~Your Will Above All Else....My Purpose Remains...~

“For Your sake we face death all day long.”
Acts 8:36

I have been living this pearl of a Scripture for the past 11 months, one month short of a year. And tonight, I just said goodnight to my grandpa knowing it could be the last time I say good night to him. I have been watching a life slowly ebb away as my parents and I have been taking care of my grandpa until he goes to be with Jesus, and something has occurred to me in the past few days.

When someone dies, their bodies expel all the bacteria that are in them, one way or another. I will spare you the graphic word picture I got from my mom this morning and suffice to say, it’s gross. Right after that process, their bodies die and if they know the LORD, they step into glory just as they step away from this life. That whole word picture got me to thinking about my own life, and if this is the actual reality of life and death, then something similar happens in a person’s heart and mind as they walk closer and closer with Jesus.

I have had my moments these past 11 months, actually the last few years as I’ve helped my mom take care of my grandpa in his home for the past 7 years. I’ve actually been helping out with my grandparents since I was 11, but before then, I was in and out of hospitals with them since I was a baby. This whole life of taking care of them didn’t just happen overnight for me. When I graduated from high school, I didn’t know what to do; college wasn’t all that appealing to me- all that studying (shudder). So, I did what I was already doing, what I was good at. I stayed home and became my mother’s right arm as she took care of her parents. When my grandma died 6 months later, my mom and I took care of my grandpa 3 to 4 days a week. Today, my parents have given up any semblance of a life to take care of my grandpa. My dad, who’d been unemployed for the past year, finally got a job and then quit to stay home and take care of Grandpa. My mom and I have run a myriad of errands, sat with and been the emotional, mental, physical support for both my dad and grandpa. Both my parents have been sick and we’ve all pulled one muscle or another and had the same headache, some of us a little more intense than the other. They have given everything to take care of him, our house is hardly ours anymore. It’s a hospice center, a hospital.

I, on the other hand, have given nothing because I had nothing to lose. This has been my life. When I was 18, I gave up the chance to go out there and “get a life”, and I chose to have no regrets where my grandparents were concerned because I felt this is where God wanted me. When life got hard and jumpin’ ship was a temptation, I knew that if I stopped doing it, I’d give myself permission to bail on anything and everything when it got hard. My greatest desire is to be someone’s wife and someones’ mother. I hear that’s the hardest job a woman will ever do. If there’s anything I don’t want someday, it’s to mess up a treasure from God like a husband and children, a family, because I bailed on my family now instead of learning the art of faithfulness.

Like I said, I’ve had my moments, but I’ve had the greatest LIFE. I have lived in hospitals where sick people are and where people take care of sick people. I have been best friends with people who are 2 generations older than me. I know better how to plan my funeral than my wedding someday because I’ve been to so many funerals (Morbid, I know)!! I know life and the meaning of it. And while I have faced death time and time again at hospitals and funerals, I have never lived death like I am doing right now. It has been a privilege to take care of this precious life, this farm boy from Nebraska, this wild rambunctious rail rider, this WWII veteran, this rodeo and race car star, this man who was hard and stubborn, abusive and mean and who , when he gave his life to Christ, became a changed man; this man who against all odds kept his family together when life told him he couldn’t, this man who has loved alot and loved well and been forgiven much and who in a few hours or a few days will see GLORY. We’ve told him he’s going to see my grandma again soon, and he’s excited for that, but my uncle said yesterday, “He will see Jesus, and he will be so in awe, he won’t even see Mom.”

That’s when something started happening to my heart. You know how I mentioned the process of death? The expelling of bacteria, the dying body, the glory? We will all meet our Maker someday with an awestruck heart. But right now, today, life can be brutal. We all know this. I know this. My family has been thru a lot in the past few years, but I’m going to be selfish here and tell you about me, while I’ve had a great life, these are some of my moments: I have been injured from helping lift Grandpa, to the point where I was doing some ab exercises and I threw a rib out and then separated the muscle from the rib. Talk about painful. As a result, I couldn’t work out for the rest of the Summer. Getting back to a regular workout has been brutal!! I have gotten sick recently and have had to change my diet because the stress has just been so intense at my house. I have been emotionally hit on all sides. I have endured loss of friends and felt abandonment and such intense loneliness and pain. I can’t even begin to put into words everything I’ve felt in the past 11 months. But when 3 people tell me in less than a week to relax, I know something’s up. Suffice to say, I’m in the process of being emptied. My mind and my heart are all preparing for a death, and not just my grandpa’s. But a death of an era. And a death to myself because when this is over, I look at my future, which could begin in a few hours, or days, depending on the LORD’s plan, and I don’t know what to do with my life. I have things I think I like and things that make me happy, but I’ve never had the chance to explore them fully. I don’t know me without my grandparents.

I face death to myself daily as God calls me to be like Him. My grandpa holds onto the rails on his bed sometimes like he’s hanging onto something for dear life. It’s like, “Dying is good, Heaven is close, but to actually give up my life, my breath? I can’t do it yet.” I am just like that sometimes. I know that dying to sin, dying to myself and running after Jesus is the only way to live, but I hold onto my definition of life for dear life because it’s the only way I know. That’s when I know that an emptying must come, a surrendering and then a death.

But as I step from my definition of life to God’s, that’s when I see glory and I am face to face with Him, like Moses was, like Mary was, like John and Peter were. All else fades.

So, my conclusion is this: empty yourself- expel the spiritual bacteria, let go and surrender to the death that seems scary in its enveloping because glory is just ahead, Jesus waits for you and He wants you to remain in His love and finally, really live.

“As for you, the anointing you received from Him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as His anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit- just as it has taught you, remain in Him.”

1 John 2:27

My blogpost's title is a line from this song. It's been close to my heart these days and so I thought I'd share it with you guys. If you're friends with me on Facebook, you have seen it as my status a few times.