More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. – Romans 5:3-5
One of the questions I keep asking myself is: What
did I do wrong? It’s funny because
if you had asked me before I looked it up, I would have sworn that guilt was one
of the stages in the Kübler-Ross bereavement cycle. It’s not.
The five stages are: Denial,
Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance.
I don’t really feel guilt so much as I feel that I failed, and I suppose
I am still in denial in a way.
I’ve cleaned the house, the kitchen, the bathrooms, cleared
out the refrigerator, and done several loads of laundry after the kids were
here, but I still have my wife’s yard-work clothes hanging where she had them
in the garage. All of her hundreds of shoes
are right where she put them. The
drawers are all the way she had them, and they will be for a long time.
Rejoicing in suffering seems rather unrealistic right
now. There are certainly things I can
focus on that are positive such as our daughter’s progress, but, overall, joy
is not an option. I can’t say that I’m
suffering the last couple of days either.
It’s more like numbness. The
uncontrollable fits of sobbing have passed for now. Unless I start talking too much.
What I know I have to do is endure. And I do have hope. Of course, there is the hope, the certainty
really, of Vickie being with Christ and knowing that I will see her again. There’s a hope, too, that I’ll break out of
this mental and spiritual dead-zone at some point. I suppose I am afraid. We were always in this together. B.V. – Before Vickie – remember, I was
dope-smoking, boozing dirt biker. I’ve
never been a Christian by myself. That
sounds stupid even as I write it because no one is ever a Christian by himself
or herself. The center of it is
communion. Not even God can commune with
Himself, which is why He is the Trinity.
So Paul brings us to that point as well: it’s because of the love of God – the greatest
of these -- which will never pass away.
Sorry for the stream-of-consciousness spillage today. I'll try to do better manana.
