in my weakness

i didn't know that the little bible verse posting on my own blog would somehow speak to me. but it did. i was just getting ready to blog when i read it before i began and that was it. 2 Cor 12:9 has been a place i've landed several times. and so it puts a new perspective on how i was feeling last night. i think now i'm going to choose to praise God. sometimes it's a choice to praise God - not just worship him - but praise him. sometimes i realize that i'm sitting in my gloominess and forgetting the abundance of blessing that comes from pain.

every now and then grief creeps up on me. i think i'm good and solid and then it just hits. not unexpectedly, this time, though. my brother and i are seeing tangible blessings that are coming from my dad's death - and i'm watching my brother be a man who i'm incredibly proud of. it's rare that he cracks and breaks. but sometimes he does. we all do. and so i pray that while he's handling the huge amount of work that comes with selling our childhood river home, that God will meet him where he is and lavish himself upon my brother. i pray for wisdom and peace. i pray for a calm when things are overwhelming and i pray that he knows that no dollar amount will ever matter to me, that there will never be a divide between us. death has no grip on the living and so i won't let the left over stuff hinder my joy. our joy.

and so last night after talking to my brother and then finally finding some quiet time to get back in the word and just allowing myself time to process, i found myself falling. and i just cried. it really snuck up on me this time - or at least in a way more than i thought it would. because it's just confusing and perfectly clear. you see, my dad left us with a historical mess of stuff. and it's been on my brother's shoulders to sift through the mess because he was the executor of my dad's will. and i'm thankful that he was, executor, because it's his methodical thinking and knowledge of handling his own business that has him pushing through the rubble like a champ. and dear jesus it's been an extra full-time job for him. and i don't know what else to do except encourage him and pray for him and love him for the time he's sacrificing from his family to tie up loose loose ends to a life that gave him his.

while i thought about all that my brother was doing, i started thinking about how we were benefiting from our loss. and part of it is financial. we're blessed beyond measure. and last night i kept thinking, 'God, you wouldn't have taken my dad for nothing and given us money for nothing.' so i'm overwhelmed with joy that i'm able to leverage money to help others for the sake of the kingdom of God. it makes me get all giddy knowing that i'm holding hidden treasure that some blessed child of God will get to receive - that a prayer is being answered through the death of a man i called dad. somewhere, i believe, a family is praying for money or groceries or help with their mortgage or clothes for their family...and the little bit of money that we'll be able to share will help.

that's so perfect. so beautiful.

it's just like our God to work out a grace that makes no sense and yet makes all the sense in the world. it's beautiful.

but there's part of me that keeps trying to shake off myself. i miss my dad. and i remember people saying, in past, that when they lost someone that it just seemed like they were on vacation and would return at any moment. i used to scowl at that - that's just ridiculous. but it's not. it's really pretty accurate. death is a mysterious thing - loss is. and last night i had this thought - that i'll share some other time - and i caught myself as i thought 'ooh, i need to call dad and ask him if he knew that happened.' but as soon as the thought entered in, so did the realization that i can't call him anymore. and i know that the reality of it all is that if he was still alive, the conversation would be difficult anyway. i know this.

but hear me on this. my dad was a stubborn and prideful man. but his heart was beautiful and kind and he had a compassion that i just miss. he had a heart for the poor and the lonely - probably because his heart could share in their desperation. dad, like all of the lost, was desperate for reconciliation, but pride got in the way. and he was desperate for acceptance and affirmation that he was good, but pride got in the way. his pride ate at what God called him to be. until the end.

and so here is my struggle. and here is where 2 corinthians comes in. my weakness is in staying in a place of praise for the salvation of my dad. and while i don't want to stay here forever, in weakness in this area, i know that Christ is sufficient. that his grace is enough and that to deny God of the grace he extended to my dad would be to deny the very essence of who He is. and so i know that in my weakness, my mind's feable attempt to understand the loss and to move forward for the rest of my life without a dad, means that Christ will extend a covering over me to fill the hole that sits in despair and grief.

because some nights, like last night, i sit in my bed and cry and i'm pretty certain that i remember a few things: how dad ties his tie, the feel of his hands and the rough callouses, how thick his hair feels, his pudgy cheeks and his hugs. i know i've said all of this before and you've read it before, but i want you to know something that's real. and that is that grief isn't just one blog or one day or one year. sometimes it trickles throughout a lifetime. it's not always painful and dagger stabbing. but it's still reminiscent and you find yourself still longing to be in the presence of the one you love.

after my cry, there was peace. i think crying is God's way of helping us mend our hurt. crying is good. and the peace i felt was the Holy Spirit reminding me that God's grace is enough. that when my mind can't wrap around loss - and all that it encompasses - God can. and it is through his spirit that i start to understand. it's in my weakness that Christ's power rests on me. his compassion, his mercy, his wisdom, it rests on me. and through my heartbreak and desperation to just hear my dad's voice one more time or to hug him and make absolutely sure he knows that i love him with every cell in my body, i feel a nudging from the spirit reminding me that if he lived, he would be pained. but if he died, he would live. it was only through death and the final reconciliation of a life of pain that my dad was able to live. he lives.

and i rest in that and i praise God for that and through his redemption, i know that nothing is impossible. nothing. that in dad's weakness, Christ's power was magnified and shown in ways i've never seen. and it was beautiful and glorious and full of splendor and far greater than any war ever worn or story ever told.

therefore i will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.

...so that i'm not so caught up in hiding my grief or being embarrassed of how i've been blessed or feeling stupid about repeating the same emotions more than once. so that i'm able to freely say to a broken world that there is a beautiful peace when we come before the feet of the One who saves and we lay it all down. we leave nothing out and try not to cover anything up. but we lay it down and let it out and let Jesus start to mend and heal the broken places and praise him for revealing the secrets of eternity to our hearts that so desperately long to be Home in paradise.