Once a daughter asked her mother this terrifying question: What would you do if papa suddenly dies? It set her thinking, in spite of her reluctance to do so. She didn't know, she told her.

Death is a certainty, yet we are never ever prepared for the death of some one close. Like love, death changes everything. The experience of losing someone is unique. Whole areas of emotions otherwise unknown crash and sweep into a person's soul like an avalanche.

Just today after lunch, while I was taking a nap, I had dreams of my mother who had passed away in March this year. In the dream I was feeling very lonely and lost, all alone in the house, looking for my mother and crying. As I woke up, I could feel the heaviness in my heart and it took sometime to come back into the normal state again. We have to go on with life as usual, since no one can remain with us for long. This thought is so painful and depressing! How we miss them!

There are no answers to the questions the grieving ask. Why, why now? Laments of, "if only, if only...", self-recrimination, guilt, even anger, feelings of abandonment-"how do I carry on from here?"

Grief, like love is part and parcel of living. To some grief comes early in the loss, to others later. I don't know if anybody in this life ever is the same again after a loss. Some describe it as a hole in the heart, something missing. Is this the "God-shaped hole" in the heart that only God can fill?

How can one be prepared for loss? The more you love, the greater the loss. So is the solution not to love too deeply and wholly, so the pain of loss is less? At some funeral , the refrain, "My life is in you Lord, my hope is in you Lord", and the sermon from Psalm 121: "Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth", were very comforting for the bereaved. The great God who made heaven and earth is our help.

From this song and psalm, the Lord says to me that my life is not to be dependant on those I love, but on the Lord Jesus Christ. While I depend on my loved ones for a myriad of things, I am to be dependant on the Lord alone.

Here is a prayer that releases us into such comforting cetainty.

"Heavenly Father I am no longer my own but yours. Put me to what You will, rank me with whom You will; put me to suffering; let me be employed for You or laid aside for You, exalted for You or brought low for You; let me be full, let me be empty; let me have all things, let me have nothing, I freely and whole-heartedly yield all things to Your pleasure and disposal. And now, glorious and blessed God, You are mine and I am Yours, In Jesus' Name. Amen."

For some who say this prayer, suffering, loss and emptiness may come true for them. For them, to live on, and maintain sanity, is to cling on to the belief that God is in control and sovereign, 'trusting in His promises and relying on His grace'. But for everyone who say this prayer, pain may come- if not now, later. And to them too, there is nothing but God, the God who is in control and who cares.

Be Encouraged.

***********************Letter # 28 (28.7.2002)****************