Encouragement

A friend of mine posted this note of encouragement on facebook, and permitted me to share it here. No matter what kind of trial you are facing, may you trust in His Word, as your sure foundation. And if you're not facing anything tumultuous, perhaps someone around you is and you can encourage them on the journey.

"God loves you so much that he will not allow you to become stagnant in your faith and spiritual walk. When you go through difficult times, he is not necessarily "testing" you, but drawing you closer to Himself, so you will realize that you need him MORE than you need the security of your daily life.

The security we find in this life is only temporary; a tornado could blow your house apart, or drought might make food scarce, but with God, you have security in everything, forever. Because He is taking care of you. He owns everything in the world, and remember, Ask and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find.

But if you are asking God for security in this life, like enough money to keep your house, or some extra food in the freezer over winter, he might have a completely different plan than you; he might mean for your family to move across country in the next year in order to grow yourself closer to Him.

"No," I respond to your thoughts. "Change is not evil!" It is not something to stamp your foot at and cross your arms and mumble under your breath because God wants to grow you into something new and bold and strong in faith, and you just don't see it being possible.

He is in the business of doing miracles, and for Him, nothing is impossible. He sees you at the end of your life as a bold and strong woman of faith, just as much as he sees you as the tiny baby you were, unable to do anything for yourself. He brought you through a lot of changes in life, and he still plans to bring you through many more to grow you to be more like Jesus. He's not going to just let you remain a spiritual baby; he is going to allow change in order to grow your soul outside of the confines that you were born with.

"I'm too shy," you say. "I don't know what to do!"

But God does.

Like the potter with the clay, he needs to take this lump of unformed soul and mold it into a magnificent vase for holding flowers in. Never mind that you are an unformed lump of clay; God is forming you into something better. Just allow him to mold you rather than fighting against him and trying to get off the potter's wheel. Humble yourself to his caring hand.

He knows exactly which trials you need to go through in order to grow into a mature and shining woman.

If you don't know what to do in order to submit to God's changes, try prayer:

Oh God, I'm overwhelmed with the changes in my life, and I'm scared about what the future will hold. I don't know what to do. Help me to trust in you completely. My faith is in you, not in money or posessions, and I need your comfort, and to have you right next to me so I can survive through these difficult times. Please grow me into what you want me to be, and help me to know it's you bringing me through this."

Add your in your own thoughts, stir in a few raisins and some shredded carrot, and bake it at 350º for about 20 to 30 minutes, and voila! Carrot cake!

Matthew 6: 24-27 "No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?"

I have more of my own thoughts on this subject, but it's late so I'll share them another day when I can think clearer...nighty, night.

A Week Later

After a whirlwind week, one in which we had the visitation, burial and memorial, we are still recovering. My parents, younger sister and her little guy were able to come down from Canada and they stayed with us during it all. It was such a blessing to have them here, especially under the circumstances. As I've mentioned before, we (Greg & I) get tired of being strong all the time. It's nice to have someone "older and wiser" to lean on once in a while.

I have to say though, that the whole thing left me rejoicing and feeling very blessed but also very befuddled and disappointed. Rejoicing and blessed because of my extra large family (118 descendants from my grandparents down) and the love and support there is in that. But also disappointed because the opportunity I had to be with them was spent keeping kids quiet and calm, keeping kids fed and happy, and keeping kids still during the long stretches of sitting. Not visiting and "fellowshipping" as I would have liked. I also find it disheartening that at these type of events, I don't know what to say. I'd love to just talk and talk about memories of our loved one that has gone on, but I never know if others want to also. I also don't do well with small-talk on a good day, and when we're grieving and I'm trying to drum up conversation with cousins that I don't see very often (while trying to feed a baby who needs a nap terribly badly), it just doesn't come out very productive by any stretch of the imagination. And that discourages me. I want to have a good conversation with family, about a good (deep as opposed to shallow) topic and reacquaint myself if much time has gone by since the last time I've seen them. I also want to make sure that all the new in-laws are included (those who've married into the family in the past few years), but doing that also takes time and energy that isn't available to me at mass functions.

And the other part, is that I still haven't cried. Oh, tears have almost surfaced a few times, but then vanished before rolling down my cheeks. And that isn't good. Crying is an essential part of healing, and yet it eludes me still. My life still goes on as usual for the most part, but for my aunt, it is drastically changed. I wish I could take some of that emptiness and quietness of his absence away, but I cannot. I do hope that I can help her (and the rest of his and our families) share the burden of grief, and come out positively on the other side of it someday.

So, there's where it's at for me. A bit here and a bit there, but mostly still overwhelmed and in a state of disarray about it all.

Untitled...not sure what to think, say or feel

As I begin this, I'm just not sure where to start. These past few weeks have been a whirlwind, and as soon as I thought I was getting used to one thought, another would bombard me (and all of our extended family), finishing today with my uncle Rich passing away. I think I'll start when I met him, and come forward in time until today.

Rich joined our family in 2001 when he married one of my spinster aunts Julie at the age of about 45. He was the newest addition of uncles, and so became more of a friend since we met as adults (unlike all my other aunts and uncles). We got married shortly after (2003), and he and Julie took the photographs at our wedding. Rich had an amazing eye for the beautiful, and out of the 8 rolls of film they took, there was not one bad picture in the bunch. And you will note that was before digital when you couldn't just hit delete on the bad ones!












We then got back in touch with them in 2005 when we moved up to WA. We stayed at their house when we arrived here, and have been good friends since. Rich had to work weekends much of the time (to his dismay), so often we'd visit late at night after he got off work, or we'd end up only seeing Julie.












Rich finally quit his job at the end of August to pursue his two passions - fly fishing and photography. He and Julie went on a trip to Yellowstone after he quit, and throughout the trip, he wasn't himself. He did all the driving, but that was all. He didn't even bring out his fishing rod, which was very unusual for him. He had been feeling generally ill (aches/pains/tired), but the doctor had not been able to find anything specific. When they got home from their trip, he was feeling very short of breath one evening, and they went to the ER. When they did a chest x-ray, they found he had pneumonia, but also that there was a mass on his lung. Cancer. In doing more testing, they discovered it had spread to his stomach, liver, lymph system and in the end it was throughout his body. He was able to get oxygen at home, but then that wasn't enough. His heart would hurt, and when they got back to the hospital, they found that his pericardial fluid had built up around his heart causing undue pressure on his heart. They drained 1L off and kept it draining and although he felt much better, he was still having shortness of breath. That was last Wednesday night, less than a week ago. He was admitted to the hospital and then on Friday transferred to a different hospital with a cancer center in hopes of getting started on chemo that day. Saturday he was still too short of breath to begin treatment. Sunday the same. Monday he decided that chemo was just too much, and that he would go home with hospice. Today he was better in the morning, so plans were made to bring him home. But around noon, he began to get much more short of breath (his O2 levels going down, down, down), and his pulse just kept going up and up. He never made it home. He was only 53 (almost 54) and had been married to Julie for 9 short years. His battle was short (3 weeks from diagnosis), but valiantly fought.

But now he's really home, in heaven. Even as close as we were as family, we never quite knew where he was spiritually, as he didn't talk about it too much. He believed in God, but we never knew if he accepted Jesus as his personal Savior. Well, before he died, he did. He acknowledged this, and from the friends and family that were with him, he was a changed man. He was sad about leaving Julie, but excited about getting to heaven to see his Savior. What a blessing! How wonderful that he had time to clear things up about his eternal destination. We have all been praying for him, and now can be at peace that he was at peace.

Tonight ours and his families gathered at their house, and I was (and everyone else too) kind of numb. Not sure if we can really believe what has happened. Not sure how life will go on without him. Not sure if we should be more sad or more joyous for his victory! But, we do know one thing. We have trust in God our heavenly Father, and He knows what lies ahead. If we but trust, we won't go wrong. "Look ever to Jesus, he will carry you through" as one song says.

The following is a link to his photography website, as well as an article that will be published in a fly fishing magazine about him.

http://www.eastforkfly.com/index.html

http://unaccomplishedangler.com/2010/11/rich-schaaff-fly-fisherman-photographer-friend/














This picture was of Rich imitating Luke, and trying to get him to stop crying. He said to Luke, "see, I can make that same face and just as much noise as you". It didn't help, as you can guess!