In Mary's Place


As you may know, my mother had been sick for a very long time. She had COPD and emphysema and suffered with all of the issues that these diseases entail. My sister and I watched for years as her health deteriorated. There were numerous trips to the emergency room, surgeries and more hospital stays than I would like to count. This time last year she was admitted into the hospital to treat her lung issues. She was there for several weeks before being transferred to a restorative care facility and then to a hospice house. Weeks later, we brought her home to live at my house. To be painfully honest, those were some of the hardest days of my life. I was caring for her as well as anticipating the arrival of our new 12 year old from China.

Fast foward several months:

Mother came down with bronchitis and just coyldn't shake it. She was readmitted into the Hospice House on December 15th and then the Lord, in all of His grace and mercy, relieved her from all of her pain on December 30th.

In one way, it was a very hard Christmas, one that I would not want to relive. But God's hand was all over this sad situation. He mercifully encouraged me to get all of my Christmas shopping done early. Why am I trying to make it so pleasant? He lit the fire under my rear end, made me prioritize and forced me to let go of trying to do too much (which I always do).

Now that I am on the other side of that storm, I can see His work so much more clearly. As I sat with my mother day after day, talking to her, praying with her, reading scripture and listening to her favorite Christmas hymns, I realized that God was showing up in a big way. The truth is that He's always there, but so often I am so busy I (especially at Christmas-time), that I don't see Him very clearly.

Mother helped us plan her funeral. She said she wanted it to be Joyful! not a typical funeral. Joseph, her minister, said that the Easter liturgy was the most joyful service of the whole year (she was Episcopalian). So that's what we did. She even helped me choose the music. She couldn't talk at that point, but I told her to squeeze my hand when I mentioned a hymn that she liked. Later, when I gave the list to the organist, he came to one song and said, "Sissy, that one is not joyful. I don't think that was a squeeze, it was just a twitch!" He knew Mother very well and I am so thanful that he, (Gary McCraw) and Al Jeter, two of her most favorite musicians, were able to be a part of her special day.

At the time, I was reading a book called The Art of Dying. I know, it sounds morbid, but it was very insightful. It talked about how God's presence is so much stronger as He begins to bring a person home. The angels were in that room, with me, my sister, my uncle, Miss Mittie and all of the sweet visitors who came to see her. Every time someone walked in she would come out of what I would call a semi-comatose state, throw back the covers and try to get out of the bed (which she hadn't done in days) to show them all of the scars on her legs (due to surgeries for COPD related vascular issues). Bless her heart, she was so proud of those scars...that prove that God was with her all the while.

Anyway...
God was really in that room and as I sat there I felt as if I was sitting at the feet of Jesus, feeling the strength of His mighty hand draw Mother home and me closer to Him. I was able to let go of all of the "busy-ness" that I would normally have been doing at that time of year and just sit with Him and soak up all of the love and comfort that He was offering.

I am so thankful that in the days following we are surrounded by all of you who love my mother, my sister and I so very much.

God has a set of scales and when the trials on one side are very heavy, He fills the other side with all of the comfort and grace needed to get us through.

His love is overflowing and everlasting!

Prayer for Today

Dear Lord, 

 I pray that I will learn about you in such a way that you will teach me to seek, 

find and focus on the gentleness that you have placed inside of Hannah. 

I pray into her the opposite of what I see in her personality. 

Help me to understand her heart. 

Lord I know that you are "bringing forth beauty, refinement and gentleness.

 Under our roof is a greenhouse," where you take dirt, water and the light of your Son and you bring forth beautiful life from a seed that had fallen to the ground and had the appearance of being dead. "Dirt giving birth to life. New shoots are everywhere and soon it will be spring." 

Please help me to declare her beauty even when she's not around, because I know that what I say in private becomes easier to believe in her presence. Help me to see her beauty and know her beauty. I want to see her like Jesus sees her.

And the power of life and death lies in the tongue. Proverbs 18:21

I believe that so much of what I "feel is in direct opposition to what your word says is true...It's likely she lives covered under a blanket of shame - she's been telling herself or hearing others remind her of what a problem she is. [I] get to be Jesus' eyes and search below the dirt for early signs of growth." I know that these days cannot be her days to grow if they are not first my days to grow. And I already see ways in which you are molding her. She is a beautiful, compassionate, giving person. Lord, she is trying to love you as best as she knows how. Your word says that we should let the little children come to you, not to hinder them.  She loves to listen as I read your word. She's trying to understand, Lord, and I know that she will be forever blessed for the child-like faith that she has.

May I remember that "these are not [my] worst days, these days are fodder for a work that will leave [me] forever changed."

Perspective is everything.

Epiphany...

A sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by simple or commonplace occurrence or experience.

 The liturgical church celebrates the season after Christmas as Epiphany.  It is a time when we remember the journey of the wise men following the star to find the King of Kings. The definition above doesn't do justice to the epiphany that these men probably had when they found the Lord Jesus. After such times in our own lives, if we are open to God's molding, there will also be a period of growth.

After several months of having our precious daughter home with us I am having an epiphany about what God is doing. He is allowing me a tiny glimpse into His workshop....

I was blessed to read a blog about the adoption story of a woman named Sara. It's called 

Every Bitter Thing Is Sweet and she writes about things in her life that are so similar to mine, but in a way that I cannot. In this post, anytime you see these { } that means they are Sara's words, not mine. And I must also give her credit for the inspiration behind this post...so much of it will be paraphrased but with details changed. She has given me permission to do this.

God is doing a mighty work in this home. Sara (the one above, not our daughter, whose name has an h on the end) relates it to our home being a greenhouse where there is dirt and mess and time going by when we don't see anything happening. But underneath the dirt and the trash, there is a sprout...a shoot of new growth...

During 12 long years in an institution Hannah learned a set of skills and built a hard, tough, shell around herself that helped her survive. She {has a heart that longs to live childlike free, but is trapped behind years of inertia. At times she moves like a freight-train  -  unstopping, always racing, never able to rest. She didn't stop then, so why now? Rest was danger, how could it, overnight, turn into safety? She barrels through life and at times people. It's what she's always done. It was her survival. But tucked behind 10 of her missteps is one move in the right direction, one sprig of beauty. }

{One of the greatest dangers of adoption is believing for your child what your child already believes about themselves. It's subtle. And easy when the sum total of all their behaviors in a given day seems to point in one direction.

But we weren't called to be the thermometer in the life of a child who has years of seeing themselves in only one light. We are here to tell them who they really are and, in the light of who He is that they are royalty. They just don't know it yet. They haven't been told.}

But God, in His mercy is in the process of winning her back. {He kneels, toes pressed against the ground, staring into dirt, and His fingers so tenderly search for that one shoot that says life is here. He wades through years of lies calcified against my heart to find His own truths buried within, and He calls them forth. I call myself "messy" and He says beauty in the making.}

{Perspective is everything.}

{The Father looks on my daughter not with eyes of hopelessness and fear. He stares into her deep and calls forth Himself, planted in her from before the day she met the streets. What the enemy calls misfit, He reclaims as heiress.}

She cherishes the time we spend together at the end of the day. Cuddled up in a big chair in her room is a safe place where she can let down her guard. She knows enough English now to be able to begin to understand what I'm saying when I talk about how much she is loved. God loves her so much that He gave is only Son so that she could spend eternity with Him.  There is not another time during the day when she is so totally focused. I am praying for her, over her and through her all of God's love and am trying to saturate her life with His word. Please pray with me that His word will take root and she can begin to let go of the lies and break out of that shell that she believes she needs to be safe.