No Other Words Are Necessary

There are days that this is all there is to say....I still just can't believe you're gone...

A Little Bit of Heaven

This is a sweet sentiment.  Since Lynda has been in heaven I feel a greater connection than ever before.  It's not only because I can't wait to get there to see her again but because it has only deepened my love for God.

You know when you have your first baby and the time comes for you to leave him or her?  There are lots of people who could take care of a baby but there's no one that you trust more than your Mother or your Daddy to know just what to do and to love you baby as much as you do.

That's how I feel about Lynda being in heaven with Jesus.  No one can take better care of her than Jesus can and no one (not even me) can love her more.  In the time between now and when I join Lynda in heaven I don't have a worry about her happiness.

As I've said before, having Lynda in heaven makes it even more like home.  Home is where the heart is and my heart is with Lynda.  Jesus made our future reunion possible on the cross so of course I cannot wait to fall on my knees and thank Him in person for loving and taking care of Lynda.

Heaven is so real to me and having Lynda there and her in my heart does make me feel that there's a little bit of heaven in our home.  I have been so surprised at the miracle that God has performed in my heart this Christmas season.  Expecting to be paralyzed with the sadness of Christmases past I have instead found the peace that passes understanding.  Christmas has taken on a new more personal meaning that I never imagined was possible after over fifty years of hearing the story of  the birth of a Savior.

I thank God that I can rejoice with Lynda as she worships Jesus this Christmas season. 

Visiting Hours in Heaven

I've heard many parents say that if they could have their child back on earth, they would do it in a minute.  I would love to have Lynda back but not as she was.  Even if God would allow me to turn back time and bring her back to her old life, how could I ever ask her to leave paradise to come back just so I could see her again?

Visiting hours in heaven.  Now that's an interesting thought.  Yes, I would love, love, love to see Lynda in heaven and talk with her but how would I ever leave?  Don't you imagine that a second in heaven would be enough for us to know that we are in the presence of God Almighty?  Of course it would.  But let's pretend that we could come and go between earth and heaven and there were visiting hours in heaven.  I'd be there every time the gates opened. 

One day though I'll be there and without visiting hours.  One day I'm going home.  I'm going home to see Lynda.  I don't know when but I know I've already spent 40 years with her and 30 years of those I could only wonder what she might want or need.  It's unlikely that it's going to be 40 more years (since I'm 61 years old).  So in the grand scale of things with an eternity ahead for Lynda and me, what's 30 or 40 more years on earth when heaven is the prize.  I know for Lynda time is no longer measured in years.

How long it will be until I see Lynda again is in God's hands.  It would be fine with me if He decided to rapture us right now.   God's timing is perfect.  I have His promise that He is with me here on earth as I will be with Him in heaven for the rest of eternity.  It is well with my soul and I thank God so much that especially this Christmas. 

Glory to God in the Highest

 Okay, so I haven't put up the first Christmas decoration in my house.  Nothing on the front door yet.  I'm not even sure if I can find my new snowman tray Russ gave me last year for Christmas.  I put it up after Christmas so it would be handy.  That never seems to work.

The day BEFORE Thanksgiving, we were at the cemetery taking down the fall oranges and yellows and putting up the Christmas flowers.  I still have one more thing I'm looking for to put on the last hook.  I want a old looking lantern that's solar powered.  I've seen them online but just haven't had a chance to stop long enough to order one.

 You have probably noticed that Lynda's grass is still green and plush.  It makes me want to lie down on it and make a snow angel without the snow.  When it went down in the 20's a couple of nights in a row after the stone was installed I told Russ we didn't have to cover it anymore.  I was okay with it dying now because it had a good root system to keep it from being muddy all winter.  We went back a few days later to see the dead grass and there it was.  Greener and taller and thicker than before.  I had to laugh.  Lynda always marched to the beat of a different drummer.  How appropriate that when all of the grass is brown and dead throughout the cemetery, the grass on her spot is green like a velvet blanket.  It's really beautiful.  We planted a combination of winter rye and something else.  Still we had no idea it would be this hardy.

My grandparents (mother's side) are buried to the right of Lynda and the stone with the flowers in the distance is the CARPENTER side of the monument.  On the other side of the monument, it says ANDERSON and my Daddy's headstone marker is a flat copper military one that's on the right of the picture between the two large monuments.

Christmas season is going to bring with it many memories of the past.  It already has but Christmas season approaching has also brought an excitement that I had not anticipated.  The more I see the reminders of the first Christmas with Mary and Joseph and Jesus in a manger.  The prophecy becoming a miraculous reality from the unlikely birth of a King all the way to him being nailed to a cross ... I cannot contain my emotions of thankfulness that Lynda is with the same God who loved us so much He sent Jesus to provide a way for us to be redeemed.

Lynda missed out on so much while here on earth through no fault of her own but now she has been reborn and in the company of the most important people ever created.  She's with the other joint heirs of Christ taking part in the most incredibly awesome celebration like none we have ever seen among earth's royalty or the rich and famous.  It defies description.  It's an invitation only party that can be attended if and only if escorted through the gates by Jesus Himself. 

Lynda who never was invited to a birthday party.  Wasn't ever able to attend a prom or become a bride is now enjoying the most glorious life known to man.  What mother wouldn't be proud and thrilled for her daughter even if it meant that she would have to be separated from her daughter for a long time?  That's what I think of now when I see the angel wings hanging with the word Rejoice that I placed at her grave.  I'm sad only because I'm not there for the celebration but I know it's going to be going on forever.

Changed....In The Blink Of An Eye!

Our Christmas in 1981 was bittersweet for us.  Lynda was home for the Christmas holidays and we had such a good time with her but she we took her back to Millcreek after the holidays in early January.  We were only expecting her to stay another few weeks.  When I think about why we didn't just keep her after the holidays it's like watching a movie that you've seen before and wanting to say to the actors in the scenes, "Oh, DON'T do that!  There's someone in your house.  Don't go in!" but you've seen the movie and you know she goes in and you know what happened next.

After Lynda died, I found myself looking at the pictures and the timelines and wishing with 20/20 hindsight that we had made another choice.  The script was already written.  The parts were already cast and the scenario for Lynda's future was changed for the next 30 years.  This is a picture of the last Christmas that my sweet streak of lightening had a perfect little body.

It is a strange coincidence that she had on the same plaid jumper in the picture that I made at Scott Center in February after the stroke.  At this point she was still paralyzed and needed support to sit up.  She couldn't walk and was extremely agitated and in pain most of the time.

This was actually a great improvement from where she was while in the hospital at LeBohneur.  She could no longer speak.  For 30 years Lynda lived a different life after the stroke but after a year she stopped crying in pain.  

When Lynda went to heaven on August 3rd, I know she no longer looks like the broken person that lay in the hospital room in ICU.  I don't know if she will look like the little girl pictured below or the adult Lynda she would have been.  It doesn't matter because the Bible assures me that I will recognize her and she will know me.   More quickly than you can move from picture number 2 to picture number 3---God can transform our broken bodies into a new creation. 

Praise God for redeeming us and for inviting us to live forever with Him in heaven. 

Because God Came Down

 Do you think there's a Christmas day in heaven?  I've been thinking about Lynda's first Christmas in heaven and it seems to me that the only people who mark one day as Christmas are those of us who live down here on earth.  We celebrate the birth of Jesus and how God became human and was born in a manger....all so He could be the living sacrifice on the cross for our sins.

Why would there be a Christmas day in heaven?  I know that our purpose for living is to worship and glorify God.  In heaven there is no day.  There is no night.  Eternity stretches forever and as the old hymn says "when we've been there ten thousand years bright shining as the sun....we've no less days to sing God's praise than when we've first begun." I have no way of knowing (but Lynda does).

We will continue to celebrate the birth of Jesus on December 25th and will worship and adore Him.  We will read the old, old story about our savior being born to Mary and Joseph and how shepherds followed the star to meet the new king.  I will still think of it as Lynda's first Christmas in heaven.

But the truth of the matter is more awesome than we can wrap our minds around.  My sweet Lynda who has never been able to ask a question or speak more than a few words is now perfect and whole.  She is able to recognize and know all who are in heaven and can sit at the feet of Jesus and listen to him tell the stories she's never heard.  She can dance and sing and praise God.  She can hug her Daddy and can talk to her angels who have cared for her almost 42 years on earth.

All of this is possible because God sent His son to earth for us.  Because God Himself walked among humans knowing that one day He would die on a cross for the world's sins.  No sin of His own.  Just ours.  The ornament shows the Christmas story where Mary and Joseph obeyed God and held God Himself in their human arms.

I look at that ornament this Christmas and think about my baby being in heaven with THE baby that changed the world and rules the universe.  It takes my breath away.  What a gift heaven is with God forever and forever.

Merry Christmas, Lynda. 

Merry Christmas!


 

Can You Believe It is December?

Today is December 2nd and it just doesn't seem possible that it could be December already.  It doesn't seem like it has been four months since Lynda left her earthly home for her eternal home in heaven.  I look at this picture of Kevin and Lynda together and it just confirms the fact that time moves too fast.

This was Christmas 1981.  Lynda was ten years old and home for Christmas holidays from Millcreek.  Kevin was two.  They made quite a tag team.  Lynda's stroke was January 21st just a few weeks after she had been home for Christmas.

Today Kevin is married to Nicole and they live in Olive Branch.  They have two children....a little boy named Mason who is almost nine and a little girl named Graysen who will celebrate her fifth birthday today.