Time being a gift instead of a lonely chore that day, I was given a spirit of thanksgiving for a love that has withstood the cruel arrows life throws at each of us and for children that have filled my soul with an undeniable sense of what is holy and sacred, what is the beauty of the unseen, and what faith believing in "what is unseen" takes. Between boxes, the echoes of my children's laughter and that of their friends' drifted among my memories at times causing my head to raise up from my chores to listen more intently, as if the voices might actually be behind or above me.. I cherished the memory of the garage door rising just at or just after curfew as my children came home safely and remembered the grateful prayers I whispered at their return. Visions of our favorite red head bouncing down the stairs with fire in her eyes and a life bigger than her five foot six frame could hold filled significant moments as her music played on my phone. As well, I recalled the pounding footfalls of my son's dominant march across the upstairs that would shake the ceiling and daily tell me he had awakened or he had yet to settle for the night. That recollection made me hurt for my own mom as the quiet without the footsteps of your children is most definitely the most lonely quiet there is - no matter our pride in their independence or victory.
There are no familiar, recognizable sounds at our new place, no hum of the refrigerator cycling on, no whirring of the furnace, no creaking of the wood, no popping of the floor, no wind rubbing the rose bushes against the house, no echoes of our memories - but there is faith.
"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen..."
When we married we hoped for and worked at a love for the ages; we hoped for happiness and for (six) children who cherished family and championed excellence (we settled for two). We hoped and prayed they in turn would also find faith in a loving God.
The verse causes me to struggle looking at the words themselves. Faith something intangible, untouchable, unseen - being a substance - which is by definition tangible, touchable, and concrete. Then the verse gives way to the word evidence - another concrete noun; however, it's relationship to faith is described by a modifying phrase - "of things not seen" leading us away from the tangible. As poetry, the words poignantly adorn the page. As scripture, the words ask to invade our lives and hearts and for me, on Saturday, in moments alone - a state I generally loathe - they said this...
Our substance, the one belonging to Witch and me, is a marriage that has withstood the trivial of job loss and the like and the unthinkable - the loss of a child.
....... It is kinder than it was, though it was never unkind; it is gentler than it was thought it was never harsh; it is more patient that it was - and it was definitely impatient.
Our substance is a family of four so devoted to the notion of faith and family that the three who remain are often momentarily lost and off-center without our daughter and sister, but always found with each other.
The evidence of things unseen is the blanket of prayer that causes us to get up and find or serve our purpose in that day, in the hands of friends who called our phones, who sent us cards, who let us cry, and who helped us move, in the hearts of those who have lifted us physically and spiritually intentionally and unintentionally. The evidence is that without the walls of a home we loved, we still love. And we still hope - perhaps with more precious thought than before.
By the end of Saturday, my body, so tired it shook, screamed at me. As I have wrestled with all of these thoughts in the last six days, I offer this... there's relationship between physical and spiritual pain and how hard I work at either - Anything of substance takes work and the evidence of work is often either great joy and great pain or sometimes its both.
#golighttheworld
.