I write this post ahead of time, because I’m not around. I took the week off to be away, to write, to reflect. Today is Wednesday, November 25, and if I had stayed around, I would have been at work and thinking of another Wednesday, when my world changed.
Five years ago today.
It feels like yesterday.
Why is that? Why does loss get suspended in time, never to be forgotten?
It must be love. The Tina Turner song immediately comes to mind, “What’s love got to do with it?” (I know, random, right?)
Thankfully, the Spirit brings to mind something a bit more worthy to remember: “A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.”* When we’ve been tightly bound to another in Christ, their loss brings a slow unraveling to our life, mind, and spirit.
The first few years left me spinning, but then as my cord of life slowly began to find its way, the spin of grief slowed as the fog lifted and God showed me how to keep going in life and service.
Now, I’m standing once again on a mile marker, and as I do, I go back to a verse that’s helped me steady my wobbly legs:
Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far the Lord has helped us.”
1 Samuel 7:12
This verse marked my journal entry just after Raouf died, and then again after my father passed away six months later. Now, I turn to it again, at this five year mark.
Grief remembers, but as change comes, God allows us to put a stone on the place of the memory, not to say it’s forgotten, but to give us the courage to move ahead.
So today, as I remember my love, I place a stone of thanksgiving for the privilege of having been loved by him and for the comfort and strength that God gives me in his absence.
Are you still spinning in grief and loss? Maybe it’s time to put down a stone and go forward in Grace and Peace.
*Ecclesiastes 4:12
Five years …it doesn’t feel that long when Raouf text me to wish us all a happy thanksgiving…and when he called to congratulate us for Soleil..
Thank you for keeping his memory alive… I miss my brother and I’m sure you miss your husband, and mission partner…I have my comfort knowing that he is in a much better place..
Christ promise
“I go and prepare a place for you and where I am you shall also be”
Love you Carol!!
Thank you, Ray. It is hard to believe so much time has passed. He loved his family, as do I. Love you
Thank you, Carol for your writing and for your courage in sharing your story.
I will share this blog with my son. He lost his 12 year old daughter last year -my precious granddaughter. Reading your words touches me deeply. Moving on still seems impossible sometimes, to both of us.
I will read more. I wish i could have hugged you before you left the AirBNB. #HateCovid. Virtual hug.
Oh, that’s so hard on you all. I trust you’ll be encouraged. If you look under the grief journey tab, you’ll see more. I pray they will help. Thank you again.