The Dash

On April 9th we buried my mother.  Culturally where I am from, the family stand to the side of the casket as people file past paying their respect.  Each one spoke quiet comforting words, some even told funny stories about my Mom so there was laughter at times, she would love that.   

  

So many said they were praying  strength for us as we grieved  Mom's passing.  Finally everyone had passed by and was seated for the start of the service.  My husband started it off with a story that made everyone laugh.  I had the honor to tell Mom's salvation story and how that gave me strength to let her go.  Then I shared how so many  try to find their strength in a bottle but the bottle always gets empty.  The Spirit of God never empties us, He stays in our soul and take us to heaven leaving our shell which is all we see in that casket.  The pain of losing a love one varies. For those who have no hope where their love one will go is not a grief that I will struggle with. As Paul said, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. There will be a missing her grief for sure. 

My nephew gave the message on how our  life is that "dash" on our tombstone.  My mother dash was 89 years.   The dash symbolizes our entire life and we are the only one responsibility for what we do with it.  There is not enough space to write about all my Mom's life contained in that dash.  Even though she wanted to get out of the nursing home she still would give comfort to those around her.  The nurses would always tell me, your Mom is the friendliest person we have here, talks to everyone, what a legacy to live us.    So when she stopped doing that, starting staying in bed, not going to the singing's and the bingo we knew she was in the early process of dying.  Her mind gradually went back to  when her Mom and Dad were alive and it was great place to live for they loved her dearly. 

Of course all this stirs the heart to thinking about my own life, what do I want my legacy to be?  As I watched my son sit by his grandma bed singing old hymns she loved  and  my daughter laying next to her grandma singing to her, stroking her, kissing on her I think I know how my kids will treat me and their Dad when our day comes to leave this earth. 
I read this recently, "Everything I do in this life will be passed on to our children.  My ceiling will be their floor".  And I still have some time left to raise my ceiling.  

Thank you to all who prayed for my Mom, me and the family.  Those prayers brought heaven to earth often in the last two weeks.   

How are you doing in your dash?