Creating in Faith - Loss and purpose

At some point in your life you will experience loss.

 

I have been finding in my 40’s that there is an increase in people I know who have either passed or have illnesses with very serious prognosis.  You never imaging yourself to be in that position, can’t prepare for it and when it comes it leaves a hole that seems impossible to fill.   

Almost 20 years after my father passed I still have dreams about him in totally new situations. In the beginning the dreams would be of him during his illness.  As the dreams progressed he would get stronger until one dream he was lifting a wardrobe and I asked him if he could be more careful because of the illness, he laughed and told me he was fine.  In my most recent dream he came to my mum’s home and had a friend with him.  He was dressed really smart and looked like the picture I have of him in his younger days.  

 On waking I realised the friend he had with him was my mum when she was a young woman. 

The loss of a loved one takes time to come to terms with, the intense pain softens, you carry on, but you never forget.  I still think about my first son who passed at 3 days old, he would have been 23 now and I often wonder what he would have been doing now, thinking about all that he could have achieved with his life.  

While we can’t bring back those we have lost we can celebrate their lives, we rejoice at the lives they touched the impact they had on this world and we look to our own lives and hope that we too can make an impact on the lives of others and be the blessing we were called to be.   

I imagined as I got older I would be sharing more times of laughter with tales of grandchildren and aching joints, alongside the creative adventures with my good friend Barbara who I had known since I was 16 and who passed in 2011 and is so dearly missed.  

 From time to time I dwell on the shared experiences, and conversations we had about our journey as artists, the love she gave to her family and the love she shared with others.

 me and Barbara in our early 20's

Ecclesiastes tells us that there is a time for everything and everything in its season: 

There is a time for everything,

and a season for every activity under the heavens:

a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot, 

a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,

a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

As we draw close to the end of the year, let us make a decision to live our lives on purpose.  Take hold of 2013 and aim to make an impact on your own life and that of others.  Whilst we will continue over the years at some point to suffer loss, let us hold on to the blessings that each individual life shared with us and celebrate their memories with joy, and let us live our lives to the full and not take one more day for granted.

  He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might He increases power...Isaiah 40:29

Come join the group - Creating in Faith, show us how you will be incorporating the words and scriptures and reflections in your art this week.  Step out and be a blessing and you will also be blessed!

Acceptance

This seems an apt start for the A-Z blog challenge that will be taking place for the month of April.  I will also be posting on my art blog. The word acceptance has been resonating at the back of my mind along with the sentence “accept the things I cannot change, and change the things I can”.......

With the grief we feel when we lose someone close to us there are many emotions that come into play. Since hearing that my friend had passed, part of me accepted that there was nothing I could physically do to change the situation but be supportive to the family. I cried, asking God why her? Why now? Why do we have to feel so much pain?  Why?

The other part of me knew without a shadow of a doubt that I could pray.... that God can and still performs miracles....I dared to hope that he would find favour and bring my friend back. It says in Hebrews 11:1 “Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen...”, so I reasoned if Moses could part the Red sea, Jesus healed the sick, walked on water and raised Lazarus from the grave, then bringing my friend back would be like a walk in the park!

I realise whatever the outcome or however I feel - change happens, and it’s happening all around us. We have no control on whether night follows day, whether the tide rises or falls or that from buds just emerging flowers and plants bloom, these are out of our control. I accept this..

I do have control however over how I respond, what I decide to do next, do I become ineffective, crushed by the weight of “why me, why now?” or do I grow, develop and accept change, accept that people come in and out of our lives for a reason, and a season, and accept that things are not always how they seem. 

Accept that there are so many qualities we have been blessed with we are often unaware how we touch the lives of others - a simple smile, asking how they are and really listening to their response, going out of your way to help someone else (just because you can), celebrating our lives and that of our friends and family and most importantly making the most of the life we have to live now. 

Sometimes we have to wait....

sometimes this is the right time and place.....

sometimes this is the right season

Stay blessed.....Amanda

A Time for Everything

There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven

A time to be born and a time to die,

A time to plant and a time to uproot,

A time to kill and a time to heal

A time to tear down and a time to build

A time to weep and a time to laugh

A time to mourn and a time to dance

A time to scatter stones and a time to gather them

A time to embrace and a time to refrain

A time to search and a time to give up

A time to keep and a time to throw away

A time to tear and a time to mend

A time to be silent and a time to speak

A time to love and a time to hate

A time for war and a time for peace

What does the worker gain from his toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on men. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-11