This week I said goodbye to my Granny, the woman who rocked me and sang “by-oh-baby” to the tune of Rock of ages and who dazzled me with her feminine beauty and strength. I wrote about her life and faithfulness in Majoring in Motherhood. I consider it one of my life’s greatest privileges to have belonged to Jon and Dorothy Powell.
I can see her in my mind’s eye, washing dishes or stirring hot chocolate. I can hear her laugh and her voice calling me, “Emiline.” Her home was a haven, a place that always meant safety and love and laughter. I think I might pay just about anything to go back and spend a day there with her. I can’t help but think that heaven will a little like going to Granny’s house.
I keep thinking that is strange for death to come in spring when the world is coming back to life. I keep thinking that this was her last spring and how we’ll all have a last spring. I keep thinking of the dissonance of it all, the death and life, the beauty and the ugliness. I keep thinking that the world is like an instrument out of tune, not quite playing the melody it was meant to.
But Christ will put it right. He’ll bring it all back into harmony and somehow make it play a sweeter tune than it did before. Someday…but not yet.
I snapped this pic of the spring blooms right after I heard she passed.
As I sat with my Granny for the last time this side of heaven, I thought of Psalm 139:16, “All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.” These last days of her life were written, each of them known before time began.
It struck me what a beautiful thing it is to have your days written by God, to know God keeps a book about us. As a writer, I know what intention and care goes into choosing words, arranging a story. What is man that He is mindful of us? Yet, somehow, the God of the universe has taken the care to write each of our days. As they hymn goes, “From life’s first cry to final breath, Jesus commands my destiny.”
Psalm 116 says, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.” I don’t think I ever fully understood this verse, but I think I do now. It’s precious in the way a final word in a story is precious: important, chosen with care. It’s not random or unseen. It’s watched over. It’s guided. If a sparrow will not fall to the ground apart from His notice, how much more will His children be laid to rest with care?
And when we think that it doesn’t seem right for it all to end this way, we can remember Gandalf’s words to Pippin.
Pippin: I didn't think it would end this way.
Gandalf: End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path... One that we all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass... And then you see it.
Pippin: What? Gandalf? See what?
Gandalf: White shores... and beyond, a far green country under a swift sunrise.
Pippin: Well, that isn't so bad.
Gandalf: No. No, it isn't.
What comfort it is to be authored by God. How sweet it is to know that the Writer of the best story is writing our story, from the first word to the last. What hope to know the story doesn’t end here for Christ has made a beginning out of all of our endings.