“Lift up
your eyes to the hills” Psalm 121:1 and go forward. There is no other way.
Walking
through grief with the Lord is an amazing journey. It is complex, yet simple. The complexity comes as I walk around daily
with emotions that conflict each other and move me from joy to sorrow in an
instance. Sometimes I wonder that I am
not immobilized. The simplicity comes in
what I do with that sorrow. In those
moments I choose to lift my eyes to the
hills from where my help comes from because I have chosen to keep God at
the very center of that joy and sorrow.
This choice enables me to continue to go forward. There is no other way for me.
This choice
I have made does not mean there is no more pain and that I don’t experience a
heavy weight on my heart. Summer seems particularly hard as this is when Ryan
would come alive and our home would be the hub of excitement, laughter and activity. Our home is STILL alive and filled with those
things, yet there is always this little anchor of pain that co-exists with me
as I acknowledge that there is something missing. Even when I’m truly laughing and my heart
feels filled with joy, my mind is saying, “Ryan would love this” and an arrow
of pain sears through. Yesterday was filled with those moments and I guess that
is why I find myself needing to work through this today.
It isn’t
hard to imagine where Ryan would be right now and what he would be doing with
his life. His friends, cousins and
siblings have moved on to places that I know, if Ryan were here, he would be
right there with them, experiencing it with them or cheering them on. But then I think, “Would they be there if
Ryan hadn’t died?” Life is filled with
cause and effect and we don’t know how circumstances would be different if our
circumstances hadn’t changed; if our lives hadn’t been altered with pain. I am grateful that many, many of these kiddos
have moved forward with strength and purpose; each searching their own walks
with the Lord. I delight in watching
where the Lord is taking each of them and appreciate when they allow us glimpses
into those walks. When we see strength
and beauty in those walks it makes us know that Ryan’s death was not in
vain. Their pain has caused them to
search God deeper and choose beauty over ashes.
That sentence right there brings healing to my heart.
I have
learned to trust God with each moment of my life, understanding that He has the
eternal perspective. He knows what “cause”
will bring about the right “affect”. He
has my best interest and has the best interest of all who love Ryan. And, if I
really mean that, don’t I have to trust that Ryan’s death is part of God’s bigger
plan? That takes real trust. But
God has never failed me, so in
those moments of searing pain when my joy and sorrow meet, when his absence is
felt so deeply, I must lift up my eyes to the hills and say, “O.K. God, I trust
you for the bigger picture. Turn my
ashes into beauty.” And then, I have to
let him do that by not clinging to my ashes.
Healing is
coming. The pain is not so
constant. But I think the pain will
always be with me because God uses it to keep me close to Him. It keeps me in that place of needing to lift up my eyes to the hills in order to
move forward. It puts me in a place of
trusting God for wherever I am, and know that however it is wrapped, in joy or
sorrow, pain or laughter, His plan is to
prosper us and not harm us, to give us hope for the future. (Jeremiah
29:11).
Our hope is
in our future. Luke just returned from
Guatemala last night and today Amanda returns from Costa Rica and Cassie from
Utah. My two nieces, Libby and Elle and an
extra friend, will be joining us on Tuesday for a few days. Our home is going to be alive and filled with
joy and laughter as we all move forward experiencing that “bigger picture” that
God has designed for us.
I continue to move forward.
