Monday, January 11, 2010

Let It Go in One Year and Out the Other!
By Pamela Blattner

“…but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”
Philippians 3:13b-14 (NASB)

Recently, I was thinking about the past year of my life. I had quit my job and most of my ministries, choosing to dedicate my time to caring for my ailing mother and opening up our home to my daughter, her husband and newborn granddaughter. My mom began to need care that I couldn’t keep up with. The Caring Bridge at the hospital helped us with the decisions we had to make for my mom’s and my best interests. The months that followed were excruciating. The day I walked out the dementia facility after seeing to it that my mother was peaceful and well taken care of was one of the hardest times of my life. I fell into a sobbing heap in the car. I felt that she would never forgive me. As I reached for a napkin lying on the seat, I heard the accuser shout, “You claim to love your mom, and you put her in a dementia care unit? I thought you loved your mom so much that you said you’d never put her in a cold and lonely place like that. She deserves better than that.”

Time has passed; mom and her friend, Bernie, who is in his nineties, love each other. It’s a quiet and dignified love. Her caregivers love her, too, and kiss her forehead each night like I used to. I hear her evening shift caregiver loudly say, “Goodnight honey, I love you” after she takes her hearing aids out, and then I proceed to finish “tucking her in” by phone around 8:30 p.m. each night.

Several online commentators quote Henry Beecher, a well-known 19th Century preacher, as saying: “We have passed through one more year. One more long stage in the journey of life, with its ascents and descents and dust and mud and rocks and thorns and burdens that wear the shoulders, is done. The old year is dead. Roll it away. Let it go. God, in His providence, has brought us out of it…its good remains...” (1)

If a hurtful or difficult memory from 2009 comes up, “issumagijoujungnainermik”! I’ve read that in the Eskimo language, it means “Not-being-able-to-think-about-it-anymore,” “to forgive.” It’s all in God’s hands. Rather than replay the pain you experienced, replay God’s mercy, His grace and His love. Let’s press forward to do exciting and new things for the Lord!

GOING DEEPER:
1. What do you need to issumagijoujungnainermik as you leave 2009 behind?
2. In what specific ways will you “press on” toward Jesus in 2010?

FURTHER READING:
1 Peter 5:7; Psalm 136:1, 139:17

(1) for example: www.preceptaustin.org/philippians_312-16.htm

Pam and her husband Richard have two adult children and two grandchildren. She serves Oakwood through its Family Care Ministries.
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