that you've had bad news at some point. You're looking for hope, for life, for joy... for a way out of the dark.
Neil offers a little encouragement as we travel these sometimes dark and stormy roads.
Change how you think... Determine to see the small pleasures in life... Choose to find the blessing intentionally...
Isn't it ironic that dad's memorial would fall the week of mom's passing? If the grief weren't so deep, we would find that aptly fitting. Dad has missed mom with an intensity that has never lessened with time.
We have all felt the grief come in waves this past week. Dad's memorial service was on Monday and the anniversary of Mom's passing fell on Wednesday... We have journeyed the valley one faltering step at a time.
I believe that only God can sustain a body when the sadness would crush a soul.
Dad's service was small, a private gathering of his loved ones, family and friends that cherished and loved him so.
We shared stories, we sang his favorite hymns...there were tears and there was laughter... a promise of grace for the days ahead.
Family came from near and far. A reminder of all the good there is along the valley road. They cheered us, loved us, cried with us, and held us as we stepped into the unfamiliar, new normal of life without dad.
Then Wednesday morning found me walking back through the doors of the columbarium, alone, bearing the yellow rose that dad always brought on the anniversary of mom's passing...
Only this time, the chair he sat in was empty...
The memorial service was finished, the family lunch served, sympathy cards read and the friends and family gone... the suddenness of being alone on this day, missing dad and feeling the weight of these 8 years since I heard mom's voice and leaned in to her hug... the tears fell unheeded and the grieving tore my heart as I sat in the chair that had always been reserved for dad.
Now it was my turn to sit and mourn. And remember. To reflect and grieve. And simply miss their very presence like crazy. The tears would not be stopped...
And perhaps that is exactly what I needed. A time to stop, and breathe deep, let the tears soak through, allowing the sadness and grief to just be. For missing mom and dad is and will be my new normal. And so are the tears...
"There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness,
but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition and of unspeakable love." ~ Washington Irving
Blessed with an unspeakable love this night,
Graced to grieve and hope and remember on this valley road... For that is part of my new normal as well.
Sometimes the words just won't come... We lost Dad a week ago, and still I cannot find ways to express the grief and the ache.
We have gathered together, held each other tight, and mourned... there is a void that will never be filled here this side of heaven.
And we have pulled out the old photos. Spent time pouring over the captured moments. Laughing over old hairstyles and ancient memories. Pictures of a life lived well. Of Work and Sacrifice. Laughter and Tears. Of Family. Of Grace... And most of all, pictures of an Abundant and Unmerited Love. We have been so very, very Blessed...
His health has declined, the COPD has worsened, the heart has weakened. We have rallied around him, time and time again.
My brothers and I have worried, we have prayed, oh, how we have prayed, we have struggled, we have cried...
More and more the work of helping dad has fallen on me. His doctor visits, his weekly infusions, his errands... settling him in to the Assisted Living Center... listening to his frustrations...over and over again...
And the truth is... Dad is getting weaker, and more critical and more difficult to deal with week to week. He rails at the changes that fate (and pancreatic cancer) have brought to his life. Losing mom is a hurt that we can't heal...
We have learned that Pancreatic Cancer doesn't just affect the patient... the collateral damage we've all experienced has been brutal.
So many times we have whispered into the darkness, if only mom were still here.
If only she had been spared, she would be here loving him, caring for him... and he would be so content... the broken heart a grief he would never experience.
But we are now the caretakers and he is far from content.
Collateral Damage. We are walking through the minefield of a pancreatic cancer diagnosis and the aftermath of its vicious assault.
I love him utterly and my soul weeps over the changes we are all facing... the words fail me.
This weekend past we traveled north to visit family and while channel surfing the radio as the miles sped by, a song crackled to life that ministered truth... and amazingly it was a country music station... go figure!
Thank you Dierks Bentley... you may never have imagined your romantic ballad could speak to our hurting hearts and encourage this daughter to stay the course...
It's a long trip alone...
No one should ever have to travel this journey alone. Lyrics that turn the bitter to sweet...
So maybe you could walk with me awhile,
Maybe I could rest beneath your smile.
Everybody stumbles sometimes and needs a hand to hold,
'Cause it's a long trip alone."
Pancreatic cancer can leave scars, can tear the heart, but it can never sever the love.
I hear the echo of scripture for this journey...
"For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow;
but woe to him that is alone when he falleth,
and who hath not another to lift him up!"
~ Eclesiastes 4:10
Maybe we could walk together for awhile and lift each other up...
Resting beneath your smile
and reaching out a hand to hold as we travel this road.
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