Thinking About Death

The report came back from the scan…my 87 year old grandmother has kidney cancer and an unidentifiable mass on her lung.

This was not shocking to our family.  Grandmother has lost 11 pounds since August and looks like a P.O.W.

It also wasn’t my first thoughts about her death.  Those came on Thanksgiving Day.  She arrived at my mom’s for our big family lunch and didn’t know who I was anymore.  I introduced myself, made the connection for her that I was her daughter’s child, and then introduced my husband and kids.

Something died in that moment.  Our relationship ceased.  Not the one that could be here in her last months but the one that shared mutual memories, laughed at family stories, and knew each other as grandmother and granddaughter.  Now I’m just a kind person that might visit.

Dementia is twisted.  Pieces of your story die but you don’t die.  This is the second grandmother that I’ve experienced a “death before the dying.”  I think it sucks if I can be frank.  There’s no good-bye and I hate the feeling of being unknown.

We won’t laugh about the time I wanted three scoops of ice cream from Baskin Robbins and because she didn’t think I could eat that many she bought one at a time.  I ate three!

We won’t bust a gut over the weekend so many of us girls visited her that we put two twin beds together trying to sleep four of us going the wrong direction; nothing funnier than your butt falling through where the mattresses meet.  If I remember correctly she was one of the four.  We have a picture of the fiasco in a shoebox somewhere.

Alongside all these thoughts rose a question, “Is death holy ground?”  Is it sacred because in an instant the effects of sin and the work of Christ “kiss,” the moment where Jesus absorbs the fall of mankind and reverses it?  Could my family be on a holy journey rather than simply a sad ending?

A riveting picture formed in my mind.  Grandmother’s four daughters are holding this frail woman’s hand as she walks the last steps toward the Jordan River.  They aren’t merely helping their mom finish out her final moments with care and comfort, they are helping her to the bank where they will place her hand in the Father’s and he will scoop up my grandmother and carry her over the river into His home.  It is what she always believed, that the best is yet to come as God makes everything sad come untrue and gives her a new body.

I can’t take a shift to sit with grandmother.  I live too far away.  But this morning it was clear to me I can hold her hand too as I pray for these last steps of her journey.  I can pray over my mom and aunts as they pour out their care.  And together we will help Marie get to the shoreline.

It’s a sacred time in our family we are on holy ground.  Never thought I’d think about death from this angle.

Angel

Thinking About 2011

10am New Years Day my cell phone beeped with a new text.

“May 2011 be a year of focusing on what has been given and not on what has been taken…God gave…2011.  Thankful we can walk through it together…”  It was from a close friend and seemed to have the feel of a blessing one speaks over another.

These 29 words have captivated my mind for 4 days.  The questions swirl, “What would the tone of 2011 feel like if I focused on what’s been given?”  ”How would I live differently?  Would I act differently?  Pray differently?  View people differently?”

Tis the time of year when I often reflect on the past and look ahead.  I honestly don’t know how to think about 2010 yet.  It may take months if not a lifetime to put my head around all that happened this year.

2011 has me “globally nervous” if there’s such a term.  The story looks like it’s on thin ice if not out of control.

My friend’s text broke into these thoughts like a compass pointing me North.

One could never exhaust the conversation over what has been give to us by God.  The categories would cover every facet of life.  Two thoughts caught my attention this morning. First, “God gave…2011.”  Oh to take into the depths of myself the truth that God is giving us 2011.  Each day, moment, and nano second.  Whatever happens this year be it $5 a gallon gas or more war it is all from God’s hand, within His control.  A mysterious rest rises up within when I think out the implications.

The other thought came out of reading Habakkuk and Malachi.  God gave a promise.  A covenant.  That promise has remained constant throughout history and will until the day Jesus returns bringing the new heaven and the new earth.  The promise that God will reverse the fall of mankind, gather a family to himself, make everything new, and make everything sad come untrue is as real today as it has ever been.

As I plunge 2010 and 2011 into the reality of the promise, God and Jesus are more beautiful to me today than they were yesterday. And is par for the course, when my Father and older brother become increasingly beautiful I am transformed.

So, how have you been thininking about 2011?

Would you give me the privilege of writing a blessing over you?

May 2011 be a year of focusing on what has been given and not on what has been taken…God gave.

Enjoying the promise today,

Angel

Still Thinking About Playing

My great niece came for a visit.  She’s 5.  K.J. has wonderful qualities about her, most noticeable is that she skips or Irish dances instead of walking.  The day she arrived we packed up and went to the neighborhood park.  She skipped out the van, through the sand, across the suffle board fields, and anywhere that her little feet would carry her.  

As I watched her the question hit me, “What is going on in her heart that makes her skip?  What does a ‘skipping heart’ feel like?”  It sure did seem playful to me, getting back to how God says to me, “Angel, you play and I’ll work.”  And why don’t I skip?  Granted I’m over 40 but honestly, I don’t feel like skipping.

For 48 hours I watched K.J. skip and dance.  Slowly the thoughts began to come. A skipping heart is free.  A skipping heart is restful.  A skipping heart is secure.  A skipping heart is safe.  A skipping heart is loved.  A skipping heart is light.  A skipping heart is playful.  There it was the ‘play’ word again.  

I began to imagine the absurdity of K.J. taking on the responsibilty to work and bring home the bacon like her dad does.  Think of it, he’s headed out the door one morning and she goes with him.  

Corey looks at K.J. and says, “Where are you going?”  

“Why I’m going to work, Dad.  There are bills to pay, home repairs to finance, college funds to fund, and food to purchase.  I’ve got to get busy,” she says.

He kneels down, looks in her eyes and says, “K.J. that’s my job.  Sweet girl, your job is to play.  I’ll take responsibility for all these things.  I made that promise when you came into the world.  I work so you can play.  You don’t need to do my job, I can handle it.  You stay and enjoy every moment playing.”

“But Dad are you sure you can handle all this?  I’m not convinced you’ll take care of it,” she replies.  

“I’m absolutely positive I can handle the load,”  her Dad says.  

If it’s crazy to think a 5 year old girl would take on the responsibilities of her father how absurd is it for me to think I’ve got to carry God’s load.  The space between my ability verses His is emense and yet every day I pick that oversized suitcase of life responsibility up and start dragging it through the day.  I’ll never skip dragging a suitcase.  

I’m considering that growth for me is not that I don’t pick up the suitcase handle but how quickly I drop it.  Even as I write there are suitcase handles beckoning me to grab them.  

But in that beckon I hear a whisper, “Angel you play and I’ll work.”

“But Dad, I’m not sure you can handle this one, it’s really big,”  I say.  

“I assure you I’m big enough to handle it, I promised the day I made you that I’d work so you can play.  Go play.”

I’ve got to go now, I feel a skip coming on.

You Play I’ll Work

Last night I went to bed thinking of how pressured I feel.  I feel too resposible for a new job I just started this month.  As if the well being of the whole organization rests on my getting my work done.  To top it off my school books whisper to be read and even the housework ‘speaks’ to me as I walk through a dusty living room with 1/4″ thick grime on the fan blades hanging from the ceiling.  I woke up knowing I can’t live long term with this pressure nor will my family thrive long term with a mother and a wife on the edge.  The familiar words of my counselor began to ring in my head.  They are her picture of what God is saying to me that she and I want to see embodied in my life.  ”Angel, you play and I’ll work.”  So I ran afresh to God to repent of this over responsibility.  And I sensed His smile, His reaching down to pick up this ‘heavy suitcase’ that I His child was trying to drag along, and His whisper “You play sweet girl, I’ll do the work.  As you make those calls for work, write those emails, and even cook dinner tonight, I’ll do the heavy work you just play at the things I’ve given you today.”  So, I played today and I saw God do the work.  I hope I remember to play again tomorrow.

Hello world!

Welcome to WordPress.com. This is your first post. Edit or delete it and start blogging!