The Lord isn’t always very pastoral with me. A couple times when the pain of loss was still severely new and chronic, I cried out, “I can’t do this!” And He replied, “Yes you can; you’ve gone through worse.” And remembering, I had to agree. He got me through those times, and He’s gotten me through this past year too. Glory to His Name. The moments of intense sorrow take place more seldom now, but one of them happened just last month in Hawaii. I was walking back from a wonderful talk with Phil & Amy, thinking that it was 30 years earlier when Cynthia and I went to Kona to help Loren and Howard get the University going; ten years now since Howard’s passing; and how proud both Howard and Cynthia would be to see Phil & Amy now on staff at that campus. Sudden tears, one more time . . .
Some of you heard that I found the missing gift certificates in January. I had given Cynthia one for Christmas 2011, she loved going to Schilliger’s garden center here in the Spring. She especially loved the anticipation of having a gift certificate so she could choose what she liked.
But she hid them away, and I didn’t know where. When I was looking through some files in my office, I found the envelope! Not just the one I’d given her, but 4 others too. So the other day I went to Schilliger’s with Marie and Patricia and we got some more flowers for her grave (see attached photo). Cynthia’s certificates will help me inundate our apartment and garden with flowers this year . . . she will bless many again.
Steve & Marie are God-sent here again, exactly one year later. We met at the grave today, along with Richard & Elaine, Doris, Derek, and Eliane H. We read the 23rd Psalm together, as we did over Cynthia three times a day during her last weeks here. Richard’s idea was to share bread and wine at the grave; I brought the bread, the last loaf of banana bread that Cynthia baked and froze. She always baked it to share, it was part of her hospitality. I found it at the bottom of the freezer, it was still good. And still blessing others . . . . Springtime is bringing all the flowers out now; another sign that life triumphs over death. Hallelujah!