Her last breath is breathed and the whisper of heaven hangs heavy in the room. Her face transforms, a smile on her lips as her lungs release oxygen one last time. Perhaps she is looking into the face of Jesus. Her fight is over, her battle won.
Earlier she whispered in desperate tones as she grabbed my shirt tight, “I have to go into the street to fight.”
With tears in our eyes we laughed heartily. We stood vigil, watching as her soul slipped from this physical world into eternity.
A quiet calm fills the room as if her soul made a noise that is now silenced this side of forever. The stillness brings peace mingled with grief. Our tears slide down our cheeks and splash upon her sheets. We do not move. Movement seems out of place as this transition between physical life and eternal life takes place.
How do we live when she is still in her bed, her physical body emptied of her essence – her soul? But move we must. We must go about our grieving and our lives now. Our lives forever changed and marked by this woman who is no more here, but is whole there.
Hints of joy cut through the grief. Stories come and memories flood – memories that make us laugh as we grieve our loss. Joy that she is whole in heaven, not suffering in her physical tent. She is home. We long to join her there.
Yet with Paul we remember, “To live is Christ, to die is gain.”
Days, weeks, months, years fly by and still her memory is fresh. Grief is not a constant reminder as it was before, but a hole in the fullness. A moment I wish she could enjoy with me, a desire to hear her stories, oh to laugh with her again.
These holes in my fullness only serve to increase my longing for my heavenly home. May the holes in your fullness do the same for you.
by Angela Mackey Rethinking My Thinking
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