Month: December 2007

I am home for Christmas, and it’s not just in my dreams . . .

John 1:14 “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

This is a poem I wrote a while back when I was in the middle of a very difficult situation, but had to keep going about my daily routine. It’s an example of my own Lamentations, my acknowledgment that the life we lead here on earth can be so very hard at times.

Life doesn’t stop for a broken heart.

It doesn’t slow down just because

It hurts to breathe, think, talk, eat, write.

And it doesn’t let us off so we can

Cease living for a while

‘Til the pain ceases stabbing every thought

And we can once again laugh without

Wanting to cry.

No, life speeds on,

Careless and carefree,

And there are dishes to wash,

Papers to write,

Meetings to sit through,

Clocks to be punched,

And the broken heart is

Left crumpled and torn

In a corner of our life

Like an old sweater

That there’s no time to mend.
 

I’ve been reading in Jeremiah of late. It’s a tough book to wade through. It’s full of righteous judgment upon judgment upon judgment against rebellious Israel; each one sad and painful. But then, I come to passages like this one in chapter 32:37-41 (ESV):

“Behold, I will gather them from all the countries to which I drove them in my anger and my wrath and in great indignation. I will bring them back to this place, and I will make them dwell in safety. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God.  I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever, for their own good and the good of their children after them. I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them. And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me. I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will plant them in this land in faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul.”

My heart rejoices greatly in that.

Why should I so delight in promises made thousands of years ago to this tiny chosen nation? After all, I am not an Israelite. These promises are not for me, a Gentile member of the Church.

I love these truths because they reveal the God I serve as a compassionate, covenant-keeping God. He loves Israel with an everlasting love. And despite their past and present rejection of him and of his Messiah, these promises will come true. I will see them come true.

And I will marvel at such a wonderful Savior, such a faithful King.

I don’t dread my own death, only others’. It’s selfish of me, I know, but I don’t want to have to be the one to deal with the pain, the mind and heart-breaking loss. I dread the phone call, the burn of tears on my eyelashes, the crazy disbelief, like the time when I was little and Dad and Mom told me a friend had died in a car accident and I just kept thinking they could put her body back together again and she’d be OK. But life, once broken into a billion pieces by the mallet we call death, can’t be fixed.

Not yet anyway.

And the dread I feel sometimes overwhelms the hope – the settled assurance – that the lives of those I love are in the most capable, caring hands in the universe. Their times, as well as mine, are His to determine. He knows when, or if, we will die. I need to rest in that fact that when tragedy strikes my fragile heart, His grace will be all sufficient. Still, I long for, ache for, live for, the “if”. I desire with all my heart to be of the generation of believers who never died, but were instead raptured to live forever with our Savior, to be free from dread, to be free of sin, to be free of decay, to be free eternally from death.

Today I said goodbye to my kids. The last thing I heard as I walked out the classroom door was their laughter. It was a fitting end to the few special months I was privileged to spend with these little guys. I laughed with them every day.

A lot.

This morning was no exception. When my supervisor announced that this was my last day, she told them I was leaving and that I was going to be working at a hospital (my medical practicum starts in January). The kids were quite impressed, based on the chorus of wows. Tommy, apparently, was especially impressed. As he walked out the door, bundled up in his heavy winter jacket and Packers hat, he threw his arms around me, buried his head in my stomach, and said, “Bye, Miss Morrison. Have a good time at the doctor’s!”

And I laughed.

I wasn’t really thinking about it yesterday when I walked into class, but I was thinking a lot about it when I walked out. It was my last class session of the semester. On Friday, I have my last day at my practicum. By this time next week, my semester will be over. I have just one final on Monday. Then in January, I begin my last semester in school. Quite possibly the last one ever.

Wow. That snuck on me. I think I get so used to routine, just getting through the day or the week or the month. And then, wham! what I’ve been doing is over and it feels extremely sudden. I hit that last date hard and get mental whiplash. The end of something is sneaky in a very subtle way. I never expect to be surprised at how quickly it comes, but I always am.

I’m looking out the window now where it’s snowing in the deepening dusk. I’ll be going out a walkin’ in it soon, which will be a nice end to the day.

And for the end of this post, here’s a great statement of trust in the LORD by King Jehoshaphat when “a great horde” was coming against Judah:

2 Chronicles 20:12b “We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”

In Kenya when you haven’t seen someone for a while, you might say upon encountering them again, “You have been so lost.”

And I have been.

But I’m back to wish my faithful (???) readers a Happy December. Last year here in Milwaukee we had a blizzard on the 1st of December. This year the new month has brought with it a lovely wintry mix, i.e. snow and stinging ice pellets driven by 25 mph winds into one’s face. It was a perfect day to play football. Truly it was a fun time, because of the following  combination of factors:

December. Snow. A Saturday afternoon. A pick-up football game with good friends.

What more could you ask for?

(Perhaps me, actually blogging more than 5 times a month, ala November? I’ll be working on it.)