My Family Journal: 2011

21 October 2011

The Grace of Christ & the Love of God Be With you

A knock on the door interrupted my conversation with my mother as she looked up and whispered, “Oh no, I don’t remember her name.”

I went to the door, invited her in and introduced myself. “It’s nice to meet you,” she replied. “I’m Jan from down the street. I thought your parents would enjoy some soup I made today.” After a short conversation, I thanked her, and she began to leave, then turned, and added, “ I learned this from your Mom, you know.” My puzzled look cued her to explain. “Shortly after I moved here, I fell ill. Your Mom didn’t even know me, but she brought me soups and pies. It was so nice, I knew that when I had the opportunity, I wanted to do the same for others.”

When Mom died three weeks later, I knew that she was safe in God's hands. Her reputation for assuring that others were cared for was her chariot to heaven. At the memorial service and days later at the funeral, I greeted the guests, one after another speaking of her compassion and generosity. Then looking up above the display of family photos, I saw her smiling down on her family and friends. Her reward was more than eternal life with God. It included the joy of seeing her family comforted by hundreds of neighbors and friends who remembered the woman who brought delicious food to them whenever they needed a helping hand.

God's grace sent us the Messiah, that by faith and through our love of God and neighbor, we may enjoy our relationship with God forever. Titus 3:7

07 August 2011

The Lost Love, The Prodigal Love

There was once a family, two parents and three children. The oldest child said to his family, "I want to begin my adult life, with family, home, and a career I love." Then the second child said to his family, "I am an adult now, and I want to start my family, buy a home, and begin to search and choose my career." Finally, the third child said to her family, "I, too, am an adult. I have chosen my career, and I am ready to begin my family."

So the parents said, "Go, with God's blessing and our's, for that is what each of us must do when the time of adulthood arrives." So the oldest child packed his bags and left for distant lands. There, he formed his family and found great success in his career. Likewise, the second child packed his bags, and though the lands he settled were not so distant, the career path was full and his family, like his elder brother's, began to grow. Finally, the the third child packed her bags, found favor with a fine young man, and with her career blossoming began to build her family.

And the parents said, "Our lives have been fruitful. Our children are strong, and healthy, becoming independent, and bound to increase the size of our family and, with that, our opportunities to spread the love we feel to many, to their spouses and their children, not to mention extended family members."

After some time had gone by, the children found their lives filled with activities and obligations that overflowed the vase of time available. When one of them would hunger for love, he or she would find it within the narrow lands now occupied by his or her small family and circle of friends. What need to look beyond this immediate place for love? Each personal vessel was adequately filled with love in his or her own home and local community.

Then an invitation arrived. Parents, some distance away now, not necessarily geographically, but psychologically, at the least, sought reunion. This family, growing in size, success, and independence, had grown in distance, too, and if each of the children did not notice it, certainly the parents did.

One child responded that with multiple schedules to meet and obligations to fulfill, a reunion was simply out of the question. Another child noted how this distance traveled, not necessarily geographically, but psychologically, at the least, established a seeming barrier to such an event as a reunion. And yet another child expressed concern at hob-nobbing with individuals whose style seemed incompatible with his or her own.

So the parents, noting the wide chasms within their family, curled up in their quilts for comfort and attempted to wipe away their tears of sadness. To them, love was forever, and love for their children was unconditional. Not unkind words, nor harsh judgement, nor absence could erase the love they felt for each of the children they had brought into this world. They understood, that people are different, and that liking one another or feeling respect for certain behaviors of others would be too much to expect of mere mortals.

But God gave to each of us the ability to love everyone, and expected us to share it with each other. Love doesn't mean you like someone. It doesn't require us to respect their behaviors. Love lives to grow, and the more we love the people we know, the more we can love the people we don't know. When love is given away, it multiplies, increasing all love given and all love received.

Somehow, this message of love reached each of these children, their spouses and all of their families. And while the children were still a long way off, the parents saw them, and their hearts pounded, as they raced toward them, embraced them, and kissed them. And each of the children, in his or her home that night, prayed, "God, forgive me for I have forgotten your greatest commandments. Today, through the love of my parents, You have reminded me that if I cannot love my brother or my sister, then surely, I cannot love You."

And not far away, a small child heard his parent speak this prayer, and she too, spoke to God, saying, "God, please guide me, as I grow up, to always remember my brothers and my sisters, not in judgement but in love."

24 April 2011

"It is Finished"

Good Friday: April 22, 2011: As the Pastor read the story of Jesus' final hours, I noticed the black organza that covered the banner hanging to my right. A breeze blowing through the church blew the bottom half of the cloth off the banner. I wondered: Will the breeze continue to blow the cloth throughout the service? Or, if it stops, might it stop at the moment that Jesus dies in the well-known story of His crucifixion? I continued to look periodically, but found myself focused on the story during the scourge against Jesus. Sometime after the crucifixion, I looked up again to see that the breeze was no longer blowing the cloth. As the story reached the final moments of Jesus' earthly life, the cloth of mourning was still. The wind that had caused the cloth to flutter and expose the banner was quiet, as if to say, "It is finished."

Good Friday services are filled with emotion. The black organza blowing in the breeze, then resting in peace at such a moment, brought a feeling of peace to a moment of trauma.

01 March 2011

Diffuse Systemic Scleraderma

My Mom died at the age of 75 after suffering for several years with Diffuse Systemic Scleraderma. We knew it then as CREST Syndrome. CREST stood for the 5 aspects of the disease which a person could have. Mom had Calcinosis, Raynaud's Syndrome, Esophageal ??, and Scleraderma, but not the component that begins with the letter "T."

About two years before she died, she was placed on an experimental medication that my memory tells me cost the government (research?) $3,000 a month. In August of 2005, Mom returned to Mayo Clinic for evaluation, at least part of which was to determine the effect this experimental medication was having on her disease. The tests indicated that her disease was progressing: She was getting worse, fast. Their conclusion? This experimental medication did not work. They took her off the medication.

Less than a month later, in September 2005, Mom and Dad left, as usual, for their winter home in Texas. About the middle of September, I received the first of what was to be many telephone calls from my Dad. Each one was a repeat of the first: "Mom had a really bad night, and I didn't get any sleep. This has been going on for some time, and we can't keep going like this. We need help."

I always responded with, "I'll fly down as soon as I can get a flight." The call ended with an affirmation of that plan, only to be followed up within hours by another call. "We've talked it over. Don't come. We were just tired, and feeling hopeless. We have rested, and we are ok. There is nothing for you to do here. Don't spend the money now. Wait. We'll let you know if things get worse."

Finally, on Oct. 3rd, the number of these emergency calls convinced me to reject their conclusion that I should not fly to Texas to spend time with them. I stayed with them for 8 days, leaving at that time only because they insisted I needed to return to my home and family. Before leaving, I visited my mother's sister, who lived near them in Texas. In our conversation, I found an opening I considered safe for delivering to my mother's favorite sister the message I knew she wouldn't want to hear: "I don't think Mom is going to make it to Christmas. She might make it to Thanksgiving, but not much longer."

I returned home and immediately contacted my four siblings to give them the same message and encourage them to find an opportunity to visit as soon as possible. Three weeks later, on Nov. 3, 2005, while two of my sisters were flying home from their last visit to our mother's bedside, Mom died.

Less than 2 months after she discontinued her experimental medication, Mom's disease killed her. For about two years, taking this medication, Mom lived with her disease; was it because this experimental medication was slowing the pace of the disease? I suspect we will never know, but the drastic change from some deterioration to immediate decline followed by death within 2 months seems to indicate that this experimental medication was having a positive impact. Without a baseline to which we could compare the progression of her disease during those two years, we won't know the answer to this plaguing question.

My Mom kept a daily journal. My Dad still has all volumes of it, and I have read portions of it. She provides more detail than I am able to remember and record here. I wonder, with the lack of research on this disease, if her case with her notes could help someone else suffering from Diffuse Systemic Scleraderma experience a better outcome.

My Personal Post-Note:

Most of us must experience the death of a mother, and I know that God's presence was my most powerful crutch through this difficult time. It is only human, however, to carry the memory of regrets. I have two of them. #1: While visiting her, Mom wanted desperately to have her hair washed. She was too sensitive to cold temperatures to go to the shower and too weak to climb two stairs to reach a sink, so we never washed her hair. #2: When I said "good-bye," she was sleeping in her recliner. That was what she wanted me to believe, and I fell for it. I said "good-bye," in general to the space in which she and Dad were sitting, but I didn't go to her, hug her and give her my love and personal good-bye. These are hard failures to live with, but once again, I know God is giving me strength to accept my failures and live with them in peace, and in the joy of believing that she is better off where she is than she was when she was suffering from this awful disease.

13 February 2011

My Family Journal: Ephesians: We Are God's Temple

My Family Journal: Ephesians: We Are God's Temple: "A couple of years ago, my middle school Sunday Church School class built 'God's Temple' based on the book of Ephesians. Our interpretation ..."

Ephesians: We Are God's Temple

A couple of years ago, my middle school Sunday Church School class built "God's Temple" based on the book of Ephesians. Our interpretation came from Henrietta Mears book, What the Bible is all About. In his letter to the Ephesians, Paul describes the church (ecclesia) as a building of "stones" with the "Christ Stone" at its head. We are the "stones," and understanding the rooms of this temple provides a deeper understanding of Paul's message to the people of Ephesus, and of our relationship with God.

With Chapter 1, we explore the Anteroom, where we are reminded of how we are blessed by God. We are "saints in Christ Jesus," "chosen," "redeemed and forgiven," "sharers in His promise," and holders of the "wisdom of God." This was God's intended foundation for us from before the creation of the world. How well do we know the platform from which we begin our relationship with God?

We might be tempted to tremble as we enter Chapter 2, the Audience Chamber of the King. Like Paul, we are ever mindful of our sin-filled past, made whole by the greatest gift of all, the blood of the King's son. Here, the Holy Spirit is prepared to guide our transformation, welcoming us, teaching us the difference between the darkness and the lightness, between the desperation and the hope, between a Saul and a Paul. What wondrous love is this?

In the Throne Room, we anticipate the need to certify our right to enter, but instead, the Lamb of God invites us in as one of the flock. We are here by God's grace and mercy. Like Paul, we seek to be "strengthened by the Spirit" and have "Christ live within us." We hope to know the "breadth," "length," "heights," and "fullness of God."

Entering Chapter 4, the Jewel Room or the Garment Chamber, we are reminded to shed our old ways and put on the garments befitting the children of God. Each of us is a "gem" designed uniquely by God and for a purpose. We are baptized and become one of God's own, with "complete humility," "bearing with one another in love," and "keeping the bond of peace."

The Choir and Oratory Room (Eph. 5) reminds us of our responsibility to accept, acknowledge, and share our God-given talents for the benefit of all of God's family. Instead of burying our talents, we invest them, witnessing to the power and glory of Christ and helping our community grow.

Finally, we enter the Armory where we put on the armor of God, the strength to stand with our Triune God and display the glories of being in a relationship with the Almighty King, the joy of being part of God's Kingdom, and the peace of knowing we can always trust God with our fears and our failures. "Here I am, Lord. It is I, Lord."

After building these six rooms, we decided we needed a "patio" on which to celebrate our community with God. The patio was imprinted with their hand-prints, and within each hand-print, each student described how he or she is different BECAUSE of his or her a relationship with God. "We belong to God. We belong to God."