Week 4 | Day 4 | Live in Peace
Command:
Be Reconciled. Matthew 5:24 (NIV)
Read:
Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness, no one will see the Lord. Hebrews 12:14 (NIV)
Reflect:
I was at work when I got the call from my brother that he was on his way to an emergency, following the ambulance transporting my mom. She had a cardiac arrest at home, and dad had tried to save her. I had a guttural reaction - screaming at the top of my lungs into the phone, “No! No!” About ten minutes later, on my way home with my husband, my brother called to say that mom had passed. I was inconsolable, beating on the dashboard of the car, flailing around, and screaming.
As I was packing to go be with my family, I was cursing God, asking him, “Why now? Why her?” During the six-hour drive to Vegas, I sat immovable, staring out the window, babbling nonsense about how unfair God was for taking my mom so suddenly. She was healthy, a month shy of her 80th birthday. She was a godly woman, loved Jesus, how could he take her just like that?
Grieving her sudden passing over these past six years has been especially hard. For most of my adult life, I didn’t have a great relationship with mom. I blamed her for a lot of my childhood trauma. Two years before she died, I resolved to reconcile with her, to rebuild our relationship. Even as I kept retreating back to old habits of disconnecting, we were on the mend, hoping to start fresh. So, when she suddenly died, I felt cheated. How could God take her away just when things were mending between us?
Grieving mom has taught me that today is fleeting. That tomorrow may not wait. That forgiveness is for today. I regret that I can’t put a bow around my relationship with my mom this side of heaven. But I am grateful that God meets me, even in my grief.
React:
Is there someone with whom God is inviting you to reconcile? What steps can you take today towards that?
Pray:
God, thank you for meeting where I am, and for already forgiving me for things left undone.