When we are down to nothing....

Good morning friends,

It is a wacky crazy day at the Grudem house.

One is wacky and nutty and one is "SiCk" he has a cough and a low temp, and you can't go to school with a temp. So he is home for the day. 

This was another rough weekend. Wake on Saturday at the same place my mom's was. That was a rough thing to have to go through so soon. Sunday was at the Catholic church I was raised in. Then lunch after. Long and emotional but so loving. I was so proud of my cousin Angie. She  was so brave. She stood and read her story, it was wonderful. I could never have done that. So heartfelt and enlightening.

I was supposed to read at my moms funeral and I couldn't do it, so I made my nephew do it. I was sitting with our friend Jessica, and had done good til she walked up there. 

Grief is so strange, how different it is when you lose an aunt or uncle, or a more distant relative, it hurts and you miss them, but a parent, spouse or God forbid a child, the grief is like a chunk of your soul being broke off. Like when you break a piece of fudge in half, it doesn't break nice and even, but jagged and crumbling. The kind of wound that doesn't heal perfect but leaves a raggedy wide scar that is painful forever.

You learn to live with the pain, but I don't believe you ever get over it, just learn to adjust your heart and feelings back to reality, but I don't believe the pain ever goes, it may wane a bit and not be sharp, but still remains. 

The Priest yesterday was talking about joy and the abundance of it. How some people are happy or full of joy but feel hollow inside, their joy is real but doesn't fill that emptiness, that hole inside that stays hollow until you find the only thing that fits perfectly into it, Jesus.

He can give you the only joy that goes to your soul.

That will take the pain of grief and soften the edges.

The joy you find in Him is complete, full and never ending. Whereas the joy you feel when someone tells a funny joke or story, you laugh but it soon goes away. 

I want a whole and true joy that permeates all darkness, that makes your soul sing.

Lets find that joy today.  Mostly cause the grief is unbearable, and I am cried out.

Hearing this word from a priest, kind of surprised me, not that I didn't think he could talk about it, it just kinda shocked me  he would at a funeral. It really stirred my soul. There was also a certain comfort being in my old parish. The contours of  the walls, the stations of the cross, the beautiful statuary, but the sadness of Jesus front and center still on the cross, it is like the story froze and ended at that point. There was sadness in that, no hope for salvation, Yes He died but He also rose again. The finality of that kind of shocked me. It shouldn't have, but maybe in my grief it stood out more. I am so thankful I know the whole story. I'm not downing Catholicism at all. I am just thinking out loud. 

Lets find joy and peace in knowing Jesus is alive and reigning. 

No matter what happens in life, death, loss of jobs, moving, divorce, abuse, and on and on.

God is in control. one of my favorite sayings is this...

"When we are down to nothing, God is up to something"

I know in our brokenness God can reign fully. In our pain He brings peace.

In our sadness, joy. 

So today go to God, give Him the things that are out of our control.

Be blessed today.

Always

Suszi