At the time of this writing: to a funeral.
The wife of Mr. FG’s youth group leader (from years ago, obviously!) passed away from leukemia, and since the funeral was held fairly locally, he and I both went.
I’d met the youth group leader/pastor a couple of times before, but I had never met his wife.
As usual, though, that did not keep me from crying at the funeral. I am never good about staying composed at funerals, even those of strangers; a hazard of being an empathetic person, I think.
Anyway, despite all that, I was really glad I went. As usual, the family told stories about all the wonderful characteristics of this lady, and as usual, I find that to be inspiring because those stories are the result of living a life invested in blessing the people around you.
They also shared stories about her unwavering faith and her prayer life; she had a very strong faith!
So, all that of that was lovely.
But what I found even more inspiring is that they also agreed to talk about their mom’s struggles. One of the sons, who is a pastor, shared about his mom’s rough childhood and the way it contributed to her lifelong struggle with eating disorders and anxiety/depression, and he mentioned that those struggles put stress on her relationships.
I really appreciated that she’d agreed ahead of time to have them share this and that they were willing to share as well. I think a lot of times Christians are pretty willing to say general things like, “Oh yeah, I’m not perfect.” or, “Of course I have struggles.”, or, “Of course I need Jesus!”, but I appreciate their willingness to be so specific and real, particularly because sometimes the Christian community has been a little dismissive of those types of struggles.
Anyway. I appreciated the reality check and the reminder that people of strong faith do still also have struggles, and sometimes those struggles are lifelong. That’s good for helping me give grace to myself and also to other people!
I went to Sunday School. We were blessed to still have beautiful weather in my part of Texas and met once again in the lovely backyard of my teacher.
All classes and worship services at my church are back to the church buildings summer 2020 but we are still having our Bible study away from the building which is agreed to by SS department head. We started this outside SS in early May 2020 before church was reopened because with all the isolation we felt great need to worship together.
Shopping with my sister for a lift chair for my Mama. My Mama lives with me since she had a stroke almost 4 years ago and struggles when standing from her chair. A lift chair was not something I was comfortable purchasing online. I wanted to be able to sit in the chair and judge if it would be a good size for her or if her feet would “dangle” and not touch the floor. We did find one that is the perfect size and I will be placing that order with the store today. (The sales person suggested I wait to order it so I could request the 20% off Black Friday deal. Frugal score!)
That sounds like a lovely funeral to honor that lady!
My youngest 2 kids and I went to Meijer to see if we could get another turkey (at 33 cents per pound) for our freezer. Success! I still want at least one more, so we will go back again tomorrow morning. Luckily it’s close.
I was invited and went to a casual meal of early Thanksgiving leftovers and freshly fried wild duck at my daughter’s house just yesterday. We had early Thanksgiving for those who needed to be with other family on the day of – we’ll have a modest Thanksgiving meal on the actual holiday, too. The duck was courtesy of my daughter’s fiance’. It was delicious.
Church yesterday. And on Friday, we drove over 200 miles to go to the zoo/aquarium/botanic gardens. Exhausting day, but very fun.
Alas, the last place I went was to my sister’s house and back, two hours each way. They are people of strong faith. They are also anti-vaxxers. My sister was with a pastor’s wife, who was vaccinated, but apparently unbeknownst to her at the time, had a breakthrough case. My sister developed Covid, passed it on to her husband and he died last Tuesday.
I haven’t seen my sister for two years. There was no way I could keep myself from going to her, but now I will worry about my family for the next two weeks, even though we’re double and triple vaxxed.
I believe that God sent us vaccines and simply can’t understand people who believe otherwise. And please don’t say he’s in a better place. I’m reminded of the story of the minister who refused to leave his church during a flood, passing on offers of help, confident the Lord would save him. When he eventually drowned and arrived at the gates of heaven, God said, “I sent you two boats and a helicopter.”
Oh my word, I am so very sorry to hear of your loss. That is heart-breaking!
And I agree; as a person of faith, I strongly believe that God often answers our prayers through practical means, such as people. And medicine.
I believe the same. I recently had surgery and though my surgeon was not a Christian,I firmly believe God gave him the talent and intelligence to do the surgery I needed. God works through others! My healing was no less a miracle!