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                                     A LITTLE BIT LONGER     

So He shall give His angels charge over Thee to keep thee in all thy ways. 

                                                                                                            Psalm 91:11

Sometimes when people pray together they are inclined to hold hands.  This may happen in a circle, when two people pray together or during a church service.  In some churches it is customary to hold hands while praying The Lord’s Prayer.  People reach hands across pews and aisles to pray.

When people do clasp hands in prayer, a gesture that is common is to squeeze the hand of another a little bit longer.  When Amen is uttered, frequently there is a tendency to hold the hand of another person a little bit longer.  That brief pressing of hands together is a human reflex that speaks about human ways of holding on a while more.

With every grace God gives to us, there is a desire to hold on.  This life the Lord grants to us is one filled with people, places, things, memories, and dreams we hold dear.  God wants it that way.  He made it that way.  Although this life is not the final destination for the Christian (Heaven is) during our earthly pilgrimage we get hints of everlasting life.  The finest and warmest moments we know here can be likened to the eternal Home where believers in Jesus shall live forevermore.  Because certain people and experiences are so precious, we want to hold to them.  It is painful when it is time to let go.

Grief is a season in life when letting go is in process.  It is a sad time.  It is an exhausting time.  To say goodbye to someone or something and know that we cannot relive that season in life, is to cross an emotional bridge of acceptance that may be one of the most arduous journeys ever taken.  Sullen and long as days may seem, grief days are filled with enormous effort and energy for it takes such to adjust to a necessary goodbye.  Jesus knows this.  Jesus stays through this process—just as He was there for the memory-making in the first place.

Believers in Jesus have an unbreakable bond with Him.   Jesus holds all that we love—forever.  Whether endings comes due to illnesses, sudden deaths, divorce, miscarriage, empty nest, drug and alcohol abuse or relocation, Jesus still holds for us in His heart what is most meaningful to us.  And we are to always remember that if someone or something is meaningful to us, the same is meaningful to God.  Everything—everything—that matters to us matters to the Lord.  He gives us life and its graces and He derives blessings from us as we share life with Him, in all of it joyous as well as sorrowful experiences.  

When it is time for certain relationships and experiences to conclude, we try hold on to them.  We may be granted the time to linger.  The Holy Spirit may bring inspiration to journal, write a song, create a painting or carve woodwork that helps adjust to goodbye.  There may be times for prayer or silence that offer insights that speech cannot.  The Holy Spirit may bring revelation through Scripture to comfort and strengthen.  Whatever way one is inclined to express emotions and capture a time of meaning, the Lord is certain to offer a two-fold blessing.  He will accompany us in the process of remembrance and He will hold the future, we cannot see, in His heart of love and promise.  With Jesus, the future is always certain.  New life, different life, is ahead.  Jesus is the reason why hope is still real even when it may not be felt.  Jesus will hold on to you and to me in all of our times of transition as we are inclined to hold on a bit longer to life as we have know it.  He will keep His angels with us for protection.  He will hold on to us with His incomparable, unbreakable, and unfathomable love.  Trust Him to hold you.  Jesus can do no less.  The Bible says so, and the Bible is His heart.

Lord Jesus, You are the One who gives to us all the joys we behold in this life.  You, Lord Jesus, are our reach to the future when we are too weak to hope.  Lord Jesus, Thank You for carry us through the beginnings and endings of our seasons in life so that we can fulfill our time in this world and know the many blessings You want to give to us.  Because of You, Lord Jesus, we can go on and believe in tomorrow and all of Your grace that still abounds.  In Thee, Lord Jesus, Amen.

The Lord never tires.  The Lord never ever grows weary of loving us.  Is that not a strengthening thought.  There are times in life when we grow weary but His love is steady and strong.  Because it is, we can carry on even when we are weak.

Losses in life can and do weaken us.  They take away energy and focus and seem to leave us empty.  But the Lord’s love fills and replenishes.  Even if it does not feel as though it is carry us, it is.  He promised to be there through all the days of our lives.  Certainly this mean the days of fatigue and sorrow.  Jesus promised.  There is nothing more to be known. 

Lord, Thank You for Your promises in the Bible that give utter confidence of Your love and presence.  This has nothing to do with how we feel but everything to do with what You promised.  Your promises are true and abiding.  Thank You, Lord Jesus, Amen.