"When Words Won't Come, Just Say 'Jesus'"

Six months.  Six long months.  Or six short months.  It all depends on the day, the moment, the memory.  Losing my Dad has been, by far, one of the hardest trials of this life.  There isn't a day that goes by that a thought of him doesn't cross my mind.   I have even had dreams about him.  In one of them, he was still sick and he became upset about something I that I told him the nurse said.  It broke my heart to tell him and even more so to see this horribly scared look on his face.  It was just a dream but it still makes me sad to think about it.  It reminds me of a look I saw on his face the week before he died; I'm not sure if it was a sad, scared, or sick/tired look, but it's a look that is forever etched in my mind.  I had another dream a few nights ago where he was outside squatting down behind our son, helping him with something.  I remember thinking in my dream that he didn't even look sick; he looked like his normal self.

Normal.  What does that mean, anyway?  Life can be "normal" one minute then completely upside down the next, with the adjustment to it often referred to as a "new normal".  By no means am I having to adjust like my Mom is.  She comes home to see his truck parked in front of the house; she has to walk past his room; should she walk in his room, she sees the things on his dresser, almost exactly as he left them.  Just about everything in the house triggers a memory for her.  While I don't experience it that to the degree, I do experience something similar.  My husband and I bought my parents' house (the house I grew up in) about 8 years ago.  While we have made some changes and added our own touches, making it our own, there are things around this house that clearly remind me of him:  doors and walls that he painted, especially my old room (now our son's room); flooring that he laid down; the hooks he installed under the mantle that we continue to hang our Christmas stockings from; the picnic table he built; the trees he planted in the yard, especially the one he planted in the front many years ago that was barely more than a stick, now over 30 feet tall.  There are other things but you get the idea.  To you, they may seem like silly things to become sentimental over but seeing things he did with his hands bring back good memories of him.  One of the last projects he worked on was helping my husband to build a stand for our fish tank, only a few months before he passed away.  After some finishing touches (and a little help from our Little Man), it now sits handsomely in our dining area.

Every time I walk in my son's room in the morning or after his nap, I turn off the CD player playing his "Grandpa's songs", songs used in my Dad's memorial video.  Some days the songs strike me more than others but I know it's a part of how our son remembers him so I don't mind.  Tears are part of the healing process.  And with as many tears as I've shed, I still feel all the ones I've shoved down inside of me, just waiting to burst forth.  Sadness hits me the most at night when it's quiet and I have nothing but time to think.  Sometimes I want to yell and scream how angry I am about him becoming sick and dying and leaving us behind to deal with it and sometimes I cry just because I miss him or because he's not there to celebrate a special event with us.  I know he is with our Savior and that one day we will see him again.  Yes, I still cry and, yes, I'm still dealing with the anger.  It's been six months and I feel about the same as I did then.  But I have to heal in my own time; everybody does.  Grief shouldn't be dwelled upon but neither should it be rushed.  Memories can be healing and comforting but we should not let them consume us to the point of living in the past.  I know God will use this experience for good; it has already served as an experience I could relate to when my sister-in-law's mother died unexpectedly just about 3 months later.  If He has anything else in store, it remains to be seen; it could be months or even years before He further reveals His will in all of this.

I can't change the circumstances.  The loss of him still hurts tremendously.  The healing process for me is very slow.  Sometimes, it hurts too much to even utter words of prayer, especially when I'm praying for continued healing for our family and when I've had an especially emotional day.  Not being able to speak my prayer aloud isn't a cop-out to not express my feelings and emotions.  If you've ever experienced a loss, you know how this feels; God knows our hearts.  But I did hear a song on the radio not long ago that related to this feeling of not even having the words to pray; it's called "Just Say 'Jesus'" by 7eventh Time Down.  There are a lot of songs I can relate to in this season of life but with this one, I want to share some of the lyrics* with you that stood out to me and hit me where I'm at:

"Life gets tough and times get hard...

Your heart isn't healing...

When you don't know what to say, just say 'Jesus'

There is power in the name, the name of Jesus

If the words won't come...just say 'Jesus'.

Whisper it now or shout it out

However it comes out, He hears your cry.

...Just call out to the way, the truth, the light.

...There is just one name, strong enough to save...

If the words won't come and you don't know what to say,

Just say, 'Jesus'."

Jesus...

(*You can click here for the complete lyrics or click here to watch the music video.)