GLEANINGS from Claudia: A Byword

Posted on August 9, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“. . . God has made me a byword to everyone . . .” Job 17:6

I love to pray. When one of my sisters in the Lord needs prayer or when I hear of someone that I don’t even know who needs prayer, I delight in praying for them.  I enjoy seeking God’s heart on a person’s behalf and at times what I pray surprises me as I pray it.

Since Becky died I’ve experienced hesitation at times about praying for others – especially those who are in a life and death struggle for a child or other loved one. It isn’t anything that anyone else has put upon me, it is my own inner sense of being the mother whose child died in the face of lifted prayers. I’m living proof that God’s answer to prayer isn’t always the answer that we desperately want. I also know that I can’t pray the demanding, bold prayers for life and health and blessing that I’ve often heard others pray. Oh, I can and do ask for complete healing and life, but in the same breath I pray that the parents of the struggling child are given an “Abraham” heart – that they are willing and able to openhandedly give their child to God and wait on Him for the outcome of that complete trust. Sometimes death is the answer.

I pray for God to manifest Himself in the midst of each situation. I pray for His glory and for His perfect character to be more revealed to both the parents and ailing child and to those with whom they interact because of the sickness. I pray that these parents will be enabled to ‘trust in the Lord and do good, to dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture’ and to ‘fret not as it leads only to evil.’ I suspect that these are not the prayers that most of us want to hear.

But I’ve also gained confidence in praying. Becky’s death has shown me that God is enough even in a worst case scenario. I know that I can let go of my strangle-hold on life-as-I-think-it-should-be and trust Him to do much more than just get me through life-as-it-is. This same God that has proven Himself to me is waiting to hear and answer prayers for others facing a worst case scenario.

Job’s name became a byword for grief, suffering, and trials. I pray that ‘for God’s glory’ will become the byword in all situations for all who know Jesus.

“With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of  His calling, and that by his power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith. We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
2 Thessalonians 1:11-12

Posted in Grief | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

GLEANINGS from Claudia: Sam

Posted on August 7, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“I am in pain and distress: may your salvation, O God, protect me.”
Psalm 69:29

Fresh tears tonight as I grieve for a family I don’t even know. ‘Sam’, the 32 year old sister-in-law of a young man I know, died this morning a week after being involved in a car  accident. She leaves behind a husband, a son, a daughter, sisters, and other family and friends that I can’t count or name.

Our Becky’s death was so sudden. Within hours of her accident she was gone, never having regained consciousness. I grieve for Sam’s family that hoped and watched and prayed and rejoiced and agonized for a week as this one they love gained and slipped and ultimately lost the battle for life. Which is worse? Is there a way to calibrate grief? I think not, but I know I’ve thanked God for the blessing for Becky in not returning to consciousness here, but rather awakening to see Jesus.

I know from what I’ve heard that copious prayer was lifted for Sam’s healing. The same is true for Becky. As soon as we were aware that there had been an accident people all over the country were praying for her health and life. And then death. What is this hard answer? Is this a shouted ‘NO’ or a resounding ‘YES’ to life, to full and complete healing? It pains like a no to us, but I wonder about them . . . about Becky and Sam? Oh that they could talk to us now!

I was eighteen when I first came to know Jesus. I remember thinking, ‘Oh Lord please wait!’ when first I realized He was coming again. I wanted to meet a man and marry and have kids and experience all the sweetness of life. I wanted to share this life-giving Lord with my family and friends. I wanted time before I stepped into eternity. But now pain pushes me and my own pain seems small when I consider the groaning of humans for the years of time. This pain is a between place – it isn’t meant to be where I live. This pain is  an unwelcome bridge from what was, through what is, to what will be. “Oh Lord, I plead for Your comfort tonight for Sam’s family. Birth in us the hope of eternity, may Your salvation, Oh Lord, protect us.”

“A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world. So with you: Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.” John 16:21-22

“That’s why I don’t think there’s any comparison between the present hard times and the coming good times. The created world itself can hardly wait for what’s coming next. Everything in creation is being more or less held back. God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead. Meanwhile, the joyful anticipation deepens. All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it’s not only around us; it’s within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We’re also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy. Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.”
Romans 8:18-28

Posted in Grief | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

GLEANINGS from Claudia: Missing Today

Posted on August 6, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“The hand of the LORD was upon me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?” I said, “O Sovereign LORD, you alone know.”
Ezekiel 37:1-3

So many situations stir up my grief. Last night as Steve and I walked we spoke of Becky and what we miss most about her. I realized that I am missing ‘today’.  I miss who she would be and what she would be doing today.  Today Becky would be a full-fledged Pharmacist. She would either be practicing her skills in some setting- likely a hospital – or she would be in a hospital residency utilizing her skills and learning even more. She was so intent upon that day and so eager to exercise that which she had learned. And Becky would be excellent in that role. She combined a deep and welling compassion with the most amazing intellectual grasp of her discipline. She would’ve fought tenaciously for the best outcome for those under her care. Today Becky would also be more focused on her family. She was always a good wife and mother and Jacob and the girls tell me stories that testify to that fact. But I know that she longed for more time with her family and believed that time would come once she was settled in a career and past the intensity of the last year of Pharmacy school.

So as I remember Becky what I miss most is that which will not be. Something that  brought me to tears this morning also emphasized that lacking. My niece will have her first baby in about a week.  She is over the top excited as she waits for this event. She also waits for my cousin, her Aunt Patty, to come be with her when the baby is born. She waits for Aunt Patty because her mother, my cousin Pam, died several years ago and is part of the great cloud of witnesses. Pam would’ve shared her daughter’s over the top joy and expectation even as Aunt Patty does now. I found myself ‘fast-forwarding’ to the days of my granddaughter’s weddings and the births of their children. How we will miss Becky’s presence during those events. Again I grieve that which will not be.

But my niece Alana’s joy and anticipation at Aunt Patty’s journey to be with her during this birth brings a side dish of comfort. God provides for His children and fills in the places where there is lack. Will Alana miss Pam during this experience? Of course! But God fills up with the deeply loving presence of Aunt Patty that which is lacking due to Pam’s early
death. Aunt Patty is beside herself with joy at being asked to be with Alana and Alana can’t wait for Aunty Patty to be there – joy abounds!

In all of this I take comfort in the sweeping vista that scripture offers. Read Job and see that the grief and questions that I express have plagued man since time began.  Read
Ezekiel and see the power of death overcome by the power of God. God is in the midst of life and death, of time and eternity. God was in yesterday, He is in today, and He is in tomorrow. The tomorrow that I once anticipated will not be, but there is a beautiful God-breathed tomorrow coming and I can trust that there will be life and a full measure of His good provision in that day.

“This is what the Sovereign LORD says: O my people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel. Then you, my people, will know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the LORD have spoken, and I have done it, declares the LORD.'”  Ezekiel 37:12-14

Posted in Grief | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

GLEANINGS from Claudia: A Cheerful Heart

Posted on August 4, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“A happy heart makes the face cheerful, but heartache crushes the spirit.  The discerning heart seeks knowledge, but the mouth of a fool feeds on folly.  All the days of the  oppressed are wretched, but the cheerful heart has a continual feast.”
Proverbs 15:13-15

I’ve been blessed with a naturally optimistic outlook. My tendency in life has been to see blessing and expect good to come out of even hard times. Since Becky died what was once an inherent tendency became an often unachievable discipline. But in the last few weeks I’m feeling my nature return. As I sit in the morning enjoying a quiet time and a cup of coffee I feel deep satisfaction and joy. This same pleasure and acknowledgement of blessing comes and goes throughout the day in the natural way it has in the past.

Interestingly a part of me resists this return to any aspect of the pre-loss me. It is as if I need to be sad . . .  even inconsolable . . . to be true to the magnitude of the loss of Becky. The loss is huge even to the point that I still have a hard time remembering that I’m living out the year 2011.  It is as if time stopped December 29, 2010. And yet each day holds a measure of sweetness that I just can’t ignore. I penned the following a night or two ago when sleep eluded me and this morning I’m quietly praising God for sweetness like a gentle summer breeze.

You’re gone
The sun shines
My heart beats
Flowers grow
Coffee tastes good
Some love me
And I them

Cats still purr
Warming my lap
Two beautiful blondes
Love me
Prayers are answered
Fair is coming
And the rodeo

We walk
Work in the yard
Ignore the news
Serve the Lord
Rejoice in friends
And celebrate
Their joys

Food and friends
Spice each other
Songs speak beauty
My heart joins in
My mind explores
My spirit soars
Even though you’re gone

Praise God for gradual healing and the realization that the gentle return of enjoyment doesn’t demean the memory of Becky in any way. My days are still sprinkled with tears, but leavened with joy. I can see hope for the day when the loss is a quieter portion of me, tucked away in that joy.

“Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him.”  Psalms 126:5-6

Posted in Grief, Poem | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

GLEANINGS from Claudia: Want

Posted on August 1, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.”  Psalm 23:1

At times my life intersects with the life of a person in want. A bit of definition is required here because I’m not referring to those in deep poverty and deprivation. This person is the one for whom life’s blessings are never quite enough. In fact, those blessings are often invisible to the person in want.

I’ve found that if I have opportunity to offer a gift to a person in want, they will be
dissatisfied with what I’ve offered and want more or a different color or just plain want something else. As I watch them engage with life’s circumstances nothing is ever good except in retrospect when what they once lived becomes much more attractive than what they live now even if that which they once lived caused complaints during the time it was being lived out. It is as if this person has an internal sieve that strains out blessing and deliberately lives in want.

Kenneth E. Bailey in his book “Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes” offers a unique  translation of the very familiar phrase from the Lord’s Prayer “Give us this day our daily
bread.” He gives compelling evidence that the phrase should instead be translated “Give us today the bread that does not run out.” I love everything about this phrase. It recognizes daily bread as a gift – a blessing from the hand of a providential Father.  It completely removes fear and fret from the compelling need to eat instead expressively resting on the provision of a God capable of caring for tomorrow’s need today. It recognizes the idea of ‘enough’ for today and ‘abundance’ that supplies enough for tomorrow also. And it is a prayer for provision for ‘us’ – not just for my needs, but enough to meet the need of the community of need around me. This prayer equips me to trust enough to share the blessings poured out on me.

I know that there are times in my life when I am a person of want. When I see what God has put in my life and I want something different or something more. How I desire to be a
receiver of blessing instead of a keeper of chaff.  I also see that I can trust the ‘wanters’ in
my sphere to the abundant provision of God. “Oh Lord open my eyes to see Your hand in every little thing. Shape me into a receiver of blessing and a giver of the same. May I never grieve You by not even seeing that which You so richly pour out on me.”  

“This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him.” Deuteronomy 30:19-20

Posted in Abiding | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

GLEANINGS from Claudia: Seven Months

Posted on July 29, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.”  Psalm 9:10

July 29, 2011 marks seven months since Becky’s death.  I woke this morning with the song “Blessed Be Your Name” by Matt Redman on my mind. So appropriate . . .

Blessed Be Your Name
In the land that is plentiful
Where Your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name

Blessed Be Your name
When I’m found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed Be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I’ll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be Your name
When the sun’s shining down on me
When the world’s ‘all as it should be’
Blessed be Your name

Blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there’s pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I’ll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

I remember loving this song over the years that I’ve sung it. In the past I was acutely aware that I’d not experienced the depth of sorrow that the song acknowledges. I didn’t ‘know’ — and I’d not been called to bless and praise the Lord in the face of agonizing pain. Now I know. There have been days when it is hard to enter into praise. Those are the days when the sorrow and questions and unanswerable loss well up and surround and enter me like an impenetrable fog. There are also days when the praise and worship just bubble up and out – like this morning. I did nothing other than awaken into praise!

I remember at some time participating in a ‘trust’ exercise.  I stood with a blindfold on in a very quiet room unable to see or hear anything. My job in this exercise was to simply fall backward. Every part of me screamed ‘No! Don’t do something so foolish!” My life experience taught me that to fall backward meant pain and possibly severe injury. But I also knew that a circle of friends stood behind me ready to catch me when I fell. I feel like I’m experiencing a trust exercise now. I have the choice of holding onto pain and standing
in the unfairness of such an untimely death or of trusting what I know – that God is good and eternity waits and this separation is temporary. Today I awoke trusting and praising God in the inner man. What a blessing!

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Romans 15:13

Posted in Grief | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

GLEANINGS from Claudia: Lost

Posted on July 25, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“I myself will tend my sheep and have them lie down, declares the Sovereign LORD.  I will search for the lost and bring back the strays.” Ezekiel 34:15-16

Lost.  It has been a long time since I felt the intense power of this word.  Recently Amity and Dara and I went on a neighborhood walk to a nearby park. This is a walk that we’ve done numerous times before and the girls are well acquainted with the path that we follow.  As we got within a few blocks of the park Dara wanted to go a different way than Amity and I had plotted out.  I considered her request and told her she could go the other way and we would meet her there. She stepped off confidently and Amity and I continued on the way we were going.

Within minutes we arrived at the park, but Dara didn’t. We continued to walk on the path Dara should’ve been walking until we returned to the point at which we had separated. Still no Dara. I began to get concerned and Amity and I headed back toward home looking for Dara all the way. We arrived home without seeing Dara.  Once inside the house I yelled for her, hoping to find that she had returned home for some reason, but she wasn’t at home either. Amity and I got right into the car to drive back to the park in hopes that she had shown up there and we had just somehow missed connecting with her. As we turned the corner at the end of the street we saw Dara.  She was at the corner of the next block, face flushed, crying, obviously panicked and obviously lost.

Once we had Dara safely in the car, we drove over the various routes between my house and the park. We talked about the importance of not panicking when you feel lost. She sobbed out “Grandma, why did you let me do it – why did you let me walk alone?” I
explained to her that I thought she was ready to walk on her own and that I wouldn’t
let her walk alone again until both she and I agree that she is ready. I also assured her that the whole time she was looking for me and my house, I was looking for her. I loved it that she said back to me “I knew you were looking for me Grandma!”

Dara was confident about her choice to go alone on a different way, but when she encountered the buzzing activity of bees upon her path she lost confidence and turned back. With each step on a different way things seemed less and less familiar until she felt as if she was transported to a place she didn’t know at all. In her panic her understanding clouded and she found nothing familiar and no one to help. Her racing legs covered a lot of territory, but she might as well have been in a different city for no landmarks appeared to guide her way. She truly believed she was lost forever.

When I heard Dara’s “Grandma, why did you let me go?” it resonated to the depths of my soul. So many times I’ve wandered headstrong down my own path and the Lord has freely
allowed me to go the way I chose. When I look around and realize how lost I am, He is there waiting for me to come crying back to Him.  All the time I wander He earnestly seeks me – what a comfort that is to me.

“Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost.”
Luke 19:9-10

Posted in Grief | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

GLEANINGS from Claudia: Time and Eternity

Posted on July 17, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a
chance to eat, he said to them, “’Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.’”  Mark 6:31

Time and Eternity

Time is the substance of eternity
While we yet live
For the moment, this quiet moment,
Time’s boundaries fade, eternity rules
And I know the Eternal One’s love

So many thin places in life
Where eternity seeks to rule
Birth and death
Surfeit and want
Waiting and fretting

Should it not be that eternity is the substance of time?
Time is seen in a mirror dimly
Eternity the solid, real, truth of our existence
Oh Eternal One teach me to abide
Beyond time, living in You

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”
Ecclesiastes 3:11-12

Posted in Abiding, Grief, Poem | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

GLEANINGS from Claudia: Hope

Posted on July 16, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”  Hebrews 11:1

Sunday afternoon I’m heading to Athena to spend the night with Kristin and Christopher on the way to my last visit to the Spokane area.  I go to help Jacob, Amity, Dara and Jacob’s Mom, Barbara, pack up the Coon home for the big move to Philomath. The only reason I’ve ever visited the Spokane area was to see Kristin, Christopher and Helen early on and then Becky, Jacob and the girls once they moved from Missouri. I’ve grown fond of Spokane. I like the rolling hills of the Palouse, the fertile wheat country that nudges up close to Spokane giving way to a rocky and sparse forest just south of the city. And Spokane itself is a vibrant city that seems to have sprung up like a tenacious and
beautiful wildflower in a remote and wild place. But always my memories of Spokane
will be colored by losing Becky there. As long as I live I will remember the shock of the night of her death.  As long as I breathe I will recall the bitter cold five days we spent navigating the snow and ice that took her life. I don’t want to go back and I can’t stand to
never go back again.

After Grandmapa Camp and spending time with Jacob and the girls a week later, Becky has been much on my mind. In some way Jacob and the girls moving here is closing a chapter – it is almost as if we are giving up on Becky — finally acknowledging that she
is gone. I know Jacob has this same sense and I’m confident that the week that he has already spent sorting and packing has been excruciating. He is touching all of their things – some of which haven’t been unpacked since the move from Joplin. Every item – even the most insignificant has to conjure up memories and fresh grief.

Again I find myself clinging to faith.  I hope for the day when we will be together without ‘Missing Becky’ as the caption for our gathering. Beyond that ‘near’ time when we’ll take joy in remembering Becky instead of grieving upon remembrance, I hope for a soon reunion for this family. A time is certain when we will be with Becky together in the company of our Lord.  Faith tells me that this hope is reality waiting to unfold.

I am encouraged by the word ‘substance’ in Hebrews 11:1. The many pictures used to describe what this word meant to the Greek mind include:
* a setting or placing under
* thing put under, substructure, foundation
* that which has foundation, is firm
* that which has actual existence
* a substance, real being
* the substantial quality, nature, of a person or thing
* the steadfastness of mind, firmness, courage, resolution
* confidence, firm trust, assurance.

All of those word pictures speak to me of reality, truth, assurance. In Hebrews 1:3
the same word is used to describe Jesus as the representation of God. “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.” The word ‘being’ is the same Greek word translated ‘substance’ in Hebrews 11. Jesus is the one who took on flesh so that our faith would become sight. In the words of John he is the one “which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at, and our hands have touched . . . 1st John 1:1.”  This same Jesus, the hope of the ages, verifies our faith and shows us God. This same Jesus is the evidence of things not seen. Again today I place my faith in Him!

Posted in Grief | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

GLEANINGS from Claudia: He Is With Us

Posted on July 13, 2011 by Gleanings from Claudia

“And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? That is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Matthew 27:46

In yesterday’s blog entry I prayed thanking God for being the God of every moment of our
lives.  A follower of the blog commented on the truth that “He is in every moment” and how hard it is to actually realize that truth in our daily lives. Her comment caused me to think into this astounding truth again.  My reply to her comment follows.

“In the quiet of this morning I readily know that He is the God of every moment. In the moments of pain or loss or depression it can be harder to grasp this truth. I believe that proving to us that God is in time – even our hardest time – is part of why Jesus came. We get to see Him live within time firmly connected to and experiencing relationship with the Father at every moment. With one exception – on the cross when Jesus and the Father conspired to be out of relationship so that Jesus could bear the sin of all mankind for all time. Connection was lost – moments of time existed when God wasn’t there for His Son — all so that I would never have to experience that extreme loneliness. Because of the gift of freedom of choice I can choose to be disconnected from God – I can enter into sin – but God will never disconnect from me. His face and His grace are always turned toward me! Wow!”

The word translated ‘forsaken’ in Jesus’ heartfelt cry of agony means ‘to leave behind in some place; to desert.’ In the depths of my being I sense the cry of His heart. He came to this world – to the place of God in frail flesh – trusting the Father, walking with Father God in continual communication. Jesus was in some tough places before this, places of  uncertainty and pain, but always connected to Father God.  And now, on the cross, by
His own submission held in frail flesh nailed to splintered wood and somehow mystically becoming sin for us, He is left behind in this god-forsaken place to face death, even death on a cross, alone. So completely alone.

I’ve felt a measure of that at times. The sure knowledge that I’ve come to a place I would never choose to come and done so while doing everything I know how to do to follow
the Lord.  Why would You bring me here? And once You do bring me here, why do you disappear? Once again in the midst of these dark nights of the soul, Jesus is with us. Jesus knows. Jesus has been there. And even when our overwhelming emotions or total exhaustion or complete depression become an impediment to sensing His presence, this you can depend upon — HE IS WITH US!  “Lord Jesus, so often my heart and my flesh
fail. It is as if I become sin, flailing about in the pain that becomes my dwelling place. What a comfort to know that You have been here. You know. You understand. And You have persevered through to a place of joy and salvation for me! Lord I receive that which You have done for me and I chose to live in the place beyond the cross. Thank You that you never leave me or forsake me. Thank You that You are with me always to the very end of the age.”

“The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” Deuteronomy 31:8

“Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28:18-20

Posted in Grief | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment