My summer of grief and loss

Or, should I say, the summer of my discontent...sounds a bit more upbeat. But it is what it is.

I am glad that summer is over and we are in a new season, it doesn't feel like a new season, yet, but it soon will. The heat of summer will be transformed into misty mornings and cool evenings. I believe God takes us through different seasons in life for a reason. I may no know or understand what those reasons are, but He does and He is sufficient.

I am calling this past summer my season of grief and loss. I have been here before. It is not really a fun place to be. However, God is teaching me and reminding me that nothing belongs to me. I know this. I know this is part of surrender. My health doesn't belong to me. My family. My husband, or even my precious baby boy-who I still sometimes fear isn't going to be awake in the morning (that is called a stronghold of fear) and I have dealt with this since my heart was opened to a love I had never experienced before. First the love of a wonderful family, that is a given. But recently, in the past few years, a love of a wonderful man who, I feel, completes me and with whom I cannot imagine living a day without. Second, the precious love of my child, Carter. A different love, a love that merits worry and protection over unseen potential harm. Potential being the key word. the potential harm never seems to materialize, yet it leaves a dent in your heart that only gets bigger each time a worry or doubt pop in your mind. And it grows, and it grows and it grows until a stronghold is formed.

The Bible says that we are not given a spirit of bondage again to fear, but a spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, Abba, Father. (Romans 8:15).

I have to give my life over to God each and every day, some days moment by moment. It is a refining work He does in me. He does not want me to be entangled in bondage, and fear is bondage. Period.

God is working on me, refining me, so that I can come to a place where I say ALL is yours. I came into this world with nothing and I will leave this world with nothing. I am not to hold onto something so dearly, more dearly than my trust in God. Because that is when the fear and doubt move in. See, if I am truly going to be surrendered and totally broken before God, I have to surrender EVERYTHING. Even my right to enjoy a long life, life long friendships, healthy pregnancies and a long and happy marriage to Greg. And, it includes I have to surrender even Carter. That Carter will outlive me and that he will be disease and accident free.

I have to give up the right to smooth sailing. Because as much joy and happiness this life brings, the Lord wants me to know and understand Him. If there were never any trials then I would never know God as Comforter and Healer. It doesn't mean He is going to snatch Greg and Carter from me --but if He does, I have to know and understand that He had a bigger picture in mind. I may never understand hurt and loss, but as long as know who is the Comforter in the hurt and loss, then the why really doesn't have to be answered. This life is a VAPOR. Poof, and it is gone. God is bigger than my love for family, Greg and Carter, health and friendships.

In a sense, I feel God is teaching me about looking forward to Heaven. When person is young and full of life, the thought of not living life just doesn't really cross their mind. With the death of Roxanne, I had to question, again, this place of Heaven. I have been spared death in my family, family that I am very close to. So, in a way, Heaven seemed like a very far off place. Now, it seems a little bit closer because I have loved ones there. It made me look at my thought of heaven. It made me question it's existence. Process that it really is a place that Christ has gone to prepare for me. Because I am His child. And He prepares it for each of His children.

And not only that, but what comes with heaven....eternity! An eternity of worshipping Him. It will never end and it is going to be so BIG and we will then truly see Christ as HE is! Wow. This life is SO short. It is but a vapor.

I love my life. I love being here on earth. I feel Christ is teaching me to start loving Heaven a little bit more. And, I would assume, the older I get, the closer that HOME, my real home, will be.

I want to be refined, even though it is painful, to be able to look forward to Heaven. To meeting this Peacemaker. The Peace that Passes ALL Understanding.