Endings and Beginnings.............

Life certainly is about beginnings and endings. At times you can feel you are caught in the middle, but right now my life is just that: beginnings and endings. My only son got married Saturday to a wonderful godly woman. I could not be more thrilled with what God has brought together. Callie is perfect for Oliver in many ways. They are opposites in some areas, and are alike in others. I love Callie like she was one of my own. Thank you to her parents for bringing her up in a home that loved Jesus first of all.

On their wedding day, ending was the relationship that I had grown very fond of, kind of like sitting in my favorite chair where the pillows and fluff are molded to my body. Then somebody decides that you needed a made over chair. They threw out the pillows and the cushions, put new fabric on it, and even moved it to a different spot in the room. It is still the same chair, I just have to get used to the new rough edges, and the new pillows that have not been smushed to the contours of me. In fact, the chair will never be the same. The new chair will eventually feel soft again, but it will never be the same. To some, the old chair will become a faint and distant memory, except to the original owner.

My dear son has started on the same journey that I did almost 30 years ago. I barely remember what it was like to be that person, that sister, that daughter. My mother remembers, though. She remembers when I ran away to the neighbors house, she remembers when I played in the mud in the back yard right before church, she remembers old boyfriends, old playmates, old memories that have virtually been wiped away from my heart. They are written on her heart though. They will never go away, they will never be obliterated, or snuffed out. When she lays dying she will, if she can, still remind me of the time when.......

The endings and the beginnings are happening virtually at the same time.

With God they are always simultaneous. When we begin our walk with Him we are beginning, but is He? He thought of us before the foundation of the world. He held me and my son in His hands. We begin, but He was. When I lay dying, I will be ending, and beginning. I will also remember the pitter-pat of little feet on the stairs and the precious laughter of long ago. Beginnings and Endings......