GOOD MORNING !! HAPPY NEW YEAR 2014 ..
I BELIEVE THIS CAN BE
YOUR BEST YEAR EVER ..
YOUR BEST YEAR EVER ..
AT THE AGE OF 67 I HAVE BEEN PONDERING
VERY RECENTLY THAT PERHAPS
GOD IS SAVING THE BEST FOR LAST !!
Guess what ?? I have a Mourning Dove (Turtle Dove) nest right above my kitchen window!!! I heard them yesterday cooing to one another and singing so beautifully and when looking up, I could see the mother dove. Her nest is perched on top of my entrance way speaker, and I made a mental note not to turn it on and startle her! Soon there will be babies and I will be able to watch the process of them being born and raised!
I began to think about the fact that tomorrow January 3, 2014 will be one year since we brought my late husband Joe to the hospital with stomach issues leading to a simple gallbladder removal.. which resulted in two cuts to his liver, a need of a liver transplant and his subsequent death February 1, 2013.
The neat thing about Mourning Doves is that they mate for life cool huh? I thought I would be with my husband forever. This is the second husband I have lost in 9 years. I certainly did not expect to lose another husband and to be with him for only 5 1/2 years. As I looked at this bird and her nest, I thought about the name Mourning Dove.
I then began to ponder the fact that for almost the last year I have been going through the process of mourning in many areas with three major losses, my husband, my 4 lb Yorkie named Gidget who had been our constant companion and my 19 year old granddaughter.
Overwhelming circumstances to grieve over. In many ways I had lost my song. Grief is a process. Going through the stages of Mourning are not easy, and many times you feel as though you are indeed in the winter of your life cold and lifeless under the ground. Finding yourself crying and mourning at the most inopportune times with no control.. but all part of the process.
Your mourning may be different .. perhaps you lost your home, your job, your zest for life, your vision for a future, or just the vitality and energy you once had. Perhaps you have experienced relationship problems that are not bringing forth fruit. Perhaps your finances are all but shattered, or maybe you have been experiencing grief over things that have been happening with your children. Maybe health issues have you grieving for your youth. Or the worse scenario maybe you have lost your desire for a deep relationship with God or any desire to seek Him. Maybe you have been searching for answers to life in your own strength so long and have tried to figure it out all by yourself. Maybe you have never really allowed God to love you to life. Or maybe you are mourning what might have been or could have been or should have been.
But, God has said and has proven time and again that He turns our Mourning into dancing. He says there is Joy in the Morning .. Interesting play on words I thought to myself. He is the bread of life and desires to take our most difficult times and feed us with fresh desires and new songs to sing.
He turns our Mourning into Morning
if we will but let Him.
This holiday season was particularly hard for me with it being the first year of so many things.. the first one without Bart, my granddaughter and my Yorkie. I had met Joe on New Year's Eve ..so that was hard.. the entrance to the hospital when his demise began .. January 3, 2013 .. the closeness of the anniversary of his death Feb 1, 2013 ... I barely thought I would be able to get through this time, but God sent me precious ones to help me through this time and amazingly I am almost on the other side of it looking back. The major part is over and I truly am singing His praises for helping me through and for the people He has put in my path. He sent quiet, steady, mature, tender and loving ones who understood my deep sorrow and who had just the right words, songs, scriptures, ways to make me laugh meaningful signs of love to lead me through this valley.
I can only tell you.. that I do not know what I would have done had it not been for God and these people. God even used high school friends who I have reconnected with on Facebook and other areas to love me through this time.
It made me think of one of my favorite scriptures ever from song of Solomon 2:10-13
10- My beloved speaks and says to me: “Arise, my love, my beautiful one, and come away,
11 for behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone.
12 The flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing[a] has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.
13 The fig tree ripens its figs, and the vines are in blossom; they give forth fragrance. Arise, my love, my beautiful one, and come away.
I know it is still winter .. but in reality I think many people have been feeling as though they have been going through a winter season in their lives where it has seemed dead with not a lot of life in sight ... but I feel God gave me this nest as a sign that new life is coming forth in our lives .. and telling us the winter season in our lives is over and gone ... I am so glad that we are God's beloved and He calls us His love. It does not matter whether we are male or female, we are still His love. .. He does not want us to stay in a dormant state, He desires that we come out of the place beneath the cold hard snow and break out into blooms in His garden. and He has a new song for us even in the nighttime of our lives when there seems to be no song.. He wants us to come away from the areas that are causing us to feel, stiff, hard hearted, bitter, resistant, fearful of the future, afraid of loving or trying again.
Maybe some have been in a dormant stage due to too many losses .. maybe even afraid to love again.
A friend had me listen to a song I knew from years ago, sung by Bette Midler, but had not really given much thought to the lyrics.
Here is the sight for this song and the lyrics which I now have printed out and in my office:
"The Rose"
Some say love, it is a river
That drowns the tender reed.
Some say love, it is a razor
That leaves your soul to bleed.
Some say love, it is a hunger,
An endless aching need.
I say love, it is a flower,
And you its only seed.
It's the heart afraid of breaking
That never learns to dance.
It's the dream afraid of waking
That never takes the chance.
It's the one who won't be taken,
Who cannot seem to give,
And the soul afraid of dyin'
That never learns to live.
When the night has been too lonely
And the road has been too long,
And you think that love is only
For the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter
Far beneath the bitter snows
Lies the seed that with the sun's love
In the spring becomes the rose.
God is making Roses in HIs garden .. He says to us: Arise, my love, and come away with me .... He is singing His love song to us and calling us away from discouragement and hopelessness, lack of enthusiasm and vibrancy. Many have been feeling stagnant and lifeless. I believe God wants to fill us with new expectancy and life with plans and purpose and a new beginning and song in our hearts.Some say love, it is a razor
That leaves your soul to bleed.
Some say love, it is a hunger,
An endless aching need.
I say love, it is a flower,
And you its only seed.
It's the heart afraid of breaking
That never learns to dance.
It's the dream afraid of waking
That never takes the chance.
It's the one who won't be taken,
Who cannot seem to give,
And the soul afraid of dyin'
That never learns to live.
When the night has been too lonely
And the road has been too long,
And you think that love is only
For the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter
Far beneath the bitter snows
Lies the seed that with the sun's love
In the spring becomes the rose.
My prayer for you this coming year is that God will take any area of your life where you have been experiencing a death process and turn your
MOURNING INTO MORNING
AND A NEW SONG IN YOUR HEART
Wishing you all a bright and Happy New Year
with God's manifold blessings.
Reverend Donna Trexler-Geertz
