Death is not glamorous. It is the bruised and bloodied face on the concrete floor. It is the greasy, work-worn hands that suddenly cease their work. It is the moment frozen in time when everything is as it should be, but when nothing ever will be the same again.
They say it gets better with time. If they mean that your life becomes busy again, that you're distracted from the ragged tear that ended your previous existence, then they're giving you a cheap alternative to actual healing.
Because you lay down at night in the dark, and you feel the ache. You sit in your dingy car, and you wish for just one more wise-crack. You are hugged by so many people through the course of the week, but at the end of it you're longing for that one particular hug that no one else can give.
You realize how much you talked him up, and you find out about how he talked you up, and you wish he were here so you could do it just one more time without that awful reminder.
He is gone.
Those three words are enough to break down the most stoic personality, to rip apart the most organized life, to bring the most joyful heart to tears. You want him here because he is supposed to be here. Your family was built with him in the middle of it. Your life was built with him as a part of it. Your way of thinking and speaking is so easily constructed around the assumption that he is.
"And he was no more, for God took him."
His face wasn't the only one bloodied and bruised on that day. Death is not glamorous. It is the crown of thorns pressed into the skull. It is the bloody lashes of a whip. It is nails in the wrists and ankles. It is the cry of our King before He breathed His last.
"Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit."
Death is not beautiful. It is not natural. It is not easy, and we should not make it so. We should not say paltry things like, "it gets better", or "time heals all." Those are empty words, and they will not bring him back. Time is not going to fill in the Ben-shaped gaps in my life. Time can't replace his hugs, his laughter, his sarcasm, his love. Time can only distract me from seeing the gap and feeling the hurt. I need something more.
I need a Savior.
I won't see the triumph in Ben's death until I see the triumph in Jesus Christ's. I won't see the glory waiting for him on the other side until I see the glorified, resurrected Christ. I won't find comfort until I find the One who faced death alongside of Ben, so that Ben might, in his death, live.
A vibrant part of my life was taken when that gun went off on that wintery night. I have learned, as the long nights turned into weeks, and the long weeks turned into months, that I can live with him absent.
I have learned that to follow after my Savior means I must count these beautiful, precious people He has placed in my life as nothing.
Not that I do not love them, or that I do not invest time in them. Rather, that I lay them at the feet of an all-knowing, all-powerful Savior and say, "I love You more."
Just as I laid Ben down.
Death is not glamorous. It is the abrupt end to laughter, to love, to life. But with it comes a reminder of renewed laughter, of continued love, of greater life in death's wake.
We lost our brother, and we clung to the hope of heaven. We lost his love, and we turned to the love of Jesus. We lost his laughter, and our tears mingled with our Savior's. We lost his life, and we looked to the promise of the life to come.
They say it gets better with time. If they mean that your life becomes busy again, that you're distracted from the ragged tear that ended your previous existence, then they're giving you a cheap alternative to actual healing.
Because you lay down at night in the dark, and you feel the ache. You sit in your dingy car, and you wish for just one more wise-crack. You are hugged by so many people through the course of the week, but at the end of it you're longing for that one particular hug that no one else can give.
You realize how much you talked him up, and you find out about how he talked you up, and you wish he were here so you could do it just one more time without that awful reminder.
He is gone.
Those three words are enough to break down the most stoic personality, to rip apart the most organized life, to bring the most joyful heart to tears. You want him here because he is supposed to be here. Your family was built with him in the middle of it. Your life was built with him as a part of it. Your way of thinking and speaking is so easily constructed around the assumption that he is.
"And he was no more, for God took him."
His face wasn't the only one bloodied and bruised on that day. Death is not glamorous. It is the crown of thorns pressed into the skull. It is the bloody lashes of a whip. It is nails in the wrists and ankles. It is the cry of our King before He breathed His last.
"Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit."
Death is not beautiful. It is not natural. It is not easy, and we should not make it so. We should not say paltry things like, "it gets better", or "time heals all." Those are empty words, and they will not bring him back. Time is not going to fill in the Ben-shaped gaps in my life. Time can't replace his hugs, his laughter, his sarcasm, his love. Time can only distract me from seeing the gap and feeling the hurt. I need something more.
I need a Savior.
I won't see the triumph in Ben's death until I see the triumph in Jesus Christ's. I won't see the glory waiting for him on the other side until I see the glorified, resurrected Christ. I won't find comfort until I find the One who faced death alongside of Ben, so that Ben might, in his death, live.
A vibrant part of my life was taken when that gun went off on that wintery night. I have learned, as the long nights turned into weeks, and the long weeks turned into months, that I can live with him absent.
I have learned that to follow after my Savior means I must count these beautiful, precious people He has placed in my life as nothing.
Not that I do not love them, or that I do not invest time in them. Rather, that I lay them at the feet of an all-knowing, all-powerful Savior and say, "I love You more."
Just as I laid Ben down.
Death is not glamorous. It is the abrupt end to laughter, to love, to life. But with it comes a reminder of renewed laughter, of continued love, of greater life in death's wake.
We lost our brother, and we clung to the hope of heaven. We lost his love, and we turned to the love of Jesus. We lost his laughter, and our tears mingled with our Savior's. We lost his life, and we looked to the promise of the life to come.
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