death

Losing loved ones is never an easy pill to swallow. I've been grappling with this as there have been at least 6 deaths in the span of a few weeks of people I knew. Compared to death rates worldwide, I know 6 is not even a drop in the bucket, but it still feels like people are dropping like flies.

Dying due to old age or sickness is somewhat manageable. The unexpected deaths, however, are the most difficult to explain or understand. Yesterday I spent the day with 3 children whose father had just died the night before. Apparently, his body had been found hanging from an aqueduct bridge and tragically, it appears to have been suicide. That cry of desperation in itself is a sadly accurate reflection of the emptiness and hurt in alot of people I meet up here. But to see that passed on to children is heart-wrenching. While driving over to their house in the morning, I didn't know what to think. How do you explain to children that their father didn't want to live anymore? How do you answer their question of 'why'?

I spent the day trying to console the children: a four 8-year old girl, 10-year old girl, and an 18-year old boy. Yet I didn't know what to say. In my own mind I was running over the slew of possibilities of what God was intending through this circumstance. When I arrived at their house, I found the two girls crying next to their mother who was out of her senses with grief and guilt. Seeing this, I told the mother that I'd take the children for the day. The boy was rather silent and tried to appear brave. All I could do was hug them and tell them that it wasn't their fault. Tears rolled down my own cheek as I tried to wipe away theirs.

We spent the day at my place. eating pancakes. letting the girls play with the kitten. eating pizza. letting them be kids. I was pretty speechless, still trying to process how one "handles" situations like this. In my head, I know that God works even through tragedies like this, but I had trouble explaining that to these children. Do you sugarcoat the reality of this? Do you explain that you're not sure where their dad is? I didn't have any answers for these kids yesterday and I still don't.

The gravity of a death like this hangs heavily, but it forces one to think about the brevity of life. Even the good Book points out how our time is but a wisp in the wind. So it causes one to savor and make the most of one's time. It makes one pause and cherish those loved ones wherever they may be. what is important and not so important. Observing death stirs a desire to make one's life count because God is that good.

from the words of David many centuries ago:
"But me — who am I, and who are these my people, that we should presume to be giving something to you? Everything comes from you; all we're doing is giving back what we've been given from your generous hand. As far as you're concerned, we're homeless, shiftless wanderers like our ancestors, our lives mere shadows, hardly anything to us. God, our God, all these materials - these piles of stuff for building a house of worship for you, honoring your Holy Name - it all came from you! It was all yours in the first place! I know, dear God, that you care nothing for the surface — you want us, our true selves — and so I have given from the heart, honestly and happily."

I hope to do & say the same before my time passes: to have given of myself honestly and happily. One life to live. Oh to learn to rest in His leading and to simply obey, follow, move, respond accordingly. Make this life count!