The first year

 Today is an anniversary.

 The anniversary of my father’s leaving us, of joining with Jesus, of passing away. Of Death.

 I suppose every day is an anniversary of something. Memories come and remind of the past. Words come and bring both sorrow and hope.
 My amazing Jesus has been so very involved today, using those words for hope in the midst of sorrow. Please, please, don’t ever lose sight of the strength He gives when we aren’t expecting.
 This morning as I prepped for the day a new song came on, at least new to me. It is called “Show Me”, and sung by Audrey Assad. Listen, if you have a moment. I interpreted it to be about mourning. Maybe not only mourning a person, but a dream or a hope or a desire.
 The line it starts with, “You could plant me like a tree beside the river. You could tangle me in soil and let my roots run wild...but for now just let me cry,” fit so perfectly with the words of Emerson, which had already reached out and struck me this morning that I had to stop and catch my breath.

 This Emerson quote is long, but I can’t find it in my heart to subtract anything.

  “And yet the compensations of calamity are made apparent to the understanding also, after long intervals of time. A fever, a mutilation, a cruel disappointment, a loss of wealth, a loss of friends, seems at the moment unpaid loss, and unpayable. But the sure years reveal the deep remedial force that underlies all facts. The death of a dear friend, wife, brother, lover, which seemed nothing but privation, somewhat later assumes the aspect of a guide or genius; for it commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates an epoch of infancy or of youth which was waiting to be closed, breaks up a wonted occupation, or a household, or style of living, and allows the formation of new ones more friendly to the growth of character. It permits or constrains the formation of new acquaintances, and the reception of new influences that prove of the first importance to the next years; and the man or woman who would have remained a sunny garden flower, with no room for its roots and too much sunshine for its head, by the falling of the walls and the neglect of the gardener, is made the banyan of the forest, yielding shade and fruit to wide neighborhoods of men.”

— Self-Reliance and Other Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Oh, that last line! Don’t be sad if you are no longer able to be a peaceful, quiet, pretty little flower in a garden. Know that God is taking you farther, making you grow into a tree, and thus providing shade for the world around you. Like the blog I wrote recently, about the verse with the lines “so that”...this struck me the same way. God is using every moment. Even the hard ones.
 Perhaps you need to ask Him for a moment just to cry, but don’t get stuck there. Don’t be content there.

 The chorus of the Audrey Assad song says, “Bind up these broken bones. Mercy bend and breathe me back to life...but not before You show me how to die.”

 How to die.

 What do we need to die to, so that we can be a tree, rather than a flower? What can we mourn and then let go?

 Seek truth. Find the pain that makes you better and stronger and more of what HE has called you to be and then celebrate it. Cry those tears, then rejoice in what they create.
 Blessings my friends.