In the early season of grief, I was enveloped by trauma. Days weeks or months passing didn’t even register. Tumbling in an ocean wave is what I called it. Not knowing which way was up, not caring which way was up. I don’t even know how long that lasted because time didn’t matter to me. I still can’t tell you.
But today I realized I was in a new season. In this season I found myself thinking, am I really supposed to just live a life until I go to heaven? Get groceries, answer emails, spend time with God in the bible, help someone with loss, vacuum, purge closets, organize desk papers, cry, help Sawyer with his college application, look at Tristan’s things and put off going through them, run errands with McKenna; am I supposed to just keep doing all these things until I die? My child is dead. There has been an inside-out shift in my being, yet my life is just supposed to go on like this? Heaven and seeing Tristan again seem so far away!
Then God brought to mind what Jesus did while He was here. I’m not talking about the last 3 1/2 years of His life while He ministered with the disciples and did miracles to prove He was God in the flesh. I’m talking about the first 30 years of His life.
If the first major event was Creation, the second major event in history has to be the birth of Christ. He is the most important person ever to live. His entrance into our world was announced with angels. At His birth, multitudes of them heralded His excellence.
But then He began an angel-less, unheralded, everyday life. Knowing what was going to happen in His adulthood, and what His ultimate purpose was, He made it through 30 years of brothers and sisters, chores, synagogue school, learning a trade, working in the shop, fetching for his parents, the death of relatives, taking over as head of the family, moving, providing for the dinner table, repairing the house, all day, every day, life. His life was so common that when He did finally burst on the scene, the neighbors said, hey, we know this guy, we know his parents, how can he claim he’s come from heaven?
The most important person in the world was asked to live a portion of life in the most unremarkable way before He got to go Home. The One that He loved was in residence there.
It’s not unique to me to have to endure the mundane until I see my Tristan again. As always, I am reminded that Jesus is my sympathetic High Priest, my Comforter who can relate to my sufferings because He’s gone before me.
Luke 2:13, John 6:42, Hebrews 4:15
Dear Lord, thank You for showing me that the mundane is okay because Jesus did it. I bet He found a way to make the most routine thing a gift to You–a service well performed to glorify His Father. I’m not there yet, but that will make these remaining years a training school to reach that goal. Do you think I can do it? I almost don’t want to try. I’d rather lay down in my Mother’s Day flowers and die. That’s what I feel like. BUT- everybody will still be wanting to know what’s for dinner. My role on earth is not done. Save me from myself. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
