arise

Death of a believer is never in vain

Death does not swallow – it’s all for His gain.

And yet the heart cries, and the pleas arise –

“why, WHY, does she have to die?”

 

The faces behind who still must walk on

we know little children are not very strong.

The tears pour down and our prayers arise –

“Be with them, Lord, that their faith would not die.”

 

Her words, her life showed sacrifice here

A woman of faith, to whom God was near.

It comes to an end and our praises arise.

“Father, in her life, you have been glorified”.

 

Let’s kneel to our still-great God in prayer,

even when we wonder if He’s really there.

“For whom the Lord loveth“, He tests and He tries,

And in deepest grief, we lift up our eyes.

 

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Janella’s death has hit me hard… which is a little bit uncharacteristic of me. Not that it isn’t so tragic and awful, but that I didn’t know her well, and I had only had some brief Facebook and blog communication with her, and usually it takes much more than that for me to feel loss like I do now. Maybe it’s because I know how beautiful that vacation would have been in the midst of regular missionary stress. Maybe it’s because it just hits so close to home – those two little sweet faces, ages 4 and 2, and a grieving daddy. Maybe it’s just because the whole situation comes when I’ve been battling a fear of surrender for the longest time, because it just seems like so often, surrender ends in hurt.

But there’s this quote that I shared with some girls on Friday night and I’ll share it again here, because its so relevant:

  “How does one become butterfly?’ Pooh asked pensively.

  “You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar,” Piglet replied.

  “You mean to die?” asked Pooh.

  “Yes and no,” he answered. “What looks like you will die, but what’s really you will live on.”

-A.A. Milne

And that’s exactly it – to become the spirit-filled beings that God intends for us to be, we must be willing to go through the pain of giving up what we know and want in exchange for something unknown, and yet better.

Because “what looks like you will die, but what’s really you will live on.”