Friday, March 30, 2012

Saturday's Sayings...






~by "Sadness," via Grieving Mother, Jill Compton



Saturday's Sayings...






Even in the darkest of night there is hope.
As the moon lights our path so does hope light our way.

Remember it only takes the smallest amount of light to break through the darkness!


via John Edward



~~~




At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person.

Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.


~Albert Schweitzer

via The Compassionate Friends




~~~





I Wonder If People Understand What it is to Miss You


It isn't about accepting that you are gone
I am acutely aware that you are not here
It isn't about moving on
I move forward but you are no further from my mind
It isn't about forgetting you
You are still the first thing I think about in the morning and the last thing at night
It is about learning to not reach for the phone
I miss sharing my joys and sorrows with you
It is about not feeling your loving arms hug me
I miss the intensity of your love
It is about no longer sitting and talking
I miss hearing about your hopes and dreams
It is about thinking about you every day
I miss you every day

~Tanya Lord
via The Grief Toolbox
and grieving mothers, J.R.-M. and T.P.



~~~




The soul can split the sky in two and let the face of God and let the face of God shine through.

~Edna St. Vincent Millay


~~~




Dear GOD, please help those whose pillows are soaked with tears every night. Send your spirit to comfort them, minister them back to life and heal them.

~via Grieving Mother, T.P.


~~~





Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.

~Edna St. Vincent Millay



~~~



Oh, how we cried the day you left us
We gathered 'round your grave to grieve
Wish I could see the angels' faces
When they hear your sweet voice sing

So go rest high on that mountain
Son, your work on earth is done
Go to Heaven a shoutin'
Love for the Father and the Son

~Grieving mother, D.P.
quoting the words from Vince Gill's inspired song



~~~



2 steps forward 1 step back...and that's on a good day

~Grieving mother, T.E.



~~~



Don't ever think, even for a moment, that she's not on my mind.
Sigh. It's so hard to keep living:(

~Grieving mother, L.L.



~~~





Angel, When Your Beautiful Heart Stopped Beating, My Heart Just Broke In Two Knowing That Here On Earth, There Will Never Be Another Like You.

~via grieving mother, C.G.M.
from her friend in loving memory of her daughter, A.M.P.


A., as your 23rd birthday is here, I am reminded evermore of how I wish you were near. What would you look like or even be? I'm sure just as beautiful as you were 4 years ago inside and out, is what I would see. My life feels so unreal and like I am out of place, but when I dream of you I always wake with tears but yet a smile on my face. I can only remember in these dreams a shining glow around you and your bright smile, while at that moment I feel your warmth in my heart for awhile. It is so hard to accept how things, people and this world continue to change, when for me I am always stuck in time and you will always be Nineteen. Only if I could have one more day, one more kiss and hug, one more time to hear you call my name, one more smile and one more chance for me to change the day. For me to be able to have you home, well these are the few things that tug on my heart alone. God gets me through each day even though my broken heart will never go away. I will lean on Jesus, grow in my Faith and serve in ways that He has planned, even though I don't always understand..... I will never ever forget you sweet baby girl not for one day! Happy Birthday and angel Day Beautiful~ I love and miss you forever, Mamz~

~by C.G.M., grieving mother



~~~



Missing my girls...I have two who walk and one who soars.

~Grieving mother, T.B.



~~~












Pictures, thanks to mentioned grieving mothers

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Tuesday's Trust - The Rains May Come...






Tuesday's Trust

The Rains May Come...



Lying in my bed early this morning, I was contemplating the news I had heard the night before from my son who is here visiting this week; Nathan brought news to me from my hometown in Athens, Georgia that my handicapped brother had gone to the hospital recently with a collapsed lung. No one from home I guess had had the courage to call me with all the grief that is already on my plate.


So I was thinking, is this the way it's going to be Lord, from here on out... just one loss after another of our loved ones to face?! (As you know depressing thoughts creep in so easily in the depths of our already aggrieved hearts.) So the following poem started coming to me from my Lord's heart, so I jumped up, turned on the light and began writing...




The Rains May Come...



The rains may come,

I'm right here My child.

The rains may come,

But on your child, I've smiled.


Sorrows come, they fill the sky,

But in your heart, I bring my sun.

Troubles come, darken your sky,

But piercing your Dark, My Son.


Though all else fails, lean on Me.

My love withstands your tempestuous sea.

Though all else fails, lean on Me,

Though Darkness falls, Me ~ you'll see.









Picture, sent to me from a blog reader today, grieving mother, A.R.S. ~ Thank you!

Your 25th Birthday - In Loving Memory of Merry Katherine Prince




In Loving Memory

Merry Katherine Prince

(3/29/1987 - 8/2/2006)



25 years old, today you would be

Had Death not taken you 6 years ago.

We survive today knowing you're happy,

Living in Love under the Father's glow.


But baby our lives have been impacted

By devastations wreaked by our great loss:

If life's a prism, our light's refracted,

Shattered by the load of Death's heavy cross.


Bones broken, cancers unleashed, lives stymied,

Each of us now, in ways, walks with a limp,

No longer the same after Death's stampede;

We only get through as we cling to Him.


Grief is God's road of Light through the Darkness;

Tears clear the way as Love's cleansing rain.

Hallowing the ground of Death's harsh starkness,

God Himself meets us to comfort our pain.


Today we smile as we embrace your life,

Grief's temporary burdens though now we bear.

We know you're freed from tempestuous strife,

Once received in the arms of Abba's care.


So for now by grace, we will carry on;

We'll see you in time as we're carried Home;

But until then, you will live in our prayer

Of thanks to God we'll embrace again There.


Happy Birthday in Heaven! We love you so!

Mommy, Daddy, Nathan, Rollin, Stephanie, and Merry Elizabeth









Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Wednesday's Woe - Reawakening the Presence of Her Absence ~by Tommy Prince





Wednesday's Woe


Reawakening the Presence of Her Absence


~by Tommy Prince





I haven't had one of these dreams in a long time, but occasionally I will dream Merry Katherine is here and alive, and I have a craving in my dream to hug her and hold onto her and never let her go. And then I wake up to the nightmare of the truth that she's gone. Then I'm an emotional wreck for several days. It's like -- "This is a bad joke!"


It's a yearning for her that's still there that comes out occasionally in my dreams.



Lately, similar things are happening when my little grandaughter ("Ellie," now 7 1/2 months old) comes over to stay awhile. While she's here, I'm having a wonderful time. With her presence here, my blood pressure even drops! I'm just wowed by her.


It isn't until she's gone that I realize how I go into a form of withdrawal. I find that I cry every time Ellie leaves, but I know the tears are not about Ellie; they're because I miss Merry Katherine.



In looking back on the time I have with Ellie when she's here, I realize that I open myself up emotionally such that it taps into a craving that's in me that is reserved only for Merry Katherine.



After Ellie leaves, I feel similar to the way I do when I wake up from one of those dreams. Because I'm confused. My system is confused. My spirit is confused. My soul is confused...


I'm opened up emotionally. I'm bonded.



Ellie is getting loved on by a part of me that got to love on Merry Katherine and terribly misses Merry Katherine.


It awakens that painful absence of Merry Katherine so that her absence is even more pronounced.



When Ellie's gone, I realize I had a wonderful time with Ellie. But another part of me is terribly sad, feeling,



"I had her (Merry Katherine) right here. Now I don't.


"Ellie will be back... Merry Katherine won't!"




I really miss my baby girl.






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Picture, thanks to Grieving Mother, Jill Compton

Monday, March 26, 2012

Tuesday's Trust - Grief's Battle Scars



"The eternal glory that is in store for you far surpasses your present troubles."
~2 Corinthians 4:17



Tuesday's Trust


Grief's Battle Scars





Words to my beloved daughter today, days before what-would-be her 25th birthday, though to me she will be "Forever-19":



When you were here, I fought to keep you alive. Now you are gone, I must battle through this grief of losing you...


Perhaps my scars and grief wounds amidst these battles serve as signs of my deep, deep love for you. From fighting a war to keep you alive to fighting through this loss of you, perhaps my scars serve as badges of honor, as if I've been awarded "battle stripes" of a mother's love amidst wars I never ever wanted to fight, and never, ever thought I would have to fight.


It seems, the deeper my love, the deeper my scars.


The deeper my scars, the deeper my plunge at the Savior's feet.


The deeper my plunge, the deeper His love reaches to bring me sweet relief


amidst these harrowing, bewildering, and exhausting grief wars.




*****




God's Word seems to declare this same truth, that our scars of such hard-fought love will prove to be "battle stripes" of a sort, rewarded to us throughout eternity:


"This momentary… affliction is producing for you an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison."


~2 Corinthians 4:17





"I am tenderhearted towards all that I have made."

~Psalm 145:9









Pictures thanks to 365promises.com
Inspired by a quote from Lynn Caine in her grief book, Widow:
"Acceptance finally comes, And with it comes peace. Today I carry the scars of my bitter grief. In a way I look upon them as "battle stripes...."

Sunday, March 25, 2012

Monday's Mourning Ministry - O The Wonderful Cross ~Michael W. Smith with Matt Redman





Monday's Mourning Ministry

O The Wonderful Cross!

~Michael W. Smith




O The Wonderful Cross!

~Michael W. Smith

words by Matt Redman



When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of Glory died
My richest gain I count but loss
And pour contempt on all my pride


See from His head, His hands, His feet
Sorrow and love flow mingled down
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet
Or thorns compose so rich a crown


O the wonderful cross!
O the wonderful cross!
Bids me come and die
And find that I
may truly live


O the wonderful cross!
O the wonderful cross!
Bids me come and die
All who gather here
By grace draw near
And bless Your name


Were the whole realm of nature mine
That were an off'ring far too small
Love so amazing, so divine
Demands my soul, my life, my all


O the wonderful cross!
O the wonderful cross!
Bids me come and die
And find that I
may truly live


O the wonderful cross!
O the wonderful cross!
Bids me come and die
All who gather here
By grace draw near
And bless Your name


Love so amazing, so divine
Demands my soul, my life, my all


And the beauty and the shame
In the glory of His name
O the wonderful cross!


O the wonderful cross!
O the wonderful cross!
Bids me come and die
And find that I
may truly live


O the wonderful cross!
O the wonderful cross!
Bids me come and die
All who gather here
By grace draw near
And bless Your name




*****




May I never boast except in the
cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
through which the world has
been crucified to me,
and I to the world.

~Galatians 6:14



And being found in appearance
as a man, He humbled Himself
and became obedient to
death-- even death on a cross!

~Philippians 2:8



Then Jesus said to His
disciples, "If anyone would
come after Me, he must
deny himself and take up
His cross and follow Me."

~Matthew 16:24



Let us fix our eyes on
Jesus, the Author and
Perfecter of our faith, who
for the joy set before Him
endured the cross...

~Hebrews 12:2



This man was handed over
to you by God's set
purpose...and you... put
Him to death by nailing
Him to the cross.

~Acts 2:23



For the message of the
cross is foolishness to those
who are perishing, but to us
who are being saved, it is the
power of God.

~I Corinthians 1:18








Picture and Video: http://youtu.be/_9oIJUK8QLA