My Grandpa has gone home. I've been thinking about him a lot. Trying to process a world that exists here without him, and how strange and sad that all seems. More than that, I've been thinking about what makes saying goodbye so hard.C.S Lewis once talked about death as the one thing that we were never meant to deal with. God didn't create us with the ability to handle it on our own, because it wasn't something we were ever meant to face. He's giving us grace to handle the unthinkable, but it will always seem...wrong somehow. Because it is. It's not what he wanted for us. That makes me feel better. Knowing that I don't really have to cope, because it's never going to feel okay. It's not supposed to, not on this side of eternity. We are eternal, after all. Trapped in a finite world, in finite bodies, but infinite in spirit. This thought also gives me comfort, because when I realize this, when I live like it, then maybe I'm closer to my Grandpa than I've ever been before.
And therein lies the struggle. I said on Becky's blog, and thus in my tribute to Grandpa, that to not follow in his and Grandma's footsteps would be to live life less. I believe that with my whole heart. Every single one of us is currently living the legacy we are leaving behind to those who knew us best. What if I died tomorrow? What would be said in front of my casket, what would be said to comfort those who would be left behind to grieve? We called Grandpa many things: strong, loving, faithful, honest, hard-working, and in love with his Savior and his wife. Every one of these things was true. More than true, there were just not English words that described it properly. Everything fell short somehow. What a life he lived...
But to live life in Grandpa (and Grandma's) footsteps, is even harder than saying goodbye to him. It's living in a way that honors his memory...but no, he wouldn't want that would he? It's living in a way that honors God. Really, that is what his life was all about. It was his love for God that made his love for his wife something truly incredible. It was his love for God that made every one of his grandchildren feel like his favorite. Because we all were. It wasn't Grandpa loving us that made us feel that special, though we know he did love us all desperately. It was his stunning obedience to his Lord that allowed God to love us through him. That's why his love felt so special, so different. Because it was different. It was Jesus, and that's amazing to me. And he did it by simply being this one thing: obedient. He worried about nothing other than what his Lord thought of him, and what God wanted of him.
Again I wonder what would be said at my funeral? Not in a morbid way, but in a way that challenges me to think, "What legacy am I leaving behind?" We're all leaving one, after all. This is making me ask myself some very hard questions. I know what Peter would say at my funeral, or how he would feel. I know what a pastor or my mother would say. They'd talk about the good things I did. Most of these would likely center around YWAM, sadly enough. Two years in twenty-five. But what would my co-workers say? What would the people I talk to at the bank say? Or my non-Christian friends? Would there be only Christians in that church, because I hadn't befriended anyone who wasn't like me? What would people at work say if they knew exactly what I believed and why? Would they be surprised? I dearly hope not, but I suspect so, at least a little bit. Maybe they'd say, "I knew she believed in God, but she was a missionary? I heard her swearing after work once when she'd had a bad day...I didn't think Christians did that." Ouch. They'd be right. Do I really model the love of God not just to those I'm comfortable being a Christian around, but to everyone who meets me? Do I share my faith, or look for opportunities to be Christ to someone else? Do I love my family, or my spouse in a way that makes others notice my relationships and, gasp, inquire as to why my life is different? Has anyone ever asked me "the reason for the hope that I have"? You didn't meet Grandpa without meeting Jesus, you can meet me and not see Jesus at all, it just depends when you catch me. How hard I've been working, how financially or emotionally stressed I am, whether or not I've had a bad day at work, can all affect who you meet when you meet me. Sometimes it's not Jesus. Sometimes it's just Melanie.
I don't think Grandpa would want us to idolize him in his death, though he was loving and strong and wonderful. It would be easy to do. But if I did that, made him into something perfect, his life wouldn't be anything but an amazing story to me. It wouldn't be a challenge to the way I'm living now, and I think that it needs to be. I think God has always used Grandpa in a way that made everyone he met want to be like him. In order to do that we need to realize that he was still just a man. A great man, but just a man. He wasn't perfect. He was human. I'm human. Finally we have a starting point. I can be like Grandpa. If I just try to be like Jesus. Then my life, and my legacy, will resemble that of my Grandfather. I think that's what he'd want more. Not just to remember how wonderful he was, but to question what it was that made him like this. Because then we'd find Jesus, and that was all he ever wanted for all of us. To know that we would follow Christ with all our hearts.
Grandpa did. Everyday, Grandpa did this. On the last morning he woke up on this earth he asked God what He wanted of him. I want to be like Grandpa and Grandma. The hard thing is this: it will cost me. It will mean forgiving when someone doesn't deserve it. It will mean devotion to prayer and to God in a way that I haven't yet experienced. It means loving my spouse more than I value my individuality. More than I value myself. It will mean loving my enemies. It will mean not compromising in not only what I feel is right or wrong, but what I know God says is right or wrong. It means not living for money, or power, or for honor in the eyes of anyone but Jesus. It means a value system that the world will notice instantly, is very different. It will mean a change in the way I'm living now. I will mean sacrifice. It will mean dying knowing that I lived my life in a way that would honor the one I will spend eternity with. It will mean laying down that last time ready to see my Saviour with nothing but tears in my eyes for the gratitude that "Jesus died for me. He died for me."
11:17 PM
Ditto.
That's all.
8:18 AM
Amen to that.
What more can one say. You said it all.
11:57 PM
wow! beautiful
6:57 AM
I couldn't have said it better. What a man.
8:15 AM
Beautifully said as always. We will all miss that great man.
3:27 AM
i think grampa's standing there with jesus right now and he's pointing down at you and saying, that's my grandaughter
yeah... he definately is
10:52 AM
that's a really nice thing to say Trav. Thanks.
I hope that that's true, and I hope that I live in a way that makes Jesus point down and say "that's my daughter". That'd be enough for me.
6:21 PM
Good stuff Melanie. You do have a way with words. But I know this is more than just words, this also involves your heart. Thanks very much.
10:16 PM
On the Day Grandpa died I went into the bedroom and sat on Grandpa's side of the bed and there on the floor was a bath mat with one of Grandpa's Huge footprints on it. I thought about how he left us footprints to follow and if we look at the way he lived his life we would see that his footprints almost always match up with the footprints that Jesus left us.
I tried to share this thought at the funeral home the night of the viewing but you have just said it much better. Thanks.