Precious Friend, I Wish You Precious Peace

"There'll be peace in the valley forme someday
There'll be peace in the valley for me.
I pray no more sorrow and sadness or trouble will be,
There'll be peace in the valley for me."

Dear Sister in Sorrow,

I recall the lyrics I used to hear Mother sing, early mornings as I awakened.  It took years for me to connect her song with a specific situation, event, or occurrence.  Although Mother never laid claim to the prophetic gift Apostle Paul writes about in the First Book of Corinthians, her song often resounded with a prescience that later produced an "Aha!" from me. Her voice rang with a prayer of preparation to face oncoming travail or distress.

That's why I write to you today, dear Sister, albeit concerning a peace you may know now.  I aim to reassure you that we share the Holy Father who promises that "peace which surpasses all understanding will guard our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:7, ESV). As a Mom who has walked a mile in your mocassins and cried enough to at least fill a lagoon of tears, I want you to know Holy Spirit delivers!  He offers peace to accept the unacceptable; healing that assuages dagger-piercing pain; and Love that propels you to keep putting one foot after the other.

"No headaches or heartaches or misunderstands,
No confusion or trouble won't be,
No frowns to defile, just a big endless smile,
There'll be peace and contentment for me."  

As an adult, I soon recognized that Mother's hope-filled song trumpeted a plaintive prayer that birthed  determination and declaration as in, 

"Trouble in my way, I have to cry sometimes
Trouble in my way, I have to cry sometimes
I lay awake at night, but that's alright
I know my Jesus will fix it after while."

Mother's "playlist," as we call it now, rested on an unyielding faith.  I marvel at her perseverance and endurance, which derived from "The fruit of the Spirit" that deserved the highest appreciation.  My journey to Mother's unwavering and unchanging God-faith has been pockmarked with myriad distractions. Now, however, my burgeoning faith makes the difference between despair and hope.

Mother's travail pales in comparison to the immediacy and rawness of your grief, as well it should. We experience grief as an intensely personalized, untenable, and perverse agony that has no place anywhere except where it lands: in heart, soul, and spirit.  Only children and youth too young to understand, have not been visited by this incalculable loss.  Try to take comfort, I plead, in the knowingness that while we mourn in disparate places, not one of us grieves alone!  Blessings, dear Sister.