Goodbye to Grandpa

Yesterday morning I received a call from my sister that my Grandpa had passed away during the night. Death is so strange. My day seemed cloaked in sadness, yet I never really fully expressed it. Except that is when I told Owen, my 9 year old son, and he sobbed on my shoulder. His authentic sorrow brought out the emotion already stuffed in me. Isn’t this the beauty in children? They have no learned filters to stop their feelings; they just come out as they are.

I loved my Grandpa and was relieved that he had passed so quickly and not had to suffer long in the state he was in. He would have been 93 next month and up until the past few years having some difficulties with health and dementia, he lived a long virile life. I am sad for the hole that his loss will leave in the lives around him.

His will expressed clearly that he did not want to have a funeral when he died. Personally I have difficulty with this. Yes I believe in honouring people and their wishes but I find it a bit of a selfish choice. Simply because I have found that going through the process of a funeral or memorial, serves an important part of grieving and letting go. I don’t pretend to know Grandpa’s reason for choosing this way. I think we need to be deliberate though to find some way to say goodbye to him and to remember his life and legacy. We are the ones left here after all.

Ecclesiastes 3:1,2a says, ‘There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die. Vs 11 goes on to say, ‘He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.’

So although we may find death strange and a difficult place to live in, there is a time for everything. I wondered as I thought of Grandpa dying and thought of these verses, how many people come to have knowledge of God through the death of another. It is during these times that we ponder our own mortality. There aren’t many other occasions that get us to consider this whole mystery of life and God as much as death does. We realize in a more tangible way how precious our life is and that we are not guaranteed our next moment even. We are reminded that we do not live forever. God has set eternity in the hearts of men; ALL men have a spiritual thirst. A desire for eternal value. We are created in His image and we therefore will always have a desire to be more like him, earthly pleasures do not satisfy.

So my prayer in this time is that my family will not only feel the comfort of God, but that they would be caused to consider God. That they would come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, through him they will find eternal life. We do have a place in heaven if we make the choice for Jesus in this life. I believe my Grandpa did this and so I know that I will see him again one day. He is dancing with Grandma and my Mom and many that passed before him, praising the God who created us. Good bye for now Grandpa. Thank you for the memories and the example of your life. I love you.