Finding More than the Corners

So today I was thinking about how my life is like a puzzle, the jigsaw kind. I've heard that life is like a box of chocolates (thanks Forrest) but somehow chocolate just seems too good to describe the last 18 months, so I'm going with cardboard instead.  Back in September of '09 I had all my pieces nicely contained within my box with the pretty picture on the cover, and I enjoyed taking them out and figuring out where they would go. The  landscape was truly beautiful. However, life sneaked up on me and threw that box in the air, and the shower of pieces rained down.

Have you ever lost a puzzle piece?  I have. It drives me crazy to do a puzzle and find a piece is missing. I'll go on a manhunt for that piece so I don't have to see that little hole in the picture staring back at me. I like to finish what I start. Oh, but what a mess if the whole box goes flying through the air. How many puzzle pieces make up a life? That's bigger than a 1000 piece puzzle, believe me. Picture pieces everywhere, as far as the eye can see.

After Bill died I was too tired and distraught to even care about picking up the pieces. Then somewhere along the line I began searching for the corners. After all, Jesus is the cornerstone, so the corners are the important  ones, the foundational beginnings - Seeing and talking to friends and family, staying close to God and going back to church, sleeping and eating, generally functioning with what needs to be done. Put a big old check mark next to these. Most days I've got my corners.

So now I've been looking around trying to figure out how to gather all these other pieces. Problem is, a lot of them don't fit anymore. They're a little mangled and discolored, looks like they've been through a blender, and I'm here to say that they have. However, there's something else too - The picture on the box has changed. The Lord is telling me there's a brand new puzzle. I don't need those old pieces anymore. I can keep the memory of that landscape but it will never be whole in this life again.

So, it turns out I've been trying to fix what cannot be fixed, to finish what is already finished. I can keep the pieces that have meaning and sweep the rest from the recesses of my mind because, as it turns out, some puzzles of life are just meant to have holes, and only Jesus can fill those. So it looks like at this point I'll have to send that box to Him, as only the Master can make it and me complete.

Book of Hope

I recently have had the pleasure of reading Ruth Myers' 31 Days of Drawing Near to God.  What a wonderful work of love for anyone who has ever found themselves alone after the death of a loved one.  Ms. Myers is no stranger to heartache, having been widowed twice in her lifetime, and yet with every day of study she reveals an all encompassing God of love who is always waiting and desiring for us to draw near and bask in His presence.  She gently reminds through scripture that God is sufficient for all that we ever want or need,  that He is our true and only source of contentment, and our first love. Her humble spirit and acceptance of God's direction for her life are both remarkable and truly inspiring.  I recommend this book whole heartedly to anyone seeking respite from loneliness and desiring communion with God.  It does not disappoint!

Download Chapter 1 of 31 Days of Drawing Near to God

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review.

Am I There Yet?

So this particular song was recently swirling around inside my head and heart of late, which was somewhat of a mystery to me. It happened to pop up on Pandora radio while I was listening online and it just seemed to stick but I wasn't really sure why.  On the surface this song seemed all wrong for me. After all, I'm not "going home." I have no childhood home to go back to and I'm not even sure which home I would call "home" if I was able to return. So why the song?

Home - Daughtry
I'm staring out into the night, trying to hide the pain
I'm going to the place where love and feeling good don't ever cost a thing
And the pain you feel's a different kind of pain

Well, I'm going home, back to the place where I belong
And where your love has always been enough for me
I'm not running from, no, I think you've got me all wrong
I don't regret this life I chose for me
But these places and these faces are getting old
So I'm going home, well I'm going home

The miles are getting longer it seems, the closer I get to you
I've not always been the best man or friend for you, but your love remains true
And I don't know why, You always seem to give me another try

So I'm going home, back to the place where I belong

And where your love has always been enough for me

I'm not running from, no, I think you've got me all wrong

I don't regret this life I chose for me

But these places and these faces are getting old

Be careful what you wish for 'cause you just might get it all

You just might get it all, and then some you don't want

Be careful what you wish for 'cause you just might get it all

You just might get it all, yeah

Oh, well I'm going home, back to the place where I belong

And where your love has always been enough for me

I'm not running from, no, I think you've got me all wrong

I don't regret this life I chose for me

But these places and these faces are getting old

I said these places and these faces are getting old

So I'm going home, I'm going home

As I pondered all this in my heart I realized I felt terribly homesick, not for a physical place but for the comfort of love, for the home Bill and I had together - no matter where we were. I have family. I'm not alone in this world, but I am homesick for a place to which I can never return. I wonder if Adam and Eve felt like that when they were banished from the Garden of Eden…sent away from the special presence of God.  This separation of the veil between God and man went on and on until Jesus came and tore that veil away by His sacrifice for us, His death on the cross to cover our sin, to reconcile us to God as it was in the beginning. No more veil, no more banishment - welcome home.  So I take this and I ask myself, "How do I get home?" My heart is searching for a banished home but God, with His love remaining true, offers up an even greater home in Him. He says that we are strangers in this land, and so our hearts long for their eternal homes in heaven. Surely this home will satisfy my yearnings. So for now I console myself with the remembrance that because I've been reconciled, it's normal to feel homesickness now and again. Jesus went and prepared a place for me. It's ready and waiting for me to move in and, what's more, Bill's already there, telling my mom that someday I'm coming home.

The Devil and the Deep Blue Tutu

So now I am past the one-year mark, and April has proved to be a very busy month. I enjoyed the company of relatives who came to stay for a couple weeks, and there are upcoming commitments and obligations yet to be fulfilled. Now that my home is silent once more, with the exception of occasional animal shenanigans, I find myself poised on some edge of expectation like a ballerina on point.  How long can I/will I stay frozen in time?

Others who have walked this way before me say that the second year is worse than the first - and I think, O Lord, is that even possible?  I tell myself that won't be true for me, and I pray with all my might to make it so.  Having experienced the death of my mother at an early age, I am well aware how the memory of death tags along for a lifetime, an unwelcome hitchhiker in the vehicle that is my life.  I used to have Mr. Grim Reaper locked in the trunk of the car but this past year he's been riding shotgun, and I wonder to myself how many months or years it will take me to wrestle him back into submission this time around. However, I have a greater hope.  After all, I'm older, wiser in the Lord, stronger...and more experienced.  I have supportive friends and family. I'm learning to be an open book and to overcome fear.  My unwelcome passenger seems to find all of this distasteful and  I'm thinking that with God's help this little ballerina can take 'em.

Peace Be With You

Beach Memorial

Click on above picture for album.

Today is the one-year mark, the day family and I will commemorate our love for Bill and take time to remember his very unique and special life here on this earth. The past, present, and future all collide into our moments of memorialization - the memory of his life, the acceptance of our present circumstances, and hope for the future.

The very best years of my life were spent with Bill. He was delightedly childlike in his wonder for the world around him, yet wise in his love for the Lord, and he always, always made me feel special.  I miss him and will always miss him. I am glad now that he is no longer ill, no longer trapped in a confining body of deteriorating cells and bones, that his spirit now knows true freedom in the presence of God.  However, I am here, and the house is silent.  I rejoice for him now, but I still grieve my loss, for how great is the loss of a best friend.  I rely on the words of God that He is our first love, that He will never leave us nor forsake us, and that He has overcome this world.  My hope for the future depends on this faith.

At Honeymoon Island we will release balloons in our symbolic gesture of love and comfort one another. Life can be terribly hard and yet wondrous if we choose our perspective carefully. God has set eternity in our hearts, and it gives me peace to know that we were created for more than what we see. While now the glass for us is murky, for Bill it is completely clear, and someday I too shall see His truth and purpose.

I Don't Know Why I Thought of the Fly

A few days ago I was driving my car when all of the sudden I heard it, and then I saw it - a really big fly buzzing around, frantically trying to escape my moving vehicle. Bug splats on the outside of the windshield are annoying enough, but live bugs on the inside of the windshield is just a big NO in my book. However, I took pity on him and figured I'd roll down the side window and let him out.  So while movin' on down the road I  began opening and closing car windows - I rolled down the passenger window but he wouldn't leave, I rolled down the driver's side window, but he wouldn't leave, I rolled them both down together, and he wouldn't leave - all while trying to stop and go on Florida Avenue with a million traffic lights.  The one thing that fly wanted most was what I was trying to give him, but he was bound and determined to get what he wanted his own way.  He wanted to go through the windshield, and he was so blinded by his own focus that he completely missed his opportunity.

Ever feel like this? I'm certain I've been guilty of it. Lord, I want what I want, when I want it, how I want it! I'm working so hard to accomplish my goal, but maybe the way I'm going about it won't work. Maybe God's saying - "Hey, over here!"  "Psst!  That window's closed, but this window's open!"  Maybe if I decided to stop my frenzied flight it would give me time to look around and see that God's already made a way - it's just not the way I expected. Life has so many roads to choose and paths to walk. It's good to stop and get some directions from the Master. If I'm enclosed in sorrow or grief, troubles or despair, and I'm looking for a way out, He can show me - and that definitely beats slamming my head against the glass over and over and over any day.

Getting the Message

Ever have a recurring theme in your life?  No matter where you go and where you turn, there "it" is again?  Well, I find that is often how God chooses to speak to me. Recently He's been trying to teach me about His love for me and my friendship with Him - namely, how much He loves me, and certainly how I can in turn be a better friend to Him.

I recently received a copy of the book Lazarus Awakening ~ Finding Your Place in the Heart of God, by Joanna Weaver. You may recognize her as the author of Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World. While there were moments that my attention strayed from this newest book, the moments that did grab my attention were profound. Just having lost my husband less than a year ago to cancer, sometimes I admit I don't always feel completely loved by God. I have days where I feel somewhat abandoned, alone in this valley. However, Joanna uses her writing to tenderly remind readers how much our Creator cares, even when things look utterly dismal. My faith became sight when reading her interpretation of "Come and See."

"Where have you laid him?" Jesus asked Martha and Mary through His tears (John 11:34).

"Come and see, Lord," they replied. Then together they went to Lazarus's tomb.

Oh how I wish we could grasp the immensity and emotion of this tender exchange and what it means for us today.

Where have you laid your pain? Jesus asks us tenderly. Where do you keep all your shattered hopes and dreams? Where have you laid the part of you that died when you failed or were abandoned, forgotten, or betrayed? Where are you entombed and enslaved, hemmed in, shut down, and closed off?

Come and see, Lord.

That's the only response we need to give. Come and see.

Thank you Joanna for this reminder that when the tomb is shut and dark, and the grave clothes are wound and bound, that Jesus is coming. He's on His way to come and see, and in perfect time will be there to call my name, to wake me from my sleep, and to restore me to life.

If this speaks to you as it did to me, then begin with Chapter 1. I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review.