Words from March 16, 2020:
I found this yesterday when I was cleaning a closet in Elijah’s room. It was with a kindergarten book Isaac had put together for us years ago. I sobbed in that closet yesterday. I miss my son.
The world seems to be falling apart around us and I am still dealing with this deep loss in my spirit. Jesus come quickly…
I remember several weeks ago when we were trying to get answers about/from Isaac’s phone and they weren’t coming. Roadblocks at every turn. I felt so defeated and a dear friend said something that was so wise. I didn’t like it, but it was true.
She said “I think one of the biggest sacrifices you’re going to give to Jesus is the sacrifice of not knowing.”
It is a sacrifice to open our hands and give over our fears. Especially when the news continues to change and it feels like things are spiraling out of control.
We are in that place again. A time of not knowing what will come next. We commit to making wise choices, we try to be a good neighbor, but deep down there is this feeling of “what is happening here?!” And it can be unsettling.
I feel like we have sacrificed a lot lately. I am having to turn these feelings and fears over to God time and time again. I don’t have all the answers. I am just a mom who now holds on to pictures of her boy’s handprint because it is all I have left. And I pray for God to heal my broken heart, to heal our country.
I wrestle and I doubt and I lay it down at the altar because it is all I know to do.
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Two years ago….I don’t think anyone really knew what entering a pandemic would look like, how it would change us. And today as I read my words from that day, I still feel some of the same things. There continues to be unknowns. Maybe there always will be. Even though life seems to be getting back to “normal” in some ways…for me at least, I am a profoundly different person today. Changed by loss, taking each new day with open hands.
I am reading through the Bible in a Year again in two formats this year. The Bible Recap with Tara Leigh Cobble and The Bible in a Year with Father Mike Schmitz. Both are providing interesting and new insights to a text that I initially read through, cover to cover, for the first time last year. Even now as I read and listen each day I am hearing things I don’t remember. I am learning things I didn’t understand the first time.
In my world and from my perspective it feels like we have sacrificed a lot losing Isaac, having to let go of the “knowing why”…and then I think of the Israelites that were stuck in the desert for 40 years after fleeing slavery under Pharaoh. I think of Moses who was so faithful but also so very human. A man who had to guide and lead these frustrating, sinful (complaining) people and because of his own disobedience ultimately didn’t get to go into the promised land himself. Talk about sacrifice!
And now today there are stories on the news of war and suffering and evil and hate and it all feels like too much, doesn’t it? We are constantly moving from one pandemic to another really. If it isn’t an actual public health crisis…it is a world that is broken and hurting and lost.
And so today I pray that same prayer I did two years ago. That God would heal my broken heart, that He would heal our country, and our world. I wrestle with hard text because I see myself in a nation of wandering, complaining people that just wanted to make it into the promised land. Oh Jesus come quickly….but until then, I lay it all at the altar of my God. The One who has been faithful from generation to generation, because it is all I know to do.
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