Faith

Faith is believing in things you cannot see. The reward of faith is seeing what you have believed.
Augustine Hippo

Grace is...

Many of you know of the recent tragedy in our church family. At the church where Chris is the Associate Pastor (and only 1 of 3 paid staff): our pastor's adult son, Brent, has passed away suddenly (after a long battle with addictions) while the pastor and his wife (Roger and Deidra) were on a trip to the Grand Canyon (curtsey of our church for their 5 yr anniversary as pastor there). They were able to return to NC yesterday and have made funeral arrangements for Saturday.

In light of more grief, I have been thinking about grace and I thought I'd make a list of the ways grace has sustained me these last few days. After all, what else is there?

Grace is:

• a job that I can leave at 2 in the afternoon when I received the bad news
• our music minister and another church member who helped chris sort out what to do
• a new baby forthcoming in our pastor's family to his daughter...soon to be born in a couple of weeks
• our pastor's sister and husband already at the lodge waiting to join in a few days vacation with them when they learned this horrible news
• the mountains in the distance of Mount Airy that I can only see on clear days like today, that remind me that God is always there even when I can't see Him, just like those mountains are always there even though I forget about them when it's hazy
• an amazing church family that holds each other, holds us, and holds Roger and Deidra
• a mentor like Jack Glasgow for Chris for 5 years while we were in Zebulon, who taught him how to be grace, love and peace in times like these
• my husband
• the fact that we felt called to Mount Airy almost a year ago and accepted a position that was newly created and will sustain Roger "for such a time as this" and the belief that we were called "for such a time as this"
• words, thoughts, prayers, emails and phone calls from our own circle of friends who lift us up
• my dog who immediately forgives me and loves me when I take out my grief on him by yelling and being ugly when he didn't do exactly what I wanted
• David Crowder songs which provide me a way to express what I am feeling
• the way the love of people embodies the love of Christ and helps me to see that love is more powerful than death. I'm not sure I have fully accepted that in this past year, maybe because we did so much of our grieving for Kyle on our own. But now, I see how the body of Christ is hurting and how their love for Roger and Deidra, and even Chris and I, is being the love of God. I can't even put it into words...I will have to think on that one for awhile.
• hugs
• being able to write here
• tears

Roger has requested that we sing "Were it not for grace" at the funeral b/c the last time Brent was there, we sang that song. Last night we were practicing it and the main chorus says: "Were it not for grace, I can tell you where I'd be, wandering down some pointless road to nowhere, with my salvation up to me, I know how that would go, the battles I would face, forever running but losing the race, were it not for grace."

I know I can't understand what sustains us in this time....it is beyond my human comprehension. How is it possible that God gives us strength? How do we find grace at all? It is beyond what I will ever understand. And I praise Him that he gives it to us anyway, knowing, we will never get it.
Keep us in your prayers. Roger and Deidra Gilbert. Their daughter Kristi, her husband Jeff and daughter Jessi and soon to be baby Jake. Brent's wife, Jacki and daughter Autumn. Chris. Our church family. Grace, Grace, God's Grace.

What I was going to say...

I was going to write this blog:
Have you ever felt like you were two seconds too late?
Chris and I were in Winston last night running errands (we're getting a king sized bed (!!) tomorrow and we needed new sheets, yea!, solid sleep for Natalie!!), and as we were returning to my work parking lot to pick up my car, we saw the most amazing sunset. I mean, seriously, probably the most amazing one we've seen here in NC. I'm not sure you can beat a Texas sunset. Texas may be lacking in a lot of aesthetics but sunsets it's not. But this one was a top 5 for sure.
Anyway, it was behind us as we were traveling, lit up the whole sky. We stopped to take a picture, but it was late and dinner was still waiting so we pressed on away from the sunset towards my car, where we would turn out of the parking lot and in about 10 minutes be driving into the sunset. I kept thinking, if we could just hurry up, we'll drive into it the whole way home and then I can enjoy the sunset while getting somewhere at the same time. That shows how much I know about the sun and time. I think the sunset changes faster than seconds when it is slipping off the horizon and by the time we got my car and got on the road, it was pretty much gone. And all I could think about telling you was how I was two seconds too late (ok, a little more than that, but it sounds good). I kept thinking of how I shouldn't have taken as long at Target to look at sheets...THEN we would have caught the sunset. And it made me think about the weekend and what else I might have missed out on because I was "two seconds" too late. I was in a bad mood and criticized Chris and missed out on some time together. You get the point...I was thinking of all the times I've missed something amazing because I was doing the wrong thing.
But,
then I realized...
that's not the right blog to write. Because it shouldn't be about what I missed out on. It should be about what I DID get to experience. So I didn't get to drive home into the sunset, but at least I saw it. If I could learn to live my life in a state of thankfulness instead of regret, I think I could learn to be more like Christ.


Something to ponder over for my next blog, "How do you want to be remembered?"
I've been thinking about death again...Steve Erwin, the Crocodile Hunter, died this week, and that makes me really sad. Chris and I watched him all the time when we were first married and one year I taught geography on Australia and used his show for several lessons. Thinking of him reminds me of "those earlier days." So I'm sad for the passing of that time of my life, I'm sad for our loss of his life and excitement and enthusiasm for nature, but I'm also sad for his wife and young kids. And I see a lot of parallels between him and Kyle...they both died doing what they loved and left this world too early and taught us more than we will ever grasp. Anyway, it's got me thinking about what they will be remembered for and what I will be remembered for. Of course, that's a different question than how I WANT to be remembered. Think on it with me for a few days.

Final thought...if you haven't seen V for Vendetta, you need to. Maybe we can discuss together sometime soon. It's been in my mind all week, very powerful.