|"Jesus said to her, 'I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?'"|
-John 11v25-26-
This week someone asked me, "is it harder for you now?"
Is it harder now that my mom is no longer a part of the physical world? My answer is no.
Absolutely, it's tough. I'm human, I cry, I get angry and confused and ask dumb questions like, "why?" What's challenging about all this are the adjustments I'm facing and pure lies the enemy throws at me daily: "loner!" "You have no mom." "Everyone is pitying you." "Coming home to an empty house again!" "How can you say you're blessed?" Constant reminders that I'm physically motherless.
Lies.
I miss her. It's still so surreal-- like this is a bad dream. That's the tough part. I find myself alone and amidst the silence, the ugly reality sets in. But this is a different kind of reality. It's a dark, scary, hopeless one. One where death is simply... death.
In the name of Jesus I pray those thoughts away. Jesus clearly says that if we believe in him we "will never die." Those who have died are indeed alive.
It makes me so happy to know my mom is indeed alive, happy, pain-free and young again. She didn't die, she became alive. Her life has finally started; she's living the life that God intended for us to live many years ago.
Waiting is hard.
In the months that I ardently prayed for healing, I simply was waiting. Waiting to see God's next move. I'd say those last few weeks were the absolute hardest of my life.
The sound of the ticking clocks in my house began to taunt me (they still do, in a way, to this day) knowing that each second brought us closer to an unknown tomorrow.
I'm so happy for my mom. She doesn't need to feel the pain of this physical world anymore.
I believe--I know-- that there is a greater destination. I know the kingdom of God is drawing nearer every day. When someone so close to you is so close to the actual being of Christ, you can feel heaven so much more closer than before.
It's been lonely, yes, because we all know that "mom is where home is." Home to me is no longer the habitation made of wood and sheet-rock in Troutdale, Oregon. It's not home because my mom isn't here. My home is now in a wonderful, heavenly dwelling. I'm SO excited for the rapture, you have no idea!
God has been so good to me and has been the anchor to my soul more than ever before. Daily I'm learning how to lean on him, feed my soul and bury the fallen kernels and simply watch something new grow.
|Awaiting the New Body|
2 Corinthians 5v1-10 (NIV)
|"For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.
Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothedinstead with our heavenly dwelling, because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.
Now
the one who has fashioned us for this very purpose is God, who has
given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord.For we live by faith, not by sight. .We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.
So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it.
For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad."|
