LIVING, DYING, AND SO ON, PART 2

Well the 1st chapter of this scenario is over.  People have come, people have gone back to their everyday lives.  Rachel has had her funeral, and everyone has said their good byes.  Honestly is was a very nice service.  Lots of great words were said about this wonderful lady.  She touched so many lives, and those lives touched more lives.  Interesting how all that works.  6 degrees of separation I think is how a lot of people put it.  I know you, you know someone else and what I do affects the person you know and so on.  In this case it was true.  In her 82 years she touched many lives, not only thru her 4 children, and their children, but thru her everyday life.  Church friends, church leaders past and present, and even those in the nursing home up to the day she went home to heaven.  The simple act of dying touched the people in the nursing home and the hospice workers, even her husband of 65 years.  Yes Jim was touched by the way she died.  In his Alzhiemers fogged brain, he knew that is bride had gone on ahead of him.  He will miss her, but somehow he was able to understand that he would see her again someday in heaven.  Wonderful love story there.  Maybe another time I will write more about that.

Now it is about the living.  In this life it is about the living.  Once a person dies, and the funeral is over and people go on, often times it is out of site out of mind.  I don't believe that to be the case here because Rachel's family loved her very much.  However as the saying goes, life does go on.  Work, school, travel, all these things seem to take up our time.  Maybe we should slow down a bit and not let circumstances control our lives so much.  Maybe we should control our lives.  Rachel seemed to do this, at least until she was unable to.  When Jim was away at sea, (he was a merchant marine), she would load up the 4 kids and drive them to whatever port he was coming in, and then they would all drive back.  She ran the house, ran the family business, controlled the finances, made sure the kids were where they needed to be.  Kinda reminds you of the "typical" 50's family where mom was home and had dinner on at 5.  Well that is not exactly the way it was, but way different that most of us tend to stay.  We are all way to busy with life to take the time to understand that we are God's creatures and that He wants us to be.

Yes I think Rachel left a legacy that anyone would be proud of.  She left 4 children, 6 grand children, and yet to be determined any number of great grand children.  All are good, hard working, honest members of society.  The children are married and much in love the way Rachel and Jim were.  One grand child is married and much in love as well.  Perhaps the legacy of 65 years of staying together will rub off and become the standard of the family rather than the exception.

Remember that Rachel loved God, Jim, her family.  All in that order.  She had the order right, she had the priorities in her life right, and it paid off in the end.  She ran the race and she finished strong.  How are you living?  How is your race going?  Are you going to finish strong?