It's The Hidden Moments That Matter The Most
I'm just gonna be honest, I've felt very angry these past three weeks. I've been angry at myself and at God. I've felt like crawling under the covers of my warm bed and hiding away from the world until I was ready to face it all again, but if I did that, I would be there until I withered away to the dust I was formed from.
On August 19th, my grandma passed away.
In a matter of one phone call, I felt my heart shatter. In the rush of driving to Greenville to say goodbye at the hospital, only to get there and not be allowed in due to Covid, I felt my heart get heavy. Soon, it started to harden and I felt myself start to close off. I didn't want to hear any more stories. I just wanted her back.
In this lifetime, I won't get her back . . . but, I will see her again on the other side of eternity.
After she passed and after two long days of making funeral arrangements, I heard a story about her that opened my eyes. My grandpa was telling me how, before my grandma was taken to the hospital, she wanted to go to church one last time. She mustered up all her strength and got herself to the church to worship her Savior. She spent some of her last cognitive moments worshiping publicly and praying privately with my grandpa at their kitchen table.
Sometimes, the hidden moments, the ones we never know about until later, are the ones that mean the most.
After hearing that, I remembered and rested in the fact that God is still good. Even though He called her home much sooner than I had wanted, she was ready. Now, she is no longer in pain. I can't be selfish and want her here longer than she was meant to be here.
So, I turned to the word.
Psalm 119:114 - "You are my refuge and my shield; I have my hope in your word."
After taking all my anger, disappointment, sadness, anxiety, and frustration to God, I remembered that He welcomes all my sorrow and pain of this world. He wants all my emotions, all my love, all my heart. He loves me far beyond my comprehension. Working through this grieving process, and sorting through these emotions in the hidden places of my heart has been the most hardest, yet soul-comforting, thing ever. I'm not promised an easy life, but I am promised that God will carry me through the places that I don't have the strength to walk through.
In my grief, I've learned to embrace the stories, not to run away from them, even though it's hard to face her absence. Her memory is being kept alive by me and my family talking about her life. That's something we should never shy away from. That's something you shouldn't shy away from either.
Talk about the hard things. In doing so, think about these questions:
Are we stewarding the hidden moments well?
Are we hiding away from our troubles or are we hiding in God through them?
Are we hiding and compressing our emotions or are we allowing ourselves to acknowledge all of our emotions? Are we taking them to God?
Where is our heart in those hidden moments?