October 27th, 2010

I have sought to find words to describe the journey since October 3rd. I have discovered a sense of serenity in the midst of loss. Loss is not a thing to be quantified. It has depth and texture that is unique to each of us who experience loss. We have been touched by grace and blessing in my father's death. In the same period of time I have been touched by the loss of a co-worker and partner in ministry. The mystery of what happens in desperate darkness of life is absorbed in the words of Paul in Romans 8...

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, 

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;

we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

(Romans 8:31-39 ESV)