[grace]

"He gives grace everyday"... something I have learned and lived in new ways the past year of my life. What is the only way you see if you truly know something, you remember what to do in crisis, you know the answer to a question... test it. So in my testing this year I came to find the awesome truth of the words "grace for THE day, TODAY" in ways my mind could have never fathomed.

I could not imagine losing the man who had given me the only fatherly love I've known to cancer... but on the morning my mom walked into my room - 8 months after his diagnosis - and said "Uncle Tim is with Jesus" GRACE poured fresh. I wept, but not as one without hope. Grace gave me joy that he was finally cancer free & out of pain. Grace gave me peace I'd see him again. Grace met me right where I was.

I could not imagine losing friends at such a deep time of need as I learned to walk through life after many crushing blows... but grace met me each time I saw someone slipping, or walking, away. Grace comforted my heart that I was (am) where God wants me. Grace reminded me that I must follow Christ's call even if it meant people walked away because the call was hard or unknown. Grace whispered God's word to my mind in times of loneliness that could have led to despair.

I could not image losing a piece of our family as they walked away... truth that could heal being shunned as other things became more valuable than relationship with us. Sin tainting everything it touched and threatening to wipe away years of memories with current hurts that were (and are) piling up. But grace meets me, meets us, each day as we see afresh in God's word that He holds each one that belongs to Him, that He brings back the prodigal, that He heals what the locusts eat, that He asks for trust and gives us peace.

I could not imagine life without the one I cared so much for... yet grace met me in the moment I knew that was exactly what God was calling me to. I couldn't imagine how I'd breathe if I heard the news I so dreaded was true... again, Grace met me and I rested that God was sovereign and would never lie to me, although I was met with the realness of human lies with this news.

I could not imagine the holidays without those I loved... my uncle's name bolded and underlined at the top of this list in my mind. Thanksgiving, let alone Christmas, seems like days I would be unable to make it through. Yet... say it with me... GRACE MET ME each of those mornings. Again, God's grace was there... not a day too soon or too late... strengthening me to take the next step. It reminded me of the true reasons for these holidays... THANKFULNESS: for the time I had shared with my friends, the memories, the trips, the love I'd known; for the time with my uncle, the words of wisdom, laughter, parts of myself that are the way they are because of him, the joy he brought to family gatherings, the blessing of having him in my life if only for a time; thankfulness for 8 years of ministry; thankfulness for the new great grandchild we have; THANKFULNESS as my uncle had written to me exactly one year prior.... and Christmas: it's not about me at all (shocking i know) but about a priceless give - a babe in swaddling clothes, a child KING who began a collision course with a cross, a cross that would take away my sins and justify me to a Holy God, a cross that gives me hope to see my uncle again and be restored to those I love - even if not until heaven.


Grace comes not at the moment we imagine the worst... but at the moment of need. Sitting in the hospital hearing my Uncle's diagnosis I had grace for sure - to take another breath when I felt like there was no air in the room, the lay on the hospital lobby floor with Jeremy (his son) and talk about what we were feeling and how God was in control - I had grace for THAT moment. I did not have the grace for the day we would lose him though, until that day. Although I feared that day... God gave me the grace I needed for the moment, in the moment. I need not to have feared... God was on the job and never let me down... and never will let me down.

So as I head into the new year it is Grace for the Moment I understand in new ways and wonder, not fear (altho i fight this at times) what grace I will receive this year.