the past and the days to come

I’m doing a Beth Moore study. I’ve never done one before.  That might be a surprise to you… or you might say Beth who?  I’ve never really desired to do one, but I’m going to a new church and a good friend already goes there… and she usually does a Beth Moore study when school starts or a new semester for the ladies studies roll around.  So I decided to join her.

Anyway… I’m doing this study.  And to be honest I wasn’t sure if this was for me.  I’ve always studied my Bible since God really opened my eyes to Himself, but never in a ladies group, if that makes any sense.  And being sort of ‘from the wall’ and all, I wasn’t too thrilled about being in small groups and having to share and speak up.  Yes, sitting here typing is MUCH easier than pouring my heart out in front of six or seven sets of eyes staring back at me. 

Maybe this is just ‘my week’ like one of the other girls said last week when we gathered while I scratched my head in wonderment of such a statement.  Well, like I said, maybe this is just my week.  At the beginning of day three she makes a statement that sort of blew me over and yet I knew it was very true. 

“Christ is both Alpha and Omega.  When our lives are immersed in Him, every ending, everything we believe to be the death of us is instead a hand-engraved invitation to a new beginning.”

I read that and just said YES.  I knew what she was saying was for me. I knew it when Bub died. This is not the end of life.  We will go on.  Differently and with sorrow at times, but I knew that God would be moving forward in my life with Him and I knew He still had plans for me.  As a matter of fact, I heard a song called I Will Listen by Twila Paris during the time Bub was sick that I knew I would have played at his memorial service.  The first time I heard it, it pierced me to my very core because, as much as it hurt, I knew it was true.  I listened to it one time and the second time I heard it was at his memorial. Even now, I have to prepare myself to hear it because it is so moving to me. And a call to continue on.

The study this week was reminding me of one part of the song near the end where it talks about learning to dream the dreams He has dreamed for me. Those are hard words for a mother that has just buried her child, and yet so true.  He is still at work.  He still has dreams for what He wants to accomplish in me. 

Beth was having us make a timeline of God’s work in the past and the future work He will do in us. I so dramatically saw His hand at work in me during the time of Bub’s illness. And it just made me want to call out to Him for a fresh continuing of that work… to not get so lost in the everyday that I miss His work now and in the days to come.

ps.. no that’s not Twila singing and I have no idea who Kevin is. Carry on.