I’m just gonna get right to it. Lately, I am so tired of hearing about people dying. Not just the people that I know and love but the people that I know and love losing people that they know and love. Then there are more and more famous people I’ve admired passing away…. and what about the immensely loved pets dying in the arms of their masters? Sigh…It hurts just writing the thought of it. I resent the challenge before me, that I have to consider the reality that death can happen at any point for anyone who has ever been born. 

That’s the thing.  It’s inevitable. And I hate this fact.

It’s part of the plan that God has for every man or woman that has ever lived and will ever live from here on out. And truthfully, for the person who dies, it’s truly the best thing that could ever happen to them.
Unless they don’t know God. If they have never personally known God then, well, death is only a temporary reprieve. 

I can’t wrap my brain around it all. I can’t find a place of consignment to those words. You know… statements like:
“it’s only temporary” or
“we’ll see them again one day”,
“they haven’t died, they’ve just switched homes”,
“they’re at peace or rest now”,
“they’re not suffering any longer” or
“it’s only their bodies that have been buried, their spirits are still alive (with Christ)”…..  
Please, someone pass me some earplugs.

One of the most oft quoted Bible verses that I’ve heard since I was young is
“Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints.” (Psalm 116).
I often thought how sweet a sentiment that sounded, but frankly, I have done my best not to spend too much time considering what that actually means. I mean, I can only imagine how happy it would make God to have us home with him, face to face, because ultimately, he knows how ecstatic and at peace we will be when we are with Him. But why dwell on something (that I think is) heartbreaking for me?

If I’m honest, I’m actually not as afraid of dying as I have been for a lot of my life. In fact, I’ll just get a little morbid here – Sometimes I have literally laid out the way I would like to die as though I was placing an order…. and while I’m thinking about it, please just don’t let it include much suffering for me or anyone else I love.

Seriously though, I used to be more attached to this earth and the thought of “leaving” it was frightening! That attachment was mostly driven by the important things that I still hadn’t accomplished, like getting married, becoming a mom, and having a grandbabe.

Don’t start worrying about me, I’m just being honest here.  Suffice it to say, I have come to a general place of peace about my inevitable permanent relocation to heaven.

I haven’t, however, made peace with permanently saying goodbye to anyone that I adore. Not by a longshot.

In August of 2019, I lost my 44 year old baby brother. I was COMPLETELY unprepared when the call came that he had been found unresponsive. I had a panic attack in my family room. It was horrible. At that moment, I was in a desperate denial….
“No, wait, let me just kiss him goodbye first… Also, we had an argument, I beg you, I just need another minute to tell him how much I love him, and also, that I’m sorry for some things and while I’m at it, that I forgive him for some things. Oh and can I please just get a few more minutes to ask how he would want me to plan his memorial service?”  

When the call first came that he had passed, I knew he had been taken to the hospital so I decided to call them to ask what the protocol would be for coming to see him since we were told that he died. However, when I called them, they told me that the EMTs were able to revive him. And in that moment, a burst of adrenaline went through my body, I pulled myself together, grabbed my keys and hubs and hit the road…. I thought, “alright dude, if you’re going to be with God then you’d better hold on till I get there….you owe me”. 

We made it in time to see him, touch him, kiss him and pray for healing before his body gave up. I am forever grateful that God allowed me that one more moment even though he wasn’t coherent. It is a mercy that I feel incredibly thankful to have had. 

The thing is, the dynamics around our relationship at that time made losing him even more complicated and certainly played a role in the horrible grief that set in the moment I heard he was gone. I could never go back and say all the things I had rehearsed in my head for the last 2 years of his life. All of the plans I made to clarify, reconcile and heal – they fell through in the blink of an eye. There was no do-over. 

When I lost him in my life and realized that I will NEVER ever see him again, it was a reality that I wasn’t prepared for. I mean, I had lost 2 grandparents by the time I was 23 and a short time after that, I lost a couple of very special friends, very difficult moments of loss. In 2015, in one of the worst days of my life, I lost my precious nephew suddenly and cruelly. It was life-changing to have his young soul snuffed out of our lives, to watch his parents try pick up their broken hearts… all of the agony broke me.

But, surely I would be used to it from there on out, right?

I have realized that I will never ever get used to it. The reality of the brevity of life still haunts me sometimes. I have to work hard at not letting those losses harden my tender heart for good.

The finality of someone leaving earth is beyond my scope of understanding. The older I get, I see more and more that the emptiness felt when losing someone forever won’t be decreasing as far as I can tell. Practically speaking though, I know it’s the reality of the circle of life as God intended it to be. The hope of seeing most of those I love again carries my heart through the ebb and flow of grief.

I’m going to let you in to a recent journal entry of mine. It was a prayer of sorts that I wrote about trying to process death and dying: 

In the end, I just beg you God to give me a sense of supernatural peace. Please give me a life of inner hope and an ambition for your kingdom that will squelch my anxieties… help me to have a clear vision of all that you have for me and those I love until the day we’re all with you.
Please help me to release my clenched fists that have clung tightly to everyone I know and love and the world – that I will now know it so that I can be free in you… free to love and be loved in the moment.
More than anything else, help me to connect with you more fiercely than ever.
Jesus, you know that my heart and whole being are so emotionally driven in its passion for people. I want to accept that part of my personality because it blesses you and allows me to be used by you in a way that requires me to let go of any earthly comforts that I want to hold onto because I don’t want to suffer. I need you God. I need you to still my anxious heart. Please God, do not let me succumb to any hopeless emotional state of mind because of voids created when someone I have known and loved leaves earth to be with you.

 I think there is much more I can write about death and dying. One day. They are a multifaceted reality of life that can’t be summed up in one online entry. My heart is that I will continue to heal and grow but even more than that, I want to hold the hands of anyone I meet, including you, my reader, as we all process grief in the midst of the loss of the humans we so dearly love. Holding hands as we walk home.

Life after death for the surrendered heart to God, beyond this earth is going to be an eternal culmination of extravagant beauty and glory that we can’t even begin to imagine on this earth right now.

If you don’t know God personally or want to find your way back to Him, please reach out to me, or someone you know that knows Him. Trusting Him with your heart is the all time best way I know to cope with all this earthly pain. I promise you it will be the BEST decision you’ve ever made.

Here’s a sweet tune that I discovered the day after my little bro passed on. It’s a beautiful melody and lyric for the weary one on their way home and for the one grieving their absence.