Jerry Sittser on Loss, Darkness...

This was what Jerry Sittser （A Grace Disguised, p. 49) said: "It is therefore not true that we become less through loss-- unless we allow the loss to make us less, grinding our soul down until there is nothing left but an external self entirely under the control of circumstances. Loss can also make us more. In the darkness we can still find the light. In death we can also find life. It depends on the choices we make.

Though these choices are difficult and rarely made in haste or with ease, we can nevertheless make them. Only when we choose to pay attention to our souls will we learn how much more there is to life than the external world around us, however wonderful or horrible that world is. We will discover the world within. Yet such attention to the soul does not have to engender self-absorption. If anything, it eventually turns us toward the world again and makes us more compassionate and just than we might otherwise have been.

Not that the choices we make will always have happy results. That is especially true if we choose to face our losses squarely. When we plunge into darkness, it is darkness we experience. We fell pain, anguish, sorrow and despair, and we experience the ugliness, meanness and absurdity of life. We brood as well as hope, rage as well as surrender, doubt as well as believe. We are apathetic os often as we are, hopeful and sorrowful before we are joyful. We both mourn deeply and live well. We experience the ambivalence of living simultaneously in the night and in the light."

So darkness is not something to be avoided but to be entered into trusting that our faithful God would eventually turn the mourning into joy and give us beauty for ashes.

Mother's Day remembrance at the Lawn Cemetery - May 11, 2009

Happy Mother's Day, Juliana!

Enjoy the blessings of heavenly life!

Thoughts about Grace & Gifts...

Two comments struck me deep this morning...

Commenting on the healed Samaritan in Luke's Gospel, Boring & Craddock said: "This (grace) is a completely spontaneous act, the expression of a gratitude not commanded by Jesus. Gratitude cannot be commanded or exacted ... There is no presumption that "of course God heals/forgives/saves --- that's God's business." Grace cannot be calculated; grace is always amazing grace. "Grace" and "gratitude" are related linguistically and theologically; just as the two words are derived from the same root, so there can be no awareness of grace without gratitude, no gratitude without an awareness of grace. " [Boring & Craddock in "Luke," The People's New Testament Commentary, Louisville, KY: WJKP, 2004, 247.]

Rev. Tan Soo-Inn commented recently in his Grace@Work Mail commentary said: "Life is a gift. Creation is a gift. The Cross is a gift and so is the new heaven and the new earth and everything in between. For those with eyes to see, life is strewn with the generous gifts of God and people, ranging from our eternal salvation, to a cup of cold water on a hot day. For those of us who want to orientate our lives around the twin loves of God and neighbour, there are many reasons to say thank you. Indeed we are to give thanks in all circumstances (1Thessalonians 5:18) believing that a gracious God can bring good even out of evil (Romans 8:28)."

Perhaps, and dare I say, death is also a gift? for it leads us into God's presence where we shall have eternal peace, joy and love? I think for many of us our eschatological orientation is wrong a lot of times for we only think of the here and now forgetting that once we become Christians, our perspective ought to be aligned with that of God's.

Remembering Her on Our Wedding Anniversary - April 15th, 2009

It's been a blessed 20 years since we've got married and a good 13 years of parenting before God decided that I should shoulder the parenting task from here on...May the good LORD grant me the grace and wisdom to do this faithfully for as long as He so desires.