You Give and Take Away

On friday night, John the amazing quit waiting on the doorstep and entered the door to that life which is really life. (this is just a real pale imitation, by comparison!) He left from his home with his family by his side. Alese hovers in ICU, having made progress that has slowed.
what shall we say? this is the messy, difficult, beautiful life we get to walk through on the way to the homeland.
i guess this is what i'd say, quoting John Bunyan (1600s; spent most of his adult life in jail for not doing the party line in matters of faith)

He who would valiant be 'gainst all disasters,
Let him in constancy follow the Master.
There's no discouragement shall make him once relent
His first avowed intent
to be a pilgrim.

Who so beset him round with dismal stories
Do but themselves confound--his strength the more is!
No power shall stay his might tho he with giants fight:
He shall make good his right
to be a pilgrim!

Since Lord, Thou dost defend
Us with Thy Spirit,
We know we at the end shall life inherit!
Then fancy (worry) flee away, I'll fear not what men say:
I'll labor night and day
to be a pilgrim!

this is not a life for whiners. we were made for more than most "religion" tells us; we were made to life victorious in the midst of this grand ruin, this ever-slowing, ever-decaying place that reminds us even in its greatest beauty, that we were made for another place.

or to quote Carolyn Arends:

"We are reaching for the future; we are reaching for the past
And no matter what we have, we reach for more.
We are desperate to discover what is just beyond our grasp:
Maybe that's what Heaven is for--I believe that's what Heaven is for."

if we are here to be conformed to the image of Christ, then part of that is to experience rejection; if we are to be pressed into the mold of His image, then part of it is to learn how to bear the greatest sorrow and yet be light as a leaf, joyful as a pup at play...for the sorrow, too, reminds us that there is more.