One Step Forward

A close neighbor told me during Maia’s wake that our experience itself was more painful since the “normal human life cycle dictates that it is the children who bury their parents and not the other way around.”

Indeed, the lingering pain is still deep, continuously crushing my mind, heart and soul until now. At times, it is as if my life will stop too for a lifetime that nothing seems to matter around me anymore. Oftentimes, I forget to say my prayer. But somehow, I need to get on going.

For me to move on from this hurtful event of losing a loved one, my 22 month old daughter, I have to start from the hardest part of it, that is, forgiving myself and stop looking for someone or something to blame. It is by fact really a tough thing to do, I need to continuously ask the prayers of people around me. For all our dreams and plans for the future our family was shattered all together, gone, vanished away so soon. Our world was totally flipped upside down. Starting all over again appears far-fetched and picking up the pieces left behind is excruciating. It can still really, really be hard to even think about it at times. If only I can just fall asleep and wake up without any tiny bit of sad feeling, but the truth is, I have yet to have a sound sleep after our ordeal.

A close relative replied to my recent blog entry by saying, "…and even if the message was clear, could you have done anything against it if it is God's will?"

My husband told me that comprehending death is beyond man’s intellectual capacity, “that is why there is God and it is none of us.” For here is where faith comes in. After all, the true meaning of life is that it ends.

I thought we would be inconsolable in anyway at all but their words are becoming increasingly accurate as time goes by that they hit me hard. I poured a lot of tears on it during our nights of prayer. It showed me clearly how our God wanted it to be and who am I not to listen and obey His mysterious yet great plan.

And as faithfully as He is to His promises, God never stop working on us. He is very comforting to us by continuously sending good people and friends on our way to help ease the grief. My in-laws came back with us here in China to be with us, to listen, to guide, and to pray with us for three straight months in spite of my incoherent attitude to everyone around me. A friend keeps asking me to stay in their place just to take our minds away from melancholy.

In Bo Sanchez’ latest blog and preaching series “Do you want to be very happy?” he clearly pointed out that the greatest hindrance to true happiness is fear. My husband told me that our greatest fear is over and nothing should deter us from seeking the true happiness that is meant for our family.

Again, we need to get on going. We may not be able to prevent or alter any divine intervention in our life, but we can always choose to still be happy after any tragic event that comes our way. We only need to look beyond this tragedy and look at God’s loving assurance.

O Holy Spirit, Soul of my soul, I adore You. Enlighten, guide, strengthen and console me; tell me what I should do; command me. I promise to be submissive in all the You desire of me and to accept all that You allow to happen to me. Grant only for me to know Your will. AMEN.