Soul Sister Time

              When I surrendered my vocation to God back when I was seventeen-years-old, He called me to a life of walking through the most broken realities that people face in a first-world country.  The verse that led me to this life was 2 Corinthians 1:3-4.  Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort,   who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God .  I began counseling others at the ripe age of 23.  I looked like I could have still been in high school, and the patients given to me rightly had their doubts.  I had my doubts too.  I knew that I didn’t have the wisdom to counseling people double my age.  I didn’t have a lot of experience of deep wounds either so I couldn’t talk to them from my own experiences of deep brokenness....

              I had the privilege of spending the last week with my daughter and her seven-month-old daughter (my granddaughter).  There is nothing better than to witness the love, sacrifice and instinctual wisdom of a new mom.  My admiration for a strong daughter was heightened because during her visit a friend from college passed away.  His death was sudden and very much unexpected.  His wife was so faithful to keep us up to date on his injury and the ways we could pray.  He himself left many video messages that will comfort the family in the years to come.  However, at the point when disaster struck, the one who had to be strong—though she was facing her own shock, fear, denial, anguish—was his one and only daughter, a strong daughter like the one I have.               I don’t know his widow, but I have journeyed the path...

Thirty-two years ago on July 5, I received the shocking call from my now husband that his mother had been killed.  Her death was tragic enough for someone like me who knew and loved her.  I was devastated but not as devastated as her six children.  How would they make it after such a soul crushing loss? Thirty-two years later, I am married to her son and continue to be grateful for the love that laid such a great foundation or the man he is and the husband he is for me.  He often quotes his mom :  It’s the tone that makes the music .   It’s so freeing to be loved by someone who gets me. He knows when I’m teasing winks at my comments in an understanding way.  For this reason, I am very grateful for his mom.  She gave me a wonderful husband who learned from her that faith, love, acceptance, persistence and family are the most valued qualities to focus on in this life. She would claim that her faith in Jesus Christ is was made her the woma...

            My friend took me to see the new Disney Pixar cartoon Inside Out.  I had no idea what it would be about, but she said I would love it and I did.  They did a creative job of illustrating how complicated and wonderfully made we are.  I loved the lesson that sadness has a purpose in our emotions and how everything breaks down when we don’t allow this particular emotion to do its work.             Processing sadness leads to peace if not joy.  Sadness is necessary in all of our lives.  Expressing sadness is the only way to true peace.  I don’t know how many tears I have shed over the last three years since my husband died suddenly.  God does. Each tear has been a gift from God to help me move towards peace and joy.  Each one is so important to God that none have ever gone unnoticed.  If I reject my tears, I won’t function...

            One week, one month, and now one year has passed since my world was turned up-side-down.   At first time felt like an eternity, each day the reality that my beloved husband was no longer with me here on earth drug on and felt like it would never resolve.   Now that a significant amount of time has passed, it doesn’t seem possible that we have lived through one whole year without him.   How did we get here?   Where have we been?   How did the earth revolve completely around the sun?   We are surviving.   We are grateful.   We have had a lot of help from heaven and from earth.             I have discovered more intimately how death is a major spiritual formation in our lives.   Whether we are deeply spiritual or not, facing death forces us to consider spiritual realities.   Our souIs are opened to a deeper u...

              Grieving has a beginning, middle and an end; groaning on the other hand is a different story.   Groaning will not end until the sons of God have been revealed.    People experience grief over specific events in life.   Groaning is so comprehensive that it involves every miniscule aspect of creation from the tiniest blade of grass to the incomparable soul of man.     I know that I will push through my grief, but my heart will never stop groaning and I will not be alone.   Romans 8:22-23 says, We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.             Groaning is a gift from God that helps us find...

            Of the over 1,000,000 prayers that were prayed on behalf of my husband, I don’t know of one prayer that asked God to take him home to heaven.   Selfishly, none of us wanted to let go.   I felt these prayers as they bombarded heaven along with mine.   I asked God to miraculously heal my husband right up until the very end.   I know that God could have done that for me.   I believe that He has the power.   I know He has done that for others (albeit rarely).   Brian was always one to get the remarkable blessing.             As Peter is quoted in Acts 11:17, Who was I to think that I could stand in God’s way?   Peter was dealing with a spiritual reformation that included bringing the Gentiles into God’s love and plan of salvation for the world, long promised in the Abrahamic Covenant.   Yet the same principle applies...