My mind is hurting, my heart is crying and my soul is mourning.....

I have been thinking about heaven lately that I had thought of my grandfather Igmidio delos Reyes who was a role model for me in my pursuit of God.  His love for God as manifested in his untiring meditation of His Word day and night while his hair was still black, then salt and pepper until it all became grey has been deeply impressed within me up to this day..

My big question and wondering  as I lay in my bed while it was still dawn was "When is Jesus coming again?" My grandpa had waited for a long time and then he was gone.  My mother believed in Jesus coming again...and she was also gone.  And yet Jesus hasn't come yet...

I've been hoping then that I won't die, but meet Jesus in the air.  However, will this be fair for the next generation after me?  What about their plans of going to Mars and inhabit it, settle there and make a career and life there?  If Jesus comes now, then it is like all mankind's hope for Mars to be another inhabited planet will be futile...But then what about my waiting for His return?  Will I die like my grandpa, like my mother and not see Jesus return in my lifetime.

The thought of heaven being forever and a long long time somehow created in me a feeling of dejection.  However, I just have to trust His word that He is coming again---that He had to go away to prepare a place for me in His Father's house.  And where He is, there I will be also.

I got up.  Only to find a message in my inbox telling me of someone who became close to me even for a moment passed away.  I felt so sad that even if I was able to perform my tasks at home and at work, I was certain something was not right within me--my mind is hurting, my heart is crying and my soul is mourning. 

While sadness was overwhelming,  God had a way of dealing with my innermost self.  The office called and so I did not have to be sad but I was called to work again.

Yes, my work had been a good distraction.  As soon as I got home from my on-call interpreting jobs for the last two days, I still felt the impact of my elderly friend's death.  The heart-rending cases I became aware of as I did my job in the hospital also had a cumulative effect in my broken heart.

Tonight the son of my elderly friend sent me a picture of his mother in a coffin.  He said that his Mom had always mentioned then that she had a wonderful friend named Lilian---ah that should be me!

 This was so sweet to hear.  I did not know why she sat on that pew with me one Sabbath. Somehow my Mum and I sort of had established it as our permanent seat in church.  

After a couple of years of absence because my mother then needed a high level care until she passed away, I came back to church.

I knew another church member usually picked up my dear old sweet lady friend  to go to church. Why then did she sit across my side and not with the lady who usually gave her a lift?.  Did she hear about me giving up my university job to look after my mother that she became interested about me and asked about my mother? Or was she wishing she'd have a daughter like me as many elderly people I know also wished?  I never had a chance to ask.

When she sat next to me then for the first time, I cried profusely ...

What happened was she did not sit next to me the following Sabbath. Ah... she might have thought that sitting next to me would make me cry and she did not want to do that.  

Yes, she reminded me of my mother because she sat where my mother used to sit in church.  The truth of the matter, however, the first few Sabbaths when I went back to church, I used to shed tears which my eyeglasses hid as I sung hymns in church.  I missed the beautiful alto voice of my mother.  I also shed lots of tears during pastoral prayers while everybody's eyes were closed.  It was not her per se that made me cry---it was the thought of missing my mother. It was the thought that  I was alone then in that pew and this beautiful and kindred- spirited woman one Sabbath cared to sit next to me.  Or was it the Holy Spirit who led there in that pew where I was?

No that she was gone, too--like my own Mum, all that's left with me are memories of her and the brief time that I was able to minister to her and she, by the same token was also able to minister to me.

Once again I remind myself of what Jesus said....

Do not let your hearts be troubled.  You believe in God, believe also in me.

My Father's house has many rooms; if it were not so, would I have told you that I am going  there to prepare a place for you?

And if I go and prepare a place for you,

I will come back and take you to be with me

that you also may be where I am.

You know the place where I am going.