He Uses It All

It's been eight years today since the Lord took her home. This year the sadness didn't build and crash like a tidal wave.  It is present and under the surface, but my walk with the Lord over the last eight years has grown an acceptance of her loss like moss on a stone. The acceptance helps take the edge off the sharp edges of grief. Instead of a tidal wave, this week is a strong surf week--manageable. 

Part of me doesn't appreciate this new found softness. It still feels wrong, like a betrayal, to not ache and hurt today the same as I did eight years ago. It feels like I love her less or have forgotten her more if the pain isn't as acute, but that's not true. If anything, I may love her more today than I did eight years ago.

Because the other thing I have a hard time admitting--I wouldn't be the person I am today had her death not turned my world upside down and inside out. 

I like the person I am today. Her death was the catalyst for a deeper relationship with the Lord I'm not sure I would have sought. The struggle through the darkness of the grief and the reality of depression's hold in my life have made me stronger and wiser. Carrying, feeling, and living through the pain, despite the pain, has taught me lessons about compassion and hope no other circumstances could have taught.

I HATE that eight years later her death has been the life event I attribute to molding me into a better human being. I would gladly give up all the growth I've experienced in the last eight years just to hug her neck again. 

But then, it's not about what I want. It never has been. It never will be. It's about the person God wants me to be. It's about the masterpiece my Jesus is creating with my life for His purposes, and only He knows the tools and life lessons and ways and methods needed to accomplish His end result. Only He can take the horrible and make it beautiful in time, in ways no one thought to look. Whether He caused her death or allowed her death really makes no difference. The truth is He has continued to make beauty from ashes, to work life for good for those of us who have called on His name in our hours of need.

And I'm only one witness to her life. One story. There are more. So many more.

Though our loved ones leave us, God still uses them to further His purposes through us, through our stories. We honor them with lives well-lived. We honor their lives by battling our grief instead of hiding from it. No, we live to tell the story of another day, to tell their story another day. Whether our story is one of personal defeat or victory, the power and redemption comes from having a story to tell, to share, to live. So both our deepest lows and highest highs have the same redemptive value when you own your story and share it.

Their deaths only lose meaning when the ones they leave behind stay stuck in the past and don't press forward into the future. Too many bitter, pitiful souls have gotten lost in the quagmire of unprocessed grief. When you're stuck in the muck, you lose sight of your purpose all together, and it takes work and support to escape.

"Thank you Jesus for orchestrating circumstances that made me work hard to move through the grief. Thank you for the support You Yourself provided in Yourself and through Your people who prayed, hugged me through tears, and just walked with me. Thank you that my life can be a testimony to the fact that her death wasn't a waste. Help me to continue to honor her story with my story by submitting to Your story for us both. In the same way Father, may my life be a testimony to the fact that Your death wasn't a waste either. May the good in my life always reflect Your glory and my sin testify to Your grace and forgiveness. Continue to use it all, Lord--the ugly deaths and beautiful births and everything in between. Use it all and use me too, Father."

Cause for a Jubilee

Jubilee. It’s the word that keeps coming to mind as seven years of reflecting on loss rolls around. At first, I thought I remembered the seventh year was the Year of Jubilee in the Old Testament. Turns out it’s seven years of seven, so the end of the 49^th year or the beginning of the 50^{th (}Leviticus 25:8-10). Nevertheless, jubilee is the odd word that keeps sticking when I reflect on seven years without Savannah Veale. Seven years of processing the grief of her untimely death and the hole in my life left behind. Seven years of feeling like a completely different person because she died. Seven years of difficult mind and soul work to understand what life means to me now.

And God gives me the word jubilee. Such an odd word. An uncommon word to associate with the anniversary of a death. Yet, it is a word that means the celebration of an anniversary. It is a word that represents the ideas of emancipation and restoration.

To say I feel emancipated and restored from the experience of her death feels wrong. Very wrong. It feels like I am betraying her memory. Afterall, part of grief is the inability to express felt love. Yet, here I sit this seventh year, not crying, not depressed. All God keeps whispering is, “Jubilee.”

Maybe it is through the years of processing, the swimming pools of tears cried, the angry words screamed and prayed, and all the unanswered questions that God works to bring emancipation and restoration.

Maybe every blog written in pain, every therapy session overflowing with snotty tissues, and every word penned in public or private was actually the treatment my heart needed all along. To express pain and be heard by someone, even if it was only God, was the very medicine my heart needed to finally feel free again, to feel more whole this year than last. It’s taken me seven years to get here and be at peace, to experience jubilee on this day instead of despair. It may take others seventy.

I wholeheartedly agree, time doesn’t heal all wounds, but it does offer the gift of perspective. A perspective I have now, seven years later with her gone, that I would not have had had she stayed.  This does not mean I don’t miss her or even that I’m grateful she died. I can’t hardly even swallow those words, much less type them.

But I am grateful that my Jesus has been gentle with me. He has been understanding and long suffering and never impatient. He has poured grace upon grace into my marriage, my friendships, my children, and all my life for seven years now. He has not forgotten her, and He’s allowed me to mourn her in my way in my time, all the while showing me His way in His time. He shifted my perspective over these seven years, not to see that He healed the wound, but to see what the wound has revealed about me and about Him.

Emancipated and restored people still walk around wounded, yet they also still experience the joy of jubilee. Grief does not cancel out joy. They are not mutually exclusive of each other. I think it’s taken seven years for me to accept this as truth. I am fully aware it may take others longer, and I may be in tears tomorrow. Both are ok. Jesus is gentle with you right where you are, always your best interest at the heart of His every intention.

So, on this jubilee, this seven-year anniversary, I am grateful for Jesus who never gave up on me even when I gave up on Him. I’m grateful He is the story I get to write. I don’t celebrate her death, but I will celebrate that I can testify a relationship with Jesus frees and restores. I have lived it for seven years. No one can take that knowledge and that experience from me. No one will ever convince me God isn’t good, and He doesn’t care. You just can’t.

My word of advice and encouragement for my brothers and sisters who still grieve, hard—Take it all to Jesus. All of it. All the anger, all the pain, all the questions, all the silence, all the waiting, all the panic, all the frantic—take all of it to Him. Wrestle with Him. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12). He is mighty to save (Zephaniah 3:17). His ways are not our ways, but His intentions are nothing but for our good (Isaiah 55:8, Genesis 50:20). Will you make the choice to stay the course, to follow Jesus long enough and close enough in relationship to witness the good He intends?

Maybe that’s the celebration. Seven years today I can testify as a witness to the good He intended. I can stand as the oak tree in Isaiah 61:3 claiming all the promises to be found therein. If death and grief unearthed a reflection of God’s splendor hiding deep inside me, then His will be done, and all the glory is His. These seven years God has emancipated me unto Himself; He has restored me unto Himself in ways I did not know I needed to be freed, in ways I did not know I was lost. That is cause for a jubilee.

Seven years is a long time, forty-nine even longer. Christ has long suffered with and for His people since He first created us all and set time in motion. If He has not called it quits on us yet, can you not seek Him just one more hour of one more day? The jubilee is coming. I know this to be true.

Grateful to be His,

Jennifer Durham

There's A Tattoo On My Back

I know I write about grief a lot. After my last post, my husband gently questioned, "Is that really where you are all the time?" The truth is yes and no. Grief is funny that way. In this season of my life, it is also where the Lord continually shows up, proving Himself to me over and over again. 

But the truth lies in His presence being with me in the highs and the lows, a constant presence in the ordinary and the mundane as well.

The truth is I have experienced so much joy and beauty in the midst of my grief that it seems incongruent to be able to write about both. So, I put a tattoo on my back.

This piece of art was five years in the making. Veale's death had left me marked in such a way, it didn't seem honest to let that truth be only tattooed on my heart. But it took five years of prayer, Pinterest searching, Bible reading, and God bringing the right tattoo artist at the right place and time across my path to get it done.

You see, this is my daily reminder that joy and beauty are found all around me--in the midst of the pain and the hard and the sad, there is thrill, life abundant, adventure, and newness to be born and discovered every morning, around every corner. The common thread binding these two polar realities together? IN HIS PRESENCE.

In Jesus' presence, I experience peace, hope, comfort, joy, and a renewed love for His purpose for my life. This promise in psalms has been my anchor through the waves of grief and my reason for rejoicing at my highest highs......

Psalm 16:11 "You make known to me the path of life; 

                                       you will fill me with joy in your presence,

                                                                                                                            with eternal pleasures at your right hand." (NIV)

Savannah Veale had tattooed Job 33:4 across her rib cage as a reminder that regardless of her asthma and allergies and all the suffering they brought to her life, it was God who gave her the breath of life. It was for His glory and His purposes that she lived each day to the fullest. She was the literal, walking embodiment of joy in the midst of pain. Her tattoo was her reminder to herself that her life was not her own.....

Job 33:4 "The Spirit of God has made me;
                                                                                               the breath of the Almighty gives me life." (NIV)

And where have I found God's presence? Where have I not is a better question! My entire life I have seen Him in the artistry of His creation--every cell, every atom of matter, creature, weather movement, sunset, sunrise, mountain crag, ocean swell--in all of it, I see Jesus. I feel and experience His presence. I see God's brush strokes, His attention to detail, how the fires burn and life greens anew from the ashes, how the clouds roll in yet make for the most beautiful sunsets, how the climb is steep and jagged yet the view from the top is breathtaking. If you ever wonder why I love to travel, it's because I love to see the extent and glory of my Jesus in the world He created out of love for you and me. I can't get enough....

Psalm 19:1 "The heavens declare the glory of God,
                                                                                   and the sky above proclaims his handiwork." (ESV)

If you want to have your own personal worship experience with the Lord, find your favorite place to sit in His creation and meditate on the entirety of Psalm 19. See if He doesn't reveal Himself to you in a new way, a personal way.

And the last verse on the compass of my tattoo, well, this one was a personal call for me. I chose it because it's the verse in the Bible that comes to mind when you think of joy. The joy of the Lord is your strength, right? But when I went to look at the verse in its entirety, to make sure I wanted the context tattooed on me forever, this is what I found....

Nehemiah 8:10 "Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for                              the joy of the Lord is your strength.”(NIV)

Now, the context of the story in Nehemiah was God's children grieving as the Word of God was being read. Whether because of the realization of just how much of the law they had broken, were unable to keep, or from an overwhelming sense of unworthiness, I'm not sure, but the text is clear that they were grieved and weeping when they heard the words of the law. (Nehemiah 8:9b) But grief is grief. Why you grieve doesn't diminish the emotion or weight of grief. 

What I read here, what I heard God say to me in this verse was, "Jennifer, Go! Live your life. Enjoy what I have given you--food, health, friendships, children, marriage, ministry--Enjoy them! Share these with those around you, the ones who aren't experiencing these things, the ones who don't have Me to enjoy. Jennifer, stop grieving, for your strength to move forward, to live life, to enjoy life is found in Me. I AM the joy you so desperately seek and want to be consumed by."

And in the fullness of this verse, of which we so often only quote the last line, the Lord gave me permission, a commission even, to stop grieving and enjoy Him and share Him and give Him all the glory and all the credit for any strength or joy anyone may think I have.

And so as an obedient child, I do my best to enjoy Him and all He has given. Every chance I get. I endeavor to laugh as hard as I cry, to smile as often as I may have cause for concern, to celebrate as much as I mourn, and to be grateful even in the midst of loss. 

The beauty is one emotion does not matter more or outweigh the other. One emotion does not cancel out or diminish the importance or reality of the other. In Jesus' presence I am free to experience both fully, without fear or condemnation for He is Lord of it all.

Which is why in His presence is exactly where I aim to live my life because there is where I find everything I ever need.

You're Not Alone

Can I be honest?

I don't know how people grieve without Jesus in their lives. I don't know how they process all the questions, how they find hope for something new, how they vent, grow stronger, move forward.

Because I was reminded the other day, that every grief is deeply personal. As much as people tell you you are not alone, no one else had the relationship with the one you lost that you had. 

My therapist asked me to tell her about my relationship with Savannah Veale the other day. I didn't want to do it. It was so deeply personal to me--all the memories I have, conversations shared, life experiences digested, laughter, suffering, tears, stories, adventures. All the things about her life that Savannah shared with me are unique to only her and me. Even shared events with others, like family vacations, even though my family was there with us, sharing those memories with her and with me, we will all remember different pieces of time, different moments, different conversations from the same experiences. Not my husband nor my children had the same relationship with her that I did, not because any of us loved her more or less but because every single relationship between two people is unique to those two people.

Therefore, when you grieve your loss, you ultimately grieve it alone because the only other person you shared that same relationship with is gone. It is this reality, the loneliness of grief, that can be so hard to understand and so impossible for those watching to step into.

But for God. Except for Jesus. He knew....knows her! He knows me. He knew....knows the meaningfulness of our relationship, the depth, the importance.

And He has never left my side. He has taken the brunt of my anger and tongue lashings. He has stood with me, never flinching, and let me beat on His chest and sob and ask why over and over and over again until I can't ask why anymore.

Not once has His presence left me. He rubs my back and rocks and holds me when I cry, catching all the tears in His bottles, never letting one go unseen. Even in my hardness of heart, when I turn to hide from hope, when I want to numb out of life and not feel anymore, even in those pits, He stays with me. He crawls inside and whispers He is there. I am not alone. He sees me. He sees my pain, and He knows why I hurt. so. much.

Only He heard all the prayers I prayed over Savannah's health and safety for years. Only He had sat in that room with  just the two of us every week for a year, trying to find joy in her circumstances. Only He saw me stand alone in the hallway at the hospital, not family, not friend, but somewhere in no man's land. Only He saw me break down, utterly and completely, mourn and weep outside the hospital, alone. He saw me gasp for breath through the tears. He saw my body shake and heave in the overwhelming tidal wave of her death. Only He knows how often I relive that day and that experience and my relationship with her over and over again in my mind.

And while I can share these things now, I can reveal details of my love and my pain to try and help you understand, to help me process, the truth is, no one actually ever will understand except my Jesus. Because He saw us both, and He saw it all.

Yes, He has been the one I've blamed the most. He has been the one I've wrestled for answers, but He has also been the One who is faithful to show up and be present and Who knows how I personally struggle with all of it. No matter how angry I have become at Him for taking her, He is ultimately the only one who knew why it hurt me so much to lose her. So in the end, when I need to talk to someone who knew her and knew me and knew our relationship, I end up talking to Him.

People, friends, can step into this arena of pain and understanding only from the perspective of a loving, sideline fan. The ones who have stepped into the pain with me, have tried to wade in the waters with me, they are life preservers that I appreciate and cling to and need, but Jesus is the breath that keeps me breathing. He is solid ground when grief quakes. 

Because He knows us both. He knows it all. Intimately. He was there when we said all the things and did all the things and made all the memories. He was there too.

So for those that grieve without Jesus, I pray for you. If you know someone who's grieving without Jesus in their life, go BE Jesus to them because they won't make it without Him. I'm convinced of this. People who are grieving feel deeply, personally alone in their grief at any given moment for reasons I've tried to explain above. 

Another person will never be able to meet anyone in their grief completely, and as a minister of compassion, I've learned to accept this hard truth. But Jesus! Jesus can meet them right where they are and understand every hard feeling, rough edge, and deep wound because He knows it all! Take your grieving person to Jesus in whatever way that looks like. Grab the corners of their mat, cut a hole in the ceiling, and lower them down right in front of Him. (Luke 5:17-39) This looks like a lot of prayer, a lot of silent sitting, encouraging notes, long hugs, smiles with lots of eye contact. This looks like any number of small things and big things. Make them laugh, let them cry, send that text, plan that coffee.

Jesus knows how to reach the hurting because He knows their hurts intimately, and He uses His children to be His hands and feet to a hurting world (Matthew 25:40-45), and we don't have to understand or have a personal stake in their loss to be a conduit for His love. 

If this journey of grief has taught me anything, it's taught me that I don't have to understand or relate to anything about someone's situation to bring Jesus to them in the middle of it. And Jesus rarely looks like the right words. Jesus is a presence in the dark. He simply let's you know you're not alone. That's a message I can whisper in the dark to someone too.

You're not alone. 

Who in your life needs to hear those words today? How can you whisper it today? Stop wanting someone to whisper it to you, and go whisper it to someone else because Jesus is always whispering it to your heart, all the time, if you'll stop long enough to listen.

Airing the Box Just a Little

A few weeks after we laid her precious self in the ground, our family received the news we'd be making the move to California in a year.

Fourteen months after that, we loaded our family of four onto a plane, and we didn't look back. That was almost six years ago.

This past weekend, I was visiting back east with a sweet, sweet friend from another lifetime ago. She asked me if I still blogged. I hesitated, and answered honestly, "Well, I kinda feel like I've lost my voice for a season, but I do every now and then."

Innocently, she replied, "Oh. Was it Savannah that made you lose your voice?"

I was instantly confused. "No. My Savannah is fine, I think....oh wait....you mean......Savannah Veale." And instantly my eyes welled with tears as the realization of what she was asking doused me like a bucket of ice-cold water. It had been almost six years since someone had spoken her name to me.

My friend was kind. Immediately she apologized, hugging my neck, as we awkwardly tried to change the subject, but I was done. It was all I could do from that moment to keep the tears inside my eyelids.

You see, when I moved to California, no one knew me here. No one knew my story. No one knew Savannah Veale. Her name was not mentioned or brought up in conversation. There were no knowing eyes and kind smiles. I only had to share pieces of that story with the ones closest to me who happened to ask at the right time on the right days, and even then, they didn't know. I don't let them see how much I still grieve.

But I miss her. I still do. I hadn't realized that somewhere along the way in the past six years, I had processed enough to put her in a box on the decorative shelf of my life. Anyone looking close enough would see it is a lovely box that is cherished because it's there, not hidden, but it's also not a focal point or a conversation piece. It obviously has great sentimental value, but it's not something anyone would recognize or care to ask about.

Yet she is right there on the shelf of my life, and when her box gets opened whether on purpose or by surprise, the pain and joy that flow from her memory are deeply overwhelming.

When my friend said her name, one part of me wanted to stay and keep talking, comforted by conversation of her with someone who knew her, yet there was an equal part of me that wanted to run away and avoid the inevitable tears and pain that would follow with the joy of remembering her.

And so it is with those who grieve. I'm not sure keeping Savannah Veale in an emotional box in my life is healthy, but I also will never throw it out. I'm not sure airing it is healthy all the time either. I'm not sure anything about grief makes any sense. Some friends I know post the state of their grieving mind every day on Facebook. You never have to wonder how they're feeling. Others never share anything. at all. ever. It's like that part of their lives died with the loved one that is gone. And then there are all of us somewhere in the middle of that spectrum, wondering if anyone knows, and if anyone really even cares.

So since I'm having a hard time putting her back in that box that got opened by surprise, this is me, airing it out a little. I miss her. I miss her long lanky arms and the hugs she would give, her mischievous smile and the way she always made you feel like she was up to something. I miss the Miss Savannah bag of candy that use to sit on top of our refrigerator, only to be given out by her when she came to babysit. I miss her popping into my home unexpectedly and making all of us smile, or when she'd come looking for advice in a very sideways don't-tell-me-what-to-do-but-I'm-asking-anyway kind of way. I miss her voice. I miss her.

I replay the day she died and our last conversation on the phone in my mind more times than anyone would ever know. The verse God gave me after she died is still the one I repeat like counting sheep on sleepless nights: Isaiah 26:3 "You will keep in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on You because they trust in You."

Which always brings me right back to my Jesus. Because He has kept that promise time and time and time again. My mind finds perfect peace when it focuses on Him and trusts His ways, trusts Him--completely, fully, and unquestioningly.

I will never know why she had to die. I will never understand.  But Jesus does. My Heavenly Father, HER Heavenly Father knows and understands, and the acceptance that this is enough--that God knowing and me NOT knowing is enough--this truth begins to settle her back into the box, and His promised peace helps close the lid once again as I choose to trust His heart for me and for her.

I hope one day that box becomes a conversation piece in my life because her story is now forever woven into mine, and while time does not heal all wounds it does allow for the acceptance to grow of those wounds, and with acceptance of the co-mingling of the joy and the pain comes a freedom to share it, remember it, pick it up and show it to others without fear or shame or guilt.

This box on my shelf is a testimony to the peace of God that passes all understanding. It is the catalyst to an empathy for others and their pain that I could never have manufactured on my own. It is a gift I never wanted, but will not waste or hide. My prayer is one day I won't have to keep the lid on that box shut so tight, that my emotions surrounding her will be able to ebb and flow more freely, safely, slowly, like the tinkling music of a gentle stream, not quite so violently like a rogue wave, pulling me back under and spinning me in the washing machine of grief. One day. Maybe.

Maybe if time doesn't heal all wounds, maybe it does slow the roller coaster of grief. I don't know. We will see. Time will tell.

In the meantime, open your eyes. Those who grieve are all around you. Be gentle with yourself and with others, friends. There are so many stories people just don't tell. Grateful my Jesus likes to hear them all, and when I don't want to tell them, he already knows my heart. Here's praying someone notices the sentimental boxes you keep on the shelf of your life and has the wisdom to gently ask to hear your story because telling it, airing that box just a little, really is a comfort and an agent to healing and freedom.

Dancing with Joy & Grief

Has it been five years? Five years without her laugh, her hugs, her infectiously funny, strange sense of humor? Every May. Without fail, I fall into a funk, and the grief over her loss catches me off guard. And I have to cry and write and process and remember one of the three most devastating days in my current lifetime. I remember our last conversation as clearly as if I had just hung up the phone. I remember the hospital, the soul-searing tears, the funeral, the grief that followed.

And to try to shake the sorrow, you then try to remember all the good things too—the family vacations, the funny videos with the kids, all the middle school sleepovers and camps and prank phone calls. But for me, all the good also just adds to the sad because it all stopped when she was gone.

And it always leaves me pondering the strange dichotomy of joy and grief every time.

Grief, I think, I understand better than I'd like. I've come to recognize it's not an emotion or a process, it's a thing, a noun, a substance. It has weight and mass. It can't be measured or compared, but it can be shared. Grief is the byproduct of death. Just like we breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide, anyone who breathes in some type of death breathes out grief, and depending on the type and quantity of what you inhaled will determine how long it takes to exhale the grief. But it must be exhaled. Grief contained is simply poison to the mind, body, and soul.

And so those who grieve, cry--A LOT. Sometimes when they least expect it because grief creeps out of the corners of life in places you didn't think to look or expect to find it.

Those who grieve become irrationally angry. We lash out in small and big ways because we have so many questions that will never be answered this side of eternity, and ultimately it never feels fair or right or just.

Those who grieve are tired--all the time. Grief is one of, if not the most, exhausting substances to exhale. It clings and wraps and sticks and stays. It hurts and aches--mind, body, and soul. It takes something powerful to shake it.

Enter Joy. Now, I'm going to struggle through this. Honestly, I'm still smack dab in the middle of processing it all myself. I might be chewing on this until Jesus comes back, but if the byproduct of death is grief, then the byproduct of life in Christ should be joy. Therein lies the predicament because a Christian, a true Christ follower, will grapple with the tension of both of these in the same space this side of heaven.

Joy and Grief will forever be dance partners in this lifetime. I'm learning that I get to decide who leads. They both need a turn because grief needs to stretch its legs. It needs to be exhaled, set free, given room to be expressed. Grief needs to be known and seen, so it needs a turn to lead the dance. After all, even Ecclesiastes 3:4 says there is "a time to weep and time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance." Grief is not a bad thing; it's not a sin. It is not a sign of weakness, it is a sign of humanity.

Just like joy is not a sign of strength, it is a sign of the presence of Christ, for "in His presence is fullness of joy. (Psalm 16:11)" Joy must be allowed to lead the dance because joy inhales Christ for it is the very essence of His presence. When you allow yourself to experience joy, you are allowing yourself to experience Christ. And yes, joy is a choice, just like following Christ is a choice, so is choosing joy.

What is joy? How do you find joy? Sigh. I don't know. Still working on those definitions for myself. But I know that when I blasted praise and worship music in my home the other day while cleaning my house, singing to Jesus--with Jesus--at the top of my lungs, I know that I felt invigorated, full of life, unafraid, and inwardly at peace the rest of that day. Joy led the dance.

Then the next day, two songs on the radio and a text message later, I was an emotional wreck. Grief needed a turn again. And so goes the dance.

Today I'm writing, maybe I'll take a walk by the ocean, maybe I'll fill my home with worship music once more, maybe I'll take a nap in my hammock or run around in the yard with my children. Joy comes and fills and takes the lead in so many different forms. It is not a replacement for the grief, it is a needed compliment to it. Grief without joy is depression, a very lonely wallflower.

One of the best ways to experience joy is to choose to be joy for someone else. My heart is never quite so heavy when I can bring joy to someone else in my life, even in the midst of my own dance with grief. That's Jesus, friends! That's the power of Jesus. Romans 12:15 says, "Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep." I take this verse quite literally. There's healing in both shared joy and shared grief. Jesus steps into both with us. Why are we so hesitant to step into both with those around us?

I have learned that true friends are the ones who can share both grief and joy with one another. Is it awkward and uncomfortable at times? Absolutely. Are there always words to express? Nope, but just being present, making an effort of some sort, usually means the whole world. It's also a two-way street. I have to exhale my grief to a friend in order to give them the opportunity to be joy, but ultimately, my only reliable source is Jesus. Where others will fail me, He always succeeds and fulfills and shows up. Who better to understand the byproduct of death than the Man who suffered under it here on earth, only to defeat it, allowing joy to be available for everyone through His presence in us?

Ah, the dance of joy and grief. It is one I have not learned gracefully, but my Jesus is a patient teacher. If I must dance this dance for the remainder of my days, I pray He teaches me how to make it beautiful.

Still Rippling

I've lost track of the years now.  It hasn't even been that long. Two? three? years today, I think? that she silently slipped away out of our lives.

I've lost track of the years, but I've kept track of every moment. Every moment when I thought, "She'd love this. She'd enjoy that. She'd be laughing her head off right now at this. She would have come and stayed for the summer.  She would have gone and done this with me, with us, with my kids. She's laughing right now at that. I would have invited her to come out for this. I would have bought her that." Those thoughts, those moments, never stop. They continue to catch me off guard.

I spent a whole day bawling my eyes out last month for what seemed like absolutely no reason at all. No reason other than I was just overcome with the thought of missing her. The day passed, the tears stopped, life moved on, but on this day, every year, the world slows down just a bit. The sun passes slower through the sky, and it only seems right to honor someone who changed your life.

She really did. She changed the way I viewed people. She changed the way I viewed how to love and interact with people different from me. She changed the way I viewed suffering and how to respond and live life in the midst of it. Her death left me marked for life. For the better.

Not sure I've ever mentioned this, but I've been reliving our last conversation together in my mind for some time now, maybe half a year. I remember her calling me Saturday afternoon before she had her asthma attack on the following Sunday. I remember hearing how tired she was in her voice. I always asked how she was. She always said fine. She asked me some details about the next week because she was going to start babysitting for us for the summer after her finals were over. I remember being distracted, needing to get off the phone for some reason, so the conversation was rushed. I remember wanting to tell her I loved her, but that was weird because I'd never said that to her before (we weren't technically family after all.) But I remember having the overwhelming urge to say it, and then not saying it. Simply saying goodbye, see you next week, and hanging up, worrying about her because she sounded so exhausted.  

And then she was gone. It was Tuesday before I held her hand in that hospital room, hooked up to all those machines, looking like she had long left this earth. And I must have stood by her bedside whispering over and over again how much I loved her, how much I appreciated her. How I knew she knew, but how I wished I had said it out loud more.

That last conversation has haunted me for too long. The truth is, she knew I loved her. I knew she loved me. We didn't have to say it, although it would have been nice. But that conversation was/ is a turning point, a milestone in my life. It's a reminder to me to never be too busy to listen and respond to the things the Holy Spirit speaks. His Voice is often so quiet, so gently prodding, that my busyness inside my own brain, my train of thought that is always pressing on to the next station instead of parking in the moment, often overwhelms and barrels over His always guiding Voice. 

His Voice that is always prompting me to say "I love you", to pour the glass of milk for my son that says "I love you", to lay for two minutes longer in bed at night with my daughter that relays the message "I love you", to scratch my husband's back for just a moment longer to say "I love you." 

Jesus just wants us to ooze "I love you" out of every pore in our body, every action, every thought, every word. (1 Corinthians 13:1-3) He wants to be the love that others feel and see and know that is true because HE is the only true Love in the world. (1 John 4:8) 

And while I refuse to live in condemnation of a moment lost to say "I love you" to one of the dearest people I've known in this life, I will never forget the lesson learned. Friends, we are NOT promised tomorrow with anyone, for anyone, by anyone. (Proverbs 27:1) The Holy Spirit knows. (1 Corinthians 2:10) He knows the moments we will regret and relive and yearn for do-overs. So the challenge is to learn to listen AND obey in the moment, exactly when He speaks. No questions, no hesitations, no over-thinking. Not quenching the Spirit with our busyness or sin or excuses. (1 Thessalonians 5:19-22)

You never have to second-guess or over-think an act that says "I love you" in the 1 Corinthians 13 kind of way. Never. Just do it.

My dear Savannah Veale, I love you. Always did. Always will. You will always be a part of who I was and the catalyst God used for who I am today. You are still a source of great joy for me, even in memory. The ripple effects of your life are still rippling. 

Still rippling.

Now to Him who is able (My God is ABLE!) to do immeasurably MORE than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

Ephesians 3:20-21 (emphasis mine)

Where Does Your Hope Come From?

One year ago yesterday, a beautiful life left this world.  She took some spunk and spark and joy out with her that God has been faithful to show still blooms in the midst of the void left behind.  But it has been a long, slow, grueling year of choosing to look for joy and holding fast to what I found.

And somewhere in the midst of the void left behind, I have found blooming joy is full of the fragrance of hope.

Hope.  Hope anew.  Hope rising.  Fragile and virile and fragrant.  Hope. Hope in a God that makes all things new (Revelation 21:5). Hope that there truly is life after death, death of any kind (2 Corinthians 1:10).  Hope that one day things will get better, be brighter.  Hope.  It fills the soul and lightens the weight of the world.  Joy blooms and Hope fills life with sweetness and desire and the aroma of what's to come.

So I ask you, where does your hope come from?  In what do you place your hope?  When you make a statement like, ‘I hope everything turns out all right,’ or ‘I hope things will be different,’ or ‘I hope he/she makes a different choice,’ what exactly are you hoping in when you make those statements?

Is it just a flippant desire you throw out into the universe?  Is it a dependence on positive thinking will result in positive outcomes?  Is your hope grounded in fate, destiny, good karma?  What is hope to you?  And where do you believe it originates?

Because hope is a powerful, powerful thing.  Hope raises the phoenix from the ashes.  Hope is the life preserver for the sinking soul.  Hope makes another day worth living. Hope is the difference between a life lived anew and a life wasted.  Hope is power. 1 Corinthians 13:13a lists, "But now faith, hope, love, abide these three." Abide in these three is our command.  Maybe because the power to change life as we know it abides in these three?

So if hope is this powerful, it begs the question from where does it originate its power?  Some would argue hope comes from within.  It is the gumption, the force of the will to press on and be better, do better.  But then, if this is true, then hope originates within myself, and goodness me, I am nothing.  I am flawed.  I am mistaken. I am weak.  I am powerless.  Heaven help me if hope comes from within me!  I am only human. If anyone’s hope is based on me or anyone else from the human race, we are lost already.  Doomed to be disappointed and left hopeless because everyone will fail us at some point in time, including ourselves.

Some would argue hope comes from a higher source, a spiritual essence, a fated destiny of the universe, but this is so ethereal, so slippery and uneasy and fleeting.  It is a faith in something unseen and unproven and unsubstantiated. (My faith may be unseen, but it is not unproven or unsubstantiated, an important difference to note.)  This kind of hope is seated in the mind of the believer, not the heart, and my friends, I have proven that my mind is a throne room for the lies of the Deceiver at times. It can too easily be led astray by the latest cultural line of thought, the latest fad that creates an emotional connection.  Emotions can be just as deceiving.

No, truth lies in one Person.  I have found joy to bloom in the presence of one Person (Psalm 16:11).  And in my study of the resurrection of Christ this past Easter, I have found hope to be embodied and originated in one Person.  The Person of Jesus Christ, the Creator Son of God who lives.  

WHO IS ALIVE!

Did you hear me?  My Jesus lives!  And the reality of that truth is the origin of hope.  As my BSF leader pointed out, for every other religion that revolves around a single person, there is a grave with a body laying in it.  Not mine.  Not my Jesus.  His grave is empty (Matthew 28:5-6).  The linens that wrapped His body were neatly folded to the side (John 20:7). The stone in front of his tomb was rolled away.  It was being guarded by Roman soldiers who would have given their lives to do their duty, and instead they were left paralyzed in fear by an earthquake and angels come to proclaim the good news that Jesus was alive!  He was alive and seen in the days after His resurrection by more than 500 different people (1 Corinthians 15:6) over a period of 40 days (Acts 1:3).  He was touched.  He ate food.  He was/He is alive!!!

Do you understand what that means?  In Him alone is Hope of life after death.  His resurrection required a power no one else in the history of mankind can claim.  He raised Himself from the dead.  Now that is real power.  Ultimate power.  True power over life and death.  And in that power, His believers can truly hope.  The origin of my hope can be the power of Christ Himself, the power of a God who can raise not just others, but Himself from the dead.  In Him alone, my hope is real and true and powerful.  It is based on a perfect Person, the Big Creator God, not a thought or emotion or idea or the good intentions of others.

When I say to someone, “I hope it works out for you,” I can honestly mean, “I believe the God who raised Himself from the dead is capable of working things out for you,” because that’s truth, and that’s where my hope comes from.  Where does yours?

Because at the end of the day, when life sucks and is hard and the ones you love are suffering or have died and left this earth, is belief in yourself really powerful enough to get you through the day, to keep you from falling into despair? Job 8:13b states matter-of-factly, 'The hope of the godless will perish.'  It seems the one sure way to have no hope is to have no God, no risen Savior.

Is it really your family and friends that give you hope? Or is it the God of your family and friends that is secretly, silently leaking hope into your life through them? 

Is the universe, your destiny, your fate where your hope originates?  Or is it the God who created this universe and determines your days from the moment of conception that instills hope into your life? (Psalm 139)

We are only human.  We need to be careful to stop attributing what is God’s alone to our own thoughts and innovations.  We have nothing that He has not chosen to give or entrust us with.  We are nothing without Him.  I am nothing, and He is everything, and that is more than enough to bring joy and let hope rise.

I once stated that as a believer and follower of Christ we are the only real Joy people will experience in this life, everything else is a fake.  I come to you proposing the same is true of Hope.  Without a risen Savior, a God who has power over life AND death, people have no real hope because their hope has no real power. 

Their positive thoughts can change nothing, but a God who raises Himself from the dead can change everything.

So to all the skeptics, I write here to offer a true source of Hope, of Joy, of Love, of Life.  I ask you to consider who Jesus Christ really is, who He might really be to you because if you are looking for Hope in your life, you need look no further.

And if you truly believe Him to be who He says He is, then why aren’t we more willing to throw off the sins of all that entangles us and hold fast to the feet of Jesus and just let Him live through us?  I need to stop over-thinking and over-analyzing, and just be His child.  Be at His feet like the women at the feet of their risen Lord, clinging in worship, waiting for His instruction to go and tell (Matthew 28:9).

Because Love should be our driving purpose.  Joy should fuel the vehicle of our love, and Hope is the power, the energy created in the process that keeps a body in motion, keeps us able to move forward and onward, always pressing toward the finish line.

Hope is powerful.

And the hope of seeing my Savannah Veale again one day (and all those I love who have gone on before me, for that matter), spurs me on deeper into the heart of a God I can’t live without.

"And in His name the Gentiles will hope" (Matthew 12:21)---Yes, yes they will.  Yes, I do.

What It Feels Like to Move On

Nine months she's been dancing in heaven; bet it feels like eternity, bet it feels glorious.

Nine months now, I've thought of her almost daily.  Nine months now, my daughter has welled up in tears at bedtime asking, "Why did Miss Savannah have to die?"  I still have no good answer to that question.  The answer, "Because God decided it was time for her to go home with Him," falls flat and hard like stale bread after being repeated so often.  I'm to the point where I just want to tell my daughter, "I don't know," and give up on trying to explain God.  But that would be giving in to the anger and the resentment, and even though I don't know, I do trust, so if I relay anything to my daughter, I pray she believes I trust God made the right decision whether I like it or not.

As for me, well, I can think of her now and smile at the corners of my mouth.  The tears still tickle behind my eyes and in the back of my nose, but they don't spill and fall and flow at her every thought.

I can see her beautiful, beautiful face posted by still-grieving friends and smile that I was privileged enough to have known such a beautiful soul here on earth.  Her beauty shines out of the joy she carried wherever she went.

So, I guess, I'm to the point it feels good to remember her and love her and appreciate all the time I had with her, however too short it may have been.  I can feel grateful that God gifted her as part of my life, as part of my story.

I think the phrase time heals all wounds is a lie though.  

For those not as close to her, time might heal the wound completely.  But for the rest of us, the ones in her closer inner circle, I've come to accept there will always be a nasty scar that aches when the weather turns bad or burns and tingles a little when the dead skin underneath is poked and prodded the wrong way.  And for her family, her mother, her father, her sisters, her brother--I'm pretty sure the wound will never heal completely.  Anything can accidentally reopen it and cause it to bleed again, even if just a little.  That's a reality I do not envy them, and I pray specifically Jehovah Rapha (God of healing) is their God daily. (Psalm 22:24; Job 5:18)

No, time will not heal all wounds, but God is sufficient to sustain all wounds. (2 Corinthians 3:5)  His presence in our lives is the ultimate salve of comfort. (Psalm 23:4) His words are the icepack for the swelling.  (Psalm 18:30) The love of His people the bandage needed to protect. (1 Thessalonians 5:11) He has not failed me once in these past nine months.  He has not let me drown in the pit of despair or stay stuck in the muck of sorrow.  No, He has continually set Himself before me and inserted Himself so poignantly that I cannot ignore His overwhelming Self.

When I place my eyes continually on Jesus, I cannot see anything but His glory.  Even when I close my eyes, His glory still shines in the dark, image burned into my retinal being.

No, He has been faithful to place before me His plan.  A plan that seems crazy and over-the-top, but His plan nonetheless.  A journey that I had hoped Savannah Veale would have taken with us at some point in time, even if just for a summer.  I would have adopted her as one of my own in a heartbeat. But no, God's plan was that our family take the next step to California completely on our own, no comforting people from home to join us, no crutch for me to lean into other than Christ alone.

And maybe many of you moving on from this death or other deaths in your life are being asked to do the same thing.  Lean hard into Christ alone.  Support yourself, your decisions, your thoughts, your desires, your everything on Him alone.

Maybe you're still miserable because you've been angry with God.  Why do it His way when you've already given up so much? experienced so much loss?  And while this is a completely normal, rational, earthly response, the fact remains, you will remain miserable.  God is big enough to take the full wrath of your anger.  Let Him have it...then let it go.  Forgive God for designing life different than you planned.  Forgive yourself for blaming God, for being mad at God. Forgive and move on. (So easy to type, so hard to do...another post for another day...)

And when you find yourself moving on again, don't try to do it alone.  You may not be angry at God anymore, but you don't have to be lonely either; you don't have to be a shell of the person you once were.  You can give yourself permission to live life, no, to even ENJOY life.  And when you truly desire that joy in your life again, when you're heart is desperate for the spark and life and hope and purpose to return, guess where you will have to find it?

Right back in the arms of the God who's been there all along. The same God who had the power and right and authority to take things out of your life, also has the power and right and authority to place new things into your life. (Job 1:21, 5:18)   It's a hard pill to swallow sometimes, but for me, I have to sigh and fall into Him even harder and throw my hands up in the air and say, "It's Your plan God.  Not mine.  I really wouldn't want Your job anyway." Acceptance.  And when you finally lean fully into Him, He begins to open your eyes to all the blessings swirling around you that have been there this whole time, and then when you lean a little harder, learn to trust Him a little longer, you start to experience all the things He is continually making new around you. (Revelation 21:5)

And life returns.  And you wake up one day, in the midst of all the grief, and you smile.  And there is joy.  A joy that blooms in the midst of the muck.  And that is why followers of Christ must lean fully into Him through all the trials of life, so the world will see we are the joy that blooms in the midst of the muck.

Joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, a natural byproduct.  The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God the Father and Jesus Christ Themselves.  When we fully lean into Christ, lean into the identity of who we are in Him, we experience joy, but don't be fooled, we possessed joy the minute His Spirit dwelt within us. Possessing a piece of chocolate and experiencing a piece of chocolate are two TOTALLY different ideas. (For lack of a better analogy and want of a simple one.  Joy is so much better than chocolate!)  When we experience joy, the people around us see Christ walking among them. 

The followers of Christ are the only source of true joy this lost world ever has the hope of knowing.

Can you imagine never knowing joy?  Real joy.  The inner joy that keeps you singing even when life has you chained and imprisoned in the moment? (Acts 16:16-40) The kind of joy that invokes praise in the midst of grief, pain, the hard?(Acts 7:54-60) Can you imagine never knowing that?

Those who don't follow Christ have never known that joy, and never have hope of knowing it without Him in their lives.  What they think they know as joy is a far cry from truth.  This world sells them a lie, and sometimes, even as believers, we buy the lie of happiness, success, fame, fortune, charity, denial of self for the good of the many, good works, possessions, ministry, our children, our family, other relationships--the list goes on and on and on.  But what Satan tries to fabricate in our lives as experiences of joy are simply fakes and distractions because they don't even come close to touching the experience of the real thing!

What does it feel like to move on?  It doesn't feel like the end of a storm.  It's not necessarily a sense of relief.  It's not even necessarily the feeling of the lifting of a burden.  Savannah Veale will still be dead when I think about her again the next time, but moving on feels like when that thought comes, when the grief rises, I choose in that moment to lean HARD into Christ.  I mean, I put my full weight right into His arms and His person, and I grab onto the scriptures He's given me through the years, and the knowledge of His unchangeable character that He has revealed in my life, and I lean HARD into Him. No holding back, not an ounce of support on my own two feet, most of the time I stop dead in my tracks, and now sometimes instead of just leaning, I'm learning to do a complete trust fall right into His arms.

And only there, in His presence, in His capable, able arms, in the midst of the hard, in the midst of the leaning and letting go, in the midst of the grief, the hurt, the pain, the difficulty--right smack dab in the middle, with all of it still whirling around me, in the eye of the hurricane of those emotions--I HAVE JOY because I HAVE CHRIST.

Plain and simple.

And let me tell you something, when I have Christ, my countenance, my inner being, carries a strength in Him that springs directly from joy--even in the midst of the hard. (Psalm 28:7)

So the next time you see someone who is struggling (and let's just be honest, aren't we all struggling, all the time, with something, albeit small or big?), the next time you see someone in a situation where they should be struggling, they should be crying in a corner, bent and broken and defeated by their circumstance, they have every right to complain, grumble and criticize, and yet they smile slowly, not forced, but knowingly and tell you God is good, God is sufficient, God is able, God is enough, it's not easy, but God gets me through the day--consider yourself blessed and favored because you've just encountered real joy, you've just been smiled on by Jesus in the flesh.

I must learn better to recognize it, appreciate it, and duplicate it because actually experiencing joy in my life is what it feels like to move on.