Warnings?

There's something I can get to brooding about. Let's see if I can articulate it.
Throughout 2017 I had a strong impression that change was coming. And it certainly did--big time. I never in a million years would have dreamed the change would be what it has been. But my life has certainly change.
Sometime in fall of 2017 out of the blue said I would be lost if she was gone. She was right but her comment left me gobsmacked.
The Sunday before she died I felt an urgency to stay home with her, as she had the flu.
On January 16, the day before she died, I went to Calgary to donate blood and then I was to go on from there to a business meeting. But, again, I had an urgency to be home.
I stopped on my way home for a coffee to receive a text from her asking where I was. It seemed sad and plaintive.
On getting home I was almost overwhelmed with the thought of how devastating it would be if I never heard her voice, or her laugh or saw her smile.
And then she said she felt so sick she wanted to die.
The thing I wonder, when I take all these things in mind, is if the Lord was somehow speaking to both of us about the big change coming.
I don't know. Brooding doesn't help. But I do wonder.

Still shocked

I am slowly adjusting to my new normal but I woke up this morning once again feeling the shock of loss and the reality that someone as energetic, enthusiastic and apparently healthy as my Faye would die in an instant.
But for my absolute confidence in the sovereignty of God I don't know how I would go on. But God is sovereign. I don't understand why this horrible event happened but it did and I know my God is sovereign.
I have no particular answers or explanations but I do my God and I trust Him.

Beautiful to me

Faye had arthritic hands. They were deformed and they embarrassed her. But they never, ever embarrassed me. They were the hands of a hard working woman with the heart of a servant. And so they were beautiful to me.

Deciding to live

In the immediate aftermath of Faye's death I truly did not care if I lived or if I died. I wasn't suicidal. Far from it but the thought of rejoining Faye sooner rather than later was very appealing. I would have been okay with the possibility of a plane crash on my trip to The Philippines. All I wanted was to be with Faye again. Period.

But in the four months that have passed I have regained my will to live. There's not a lot of joy as yet but I choose to live and I expect joy will return.

The first step has been to care for the physical. Some may disagree but I believe strongly in the physical first, and then the spiritual. God created a material world with people with bodies and he pronounced it good. This physical world is good. My body is good. And I need to treat it well.

Spiritual strength will follow physical health. So I've hired a personal trainer who works me hard, for which I'm grateful. A good, intense, workout is not only good for my body but good for my spirit. And that is one hour when I don't think of anything other than the next rep.

I've also recommitted to WildFit nutritional coaching.

Health is coming back and with health comes fresh hope.

Choose life.

I watched an elementary school presentation of The Wizard of Oz last week and cried. Yep, the Wizard made me cry at the very end.
Just like Dorothy, my Faye clicked her heels three times and left this dreamworld for her real, eternal home. Joy for her, sorrow for me.

I've just returned from a trip to the Niagara Region where I spent time with my family. It was good but it prompted a lot of sadness--not deep grief but sadness.
Faye would have enjoyed it immensely and my family would have loved having my friendly, enthusiastic, servant-hearted and energetic Faye there.
Almost everything can make me sad.

I found great strength in this passage this morning:

Since you became alive again, so to speak, when Christ arose from the dead, now set your sights on the rich treasures and joys of heaven where he sits beside God in the place of honour and power. Let Heaven fill your thoughts; don't spend your time worrying about things down here. You should have as little desire for this world as a dead person does. Your real life is in heaven with Christ and God. And when Christ who is our real life comes back again, you will shine with him and share in all his glories.  Colossians 3:1-4 (TLB)

Can God's people be too heavenly minded? I think not, after all, we're commanded to set our sights on the joys and treasures of Heaven. They are promised. They are real.