Remembering momma

monday, february 06, 2006 ........a reflective repost.

As she was lying there on the bed,visible signs of torment eating away at her now frail body are evident. She may be a hundred pounds, but probably not. Her hair is almost gone. Just a few strands here and there, unable to hide her pale skull as she lies there in the bed sleeping.....or is it semi-comatose? The Cancer has been eating away at her insides for over a year. She only knew about it for the last few months. Two of her sons are standing over her as she lies there in the bed. She can't speak really anymore. The morphine dosage has been increasing daily now. She is out of pain they are told but there is no hope of survival. They are just keeping her out of pain as best they can. Both sons are holding her hands; one on the left, and one on the right. It's upsetting to both of them that she is now unable to communicate anymore. Both brothers are speechless themselves, suffering individually over the demise of their mom who is whittling away into nothing in front of their eyes over the Last week especially. All they can do is hold her hand. Both are full of emotion but unable to express it. It cannot be put into words; how it feels to watch your mother die who was at one time the rock, the glue that held the family together. Then it happened. She was looking at them now. They smiled at her. She mustered up her strength and squeezed their hands. This was encouraging. Then she did something else. She took her two sons hands and pulled on them. She brought them towards her. Both sons let her pull them in close to her in this show of strength on her part. As she brought them to her chest, she didn't pull them in to her body as they thought, instead she ever so slowly intertwined them together over her body. She was putting them together! She placed one brothers hand into the others. The two looked at each other and then to her. She had a pleading look in her eyes. It was clear; she was communicating after all. It was clear to this brother anyway. She wants us to love each other. Take care of each other as you grow. It was a powerful message; one that overwhelmed me! We held hands over her for perhaps a minute. We never really spoke about it after that, but it was clear to me that she was trying to convey to us that she wants us to care for each other because she will not be able to anymore. It's been 18 years since then. We are still in touch weekly by phone. I do love my brother very much. I often wonder if he remembers it like I do. If the message she was sending was as clear to him as it seemed to me. Maybe he wonders the same thing?...................

Life is hard?

I met a kind man this evening. He is well into his eighties and seems to accept the fact that he is close to the end of his life. When asked a few questions about his personal history for the records, he admits that he is getting forgetful and I'm better off asking his wife, "She takes care of me and all that stuff. She knows everything. That woman....she is an incredible woman. I don't know where I'd be without her." He seems overwhelmed with emotion just talking about her. I noticedduring report that he is a WWII vet. In my admission questions I asked him about it. He proceeded to explain to me from his fragmented memory as best he could of how he was "in the pit there with all my buddies around me dead, they thought we were all dead. They came over the top and I just let them all have it." He pauses long at this point woth tears in his eyes. "I've probably killed more people than most men have, but I was doing what I was supposed to do. I don't know why....." He trails off and gets choked up.
I ask him, "Why you? How come you lived?"
"Yea, why did they all die and I got to live. It's not easy...."
"You're left with having to live with what happened."
"They tell me I have something, Post traumatic stress or something like that. I never believed that stuff but sometimes the memories come flooding back. It's true I guess. I don't know what to do with it all. I mean those japs were the enemy but they're people too".
I'm left with trying to let him just share his feelings about it all.
I want to comfort him, to ask him if he has laid these things before his Creator to ask God what he should do about it all. Does he need God to forgive him? Does he want forgiveness? Is it even necessary? Wasn't he just following orders? Wasn't it kill or be killed? I did none of this but listen to him talk about it. One thing I do think about though, he has carried the weight of his past actions all these years......my life isn't so hard. My past is not so heavy in comparison.
Oh Lord help me to be grateful for all you have done for us, as well as all you have protected us from.

Know that the Lord is God; it is HE who has made us and we are His.

These verses from psalm 100 are comforting words. I fall into thinking at times that the Lord is not good. That He actually is an angry God who, when you strip away all the scriptures and things said about Him over the ages, does not like me. I believe Satan is the author of this thought. It was reinforced by a life of sinfulness before I knew the Lord. Satan tattooed it to my heart/soul/mind? that God was against me. As I have been His follower now for over twenty years, this thought has not been taken away completely. In fact, perhaps because of the reality that I still fall into sin on a daily basis as a Christian, satan turns up the heat,(so to speak), by telling me that if I belong to HIM then I certainly should not be falling into sin so much anymore, therefore God is even more angry with me now than before I really knew Him. My thought life can become extremely twisted and unable to discern truth from a lie. This happens to me often; which is the voice of God and which is just me trying to convince myself of getting my own way in life? While I do believe there is a large amount of cause and effect going on in my life; I sin, I feel bad. I must admit that understanding my God given conscience and the proper level of guilt and remorse escapes me most of the time. There is a place for guilt and shame and remorse in life. There are things that are supposed to cause these feelings in us. My understanding of them is skewed. Is it because of my corruptness before I was a believer? Is it because I still have many corrupt thoughts and actions AS a believer? Is it both? Is it because the "spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places" are doing what they are trained to do in tormenting my soul that God is against me and there is no hope for me? I suspect it is all of these things to a degree. My struggle is with grasping the proper use of my conscience. Paul spoke of his conscience being clear in many places in the scripture. That it is a gift from God. It is also corrupted by our flesh. What is the proper understanding of it? I confess I do not know. I want to follow after my Lord Jesus in all I do. The fact remains that I am not.

Oh Lord, I thank you that You are Good. I am yours. I place myself just as I am into your care. I ask for your wisdom and guidance to rest in your arms. To stay close to you today.

Psalm 100

¹ Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.

² Worship the LORD with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.

³ Know that the LORD is God.
It is he who made us, and we are his ^[a] ;
we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

⁴ Enter his gates with thanksgiving
and his courts with praise;
give thanks to him and praise his name.

⁵ For the LORD is good and his love endures forever;
his faithfulness continues through all generations.