the older i get, the less i know and understand. it's kind of paradoxical. maybe i never outgrew the constant question stage that most toddlers suffer through. if you asked my mom, she would tell you that, "why?" was my favorite question for years and years. i wanted to understand this life and if i were honest, i still desperately do. time and again, i am left with "why?"
a week ago, my grammy was killed in a car accident. my mom accurately described the event when she said, "she pulled out of wal-mart and into the arms of jesus." but as she went to heaven, we were all left here with questions that cannot be answered on this side of heaven.
we miss her and we regret the things we didn't get to say to her.
her exit out of this world was almost as grand as her stay. she loved people well. she was not perfect, but who is? she loved her husband with her whole heart until the day she died. there is no doubt that he greeted her into heaven. i can only hope to know a love like that someday. she took tap dancing lessons at 81. she wore bunny ears at easter and she loved to travel.
grammy was beautiful and i didn't always remember to tell her that.
she was a woman who had questions herself. God was not always someone she understood. i can't help but think about how she doesn't question at all anymore. all of her "why(s)?" have been redeemed. she only knew a part while she was here, but now she knows in full.
...and she's dancing with gramps.
maybe the questions and lack of understanding make us yearn for the place where all will be redeemed. this circumstance has pointed me to the One who not only understands my questions, but delights that i ask them. He grieves the brokenness of this world much deeper than i do, but he knows that when we all get to heaven, it will all be redeemed.
"for in our suffering, not apart from it, Jesus enters our sadness, takes us by the hand, pulls us gently up to stand, and invites us to dance. we find the way to pray, as the psalmist did, "you have turned my mourning into dancing "because at the center of our grief we can find the grace of God." -nouwen
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