home again,home again, without the jiggedy jig

Oh, home. Most of my blogs in the past have been about how I love home. Home, with its comforts, "comfortableness", peace and its unique power to energize. I did find these same wonderful qualities awaiting us after such a long time away, but something is different. I am different. Places and their charms don't hold the same power for me. I do not think I will ever see my home as I always have. I know now, in a way I have never been able to grasp before, that the home that is truly mine, that I was created for, doesn't exist here on this planet.

Barry, our dear son-in-law, died on July 4th. For the last 5 weeks, Phil and I have been at Clare and Barry's home, doing whatever we could to ease the workload for Clare as she cared for, loved, and helped to make Barry's home-going as pain free as possible.

Words can't contain what this journey is teaching me. I'll have to marinate for a while in these rich lessons so that I may attempt to sort them out and share them. I do know that to go to the highest places with God, you have to go to the lowest places. To overcome pain, you have to embrace pain, and to overcome fear, you let God take you to those places you fear most, and let go and watch Him go to battle for you. All this new revelation comes from a person who has a PHD in Pain avoidance. No one has been more expert at keeping pain at bay than moi! The fruit of that avoidance has been a shallow understanding of the immense power of God's love and the instant connection available to me if I won't be so afraid of being broken.
It has been said of God's kingdom that it is an upside down one. RIGHT! Throw out all your preconceived certainties about being a child of God, hold on to your big hat, one that fits a big head if you have one like mine, and dare to let God do whatever He needs to do to show you His paths to joy...the "real McCoy" joy. Let me interject here that joy and happiness are two completely different animals.

I don't know much anymore. Phil always says now, "if there is one thing I know, it is that I don't know." I get it. But the one thing we are certain of now more than any other time in our lives, is that "love never fails." Opinions fail, head knowledge fails, even experience can't be banked on. But God, and God alone, does not disappoint when He is your only source of trust.
more later, maybe not....
grateful for the choice