Blessed Thanksgiving - Thankful for the Thorns

May you have a

Blessed Thanksgiving!

******

“Show me that I have climbed

closer to You along the path of pain.”

Thankful for the Thorns

Sent to me by Jayne Raines Newton, leader of The Compassionate Friends of Atlanta:

Jane says, "This is an amazing story that really hits home. I had tears running down my face as I was reading it. It is so very true!!!!"

~shared by Tony Cincocco





Thanksgiving Classic:

Thankful For The Thorns



Sandra felt as low as the heels of her shoes when she pulled open the florist shop door, against a November gust of wind. Her life had been as sweet as a spring breeze and then, in the fourth month of her second pregnancy, a "minor" automobile accident stole her joy. This was Thanksgiving week and the time she should have delivered their infant son. She grieved over their loss.



Troubles had multiplied. Her husband's company "threatened" to transfer his job to a new location. Her sister had called to say that she could not come on her long awaited holiday visit. What's worse, Sandra's friend suggested that Sandra's grief was a God-given path to maturity that would allow her to empathize with others who suffer.



"Had she lost a child? She has no idea what I'm feeling," thought Sandra with a shudder. "Thanksgiving? Thankful for what?" she wondered. "For a careless driver whose truck was hardly scratched when he rear-ended her? For an airbag that saved her life, but took her child's?"



"Good afternoon, can I help you?" Sandra was startled by the approach of the shop clerk.



"I.... I need an arrangement," stammered Sandra.



"For Thanksgiving?" Sandra nodded. Do you want the beautiful but ordinary, or would you like to challenge the day with a customer favorite I call the 'Thanksgiving Special'? I'm convinced that flowers tell stories," she continued. "Are you looking for something that conveys 'gratitude' this Thanksgiving?"



"Not exactly!" Sandra blurted out. "In the last five months, everything that could go wrong has gone wrong." Sandra regretted her outburst, and was surprised when the clerk said,

"I have the perfect arrangement for you."



Then the bell on the door rang, and the clerk greeted the new customer, "Hi, Barbara... let me get your order." She excused herself and walked back to a small workroom, then quickly reappeared, carrying an arrangement of greenery, bows, and what appeared to be long-stemmed thorny roses. Except the ends of the rose stems were neatly snipped: there were no flowers.



"Do you want these in a box?" asked the clerk.



Sandra watched for the customer's response. Was this a joke? Who would want rose stems with no flowers! She waited for laughter, but neither woman laughed. "Yes, please," Barbara replied with an appreciative smile. "You'd think after three years of getting the special, I wouldn't be so moved by its significance, but I can feel it right here, all over again." She said, as she gently tapped her chest.



Sandra stammered, "That lady just left with, uh.... she left with no flowers!"



"That's right, said the clerk. "I cut off the flowers. That's the 'Special'. I call it the Thanksgiving Thorns Bouquet."



"Oh, come on! You can't tell me someone is willing to pay for that!" exclaimed Sandra.



"Barbara came into the shop three years ago, feeling much as you do, today," explained the clerk. "She thought she had very little to be thankful for. She had just lost her father to cancer; the family business was failing; her son had gotten into drugs; and she was facing major surgery."



"That same year I had lost my husband," continued the clerk. "For the first time in my life, I had to spend the holidays alone. I had no children, no husband, no family nearby, and too much debt to allow any travel."



"So what did you do?" asked Sandra.



"I learned to be thankful for thorns," answered the clerk quietly. "I've always thanked God for the good things in my life and I NEVER questioned Him why those GOOD things happened to me, but when the bad stuff hit, I cried out, "WHY? WHY Me?!" It took time for me to learn that the dark times are important to our faith!

I have always enjoyed the 'flowers' of my life, but it took the thorns to show me the beauty of God's comfort!

You know, the Bible says that God comforts us when we're afflicted, and from His consolation we learn to comfort others."



Sandra sucked in her breath, as she thought about the thought that her friend had tried to tell her.

"I guess the truth is, I don't want comfort. I've lost a baby and I'm angry with God."



Just then someone else walked in the shop. "Hey, Phil!" the clerk greeted the balding, rotund man. "My wife sent me in to get our usual Thanksgiving arrangement... twelve thorny, long-stemmed stems!" laughed Phil as the clerk handed him a tissue wrapped arrangement from the refrigerator.



"Those are for your wife?" asked Sandra incredulously. "Do you mind telling me why she wants a bouquet that looks like that?"



"No... I'm glad you asked," Phil replied. "Four years ago, my wife and I nearly divorced. After forty years, we were in a real mess, but with the Lord's grace and guidance, we trudged through problem after problem. The Lord rescued our marriage. Jenny (the clerk) told me she kept a vase of rose stems to remind her of what she had learned from "thorny" times. That was good enough for me. I took home some of those stems. My wife and I decided to label each one for a specific "problem" and give thanks for what that problem taught us." As Phil paid the clerk, he said to Sandra, "I highly recommend the Special!"



"I don't know if I can be thankful for the thorns in my life." Sandra said to the clerk. "It's all too... fresh."



"Well," the clerk replied carefully, "my experience has shown me that the thorns make the roses more precious. We treasure God's providential care more during trouble than at any other time. Remember that it was a crown of thorns that Jesus wore so we might know His love. Don't resent the thorns."



Tears rolled down Sandra's cheeks. For the first time since the accident, she loosened her grip on her resentment. "I'll take those twelve long-stemmed thorns, please," she managed to choke out.



"I hoped you would," said the clerk gently. "I'll have them ready in a minute."



"Thank you. What do I owe you?"



"Nothing. Nothing but a promise to allow God to heal your heart. The first year's arrangement is always on me." The clerk smiled and handed a card to Sandra. "I'll attach this card to your arrangement, but maybe you would like to read it first."



It read:

"My God, I have never thanked You for my thorns.

I have thanked You a thousand times for my roses, but never once for my thorns.

Teach me the glory of the cross I bear; teach me the value of my thorns.

Show me that I have climbed closer to You along the path of pain.

Show me that, through my tears, the colors of Your rainbow look much more brilliant."





Praise Him for the roses; thank Him for the thorns.





~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Author Unknown

Thursday's Therapy - Telling Your Story

Thursday's Therapy

Telling Your Story

from

A TCF Speech – 8 Things I’ve Learned About the Grief of a Grieving Parent

Part Three of Eight

Jayne Raines Newton of The Atlanta Compassionate Friends mailed me this wonderfully therapeutic speech two weeks ago, and I'd like to pass it along to you!

Sunday, July 6, 2003 - TCF National Conference

Conference Closing Speech by Charlie Walton

Part Three

3. TELLING YOUR STORY

A third thing I have learned over the years is that grieving people need to tell their stories more times than their friends or family members are going to be willing to hear those stories.

That is perhaps the greatest value of The Compassionate Friends, a group of people who are not only willing to hear your story again and again but will sincerely cry with you the twentieth time you tell that story just as they cried the first time you told it.

These are people who understand, people who listen intently, people who will even help you tell your story. I don't know if you have noticed it but, if you are sitting in a circle telling what happened to you, those who have heard the story lots of times will actually jump in and add a detail you might be leaving out. If there is a first-timer in the circle, the veterans may add explanations and clarifications for them.

It has become their story too. They have suffered your loss. They repeatedly provide the exact response you expected from the whole world. Do you remember your outrage at the world for continuing as though nothing had happened? Do you remember the urge to scream,

"How can you go on like this? Don't you realize that my world has ended?"

So, I praise The Compassionate Friends. a group that meets a vital and normal need, the need for someone to listen with sincere interest as we tell and re-tell our stories again and again.

On the other hand, knowing that we need to tell our stories so many times should help us be a little more understanding toward friends and relatives who are reluctant to hear our stories again and again.

They don't know that each re-telling is helping to heal.

They don't know that each re-telling is therapy.

All they know is that you keep repeating things that make them hurt and they worry that you might be stuck in that story forever.

People who have not been where you have been have no concept of how long grief takes.

They think it should end in some "respectably short time" after the funeral.

Kay and I still have some understanding, supportive friends who will come to us as December 15th approaches and say,

"I remember that it was about this time of year that Tim and Don died, and I want you to know that I am praying for your comfort, and I want you to know that those two guys are very much remembered and missed."

These are wonderful friends who have learned... sometimes with a little training from us... that

"Grief takes longer than one year."

Thank you again to Charlie Walton, and to Jayne Raines Newton who shared this speech with me, both of The Atlanta Compassionate Friends.

Stay tuned next week for Point Four of Charlie's speech!

Wednesday's Woe - What is Normal Now?

Wednesday's Woe

What is Normal Now?

from http://missingevan.blogspot.com/2009/09/what-is-normal.html

What Is Normal?

(A) mom in (the) SUDC online support group posted this. It is so true in the lives of all of us who have lost our precious children...

What is normal now?

NORMAL is trying to decide what to take to the cemetery for Christmas, birthdays, Valentine's day and Easter.

NORMAL is feeling like you know how to act and are more comfortable with a funeral than a wedding or a birthday party. Yet, feeling a stab of pain in your heart when you smell the flowers, see the casket, and all the crying people.

NORMAL is feeling like you can't sit through another minute without screaming because you just don't like to sit through church anymore. And yet at the same time feeling like you have more faith in God than you ever had before.

NORMAL is having tears waiting behind every smile when you realize someone important is missing from all the important events in your family’s life.

NORMAL is not sleeping because a thousand "what ifs" go through your head constantly.

NORMAL is having the TV on the minute you walk into the house to have some "noise" because the silence is deafening.

NORMAL is telling the story of your child's death as if it were an everyday common event and then gasping in horror at how awful it sounds. And yet realizing it has become part of normal conversation.

NORMAL is each year coming up with the difficult task of how to honour your child's memory and their birthday and surviving those days. And trying to find a balloon or flag that fits the occasion, "Happy Birthday"? Not really!

NORMAL is a new friendship with another bereaved parent and meeting over coffee and talking and crying together over your children and worrying together over the surviving children.

NORMAL is being too tired to care if you paid your bills, cleaned your house, did the laundry or if there is food in the house.

NORMAL is wondering this time whether you are going to say you have 4 or 5 children because you will never see this person again, and is it worth explaining that one of them has passed away. And yet, when you say 4 children to avoid the problem you feel horrible as if you have betrayed your child.

NORMAL is hiding all the things that have become "normal" for you to feel, so that everyone around you will think you are "NORMAL".

"What is Normal Now" quoted in http://missingevan.blogspot.com/2009/09/what-is-normal.html

Picture: Quiet Sadness http://picasaweb.google.com/

Tuesday’s Trust - Is God Always Good?

Tuesday’s Trust

Is God Always Good?

Words from Corrie Ten Boom, Holocaust survivor:

Often I have heard people say,

"How good God is! We prayed that it would not rain for our church picnic, and look at the lovely weather!"

Yes, God is good when He sends good weather.

But God was also good when He allowed my sister, Betsie, to starve to death before my eyes in a German concentration camp.

I remember one occasion when I was very discouraged there. Everything around us was dark, and there was darkness in my heart.

I remember telling Betsie that I thought God had forgotten us.

"No, Corrie," said Betsie, "He has not forgotten us. Remember His Word:

‘For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His steadfast love toward those who fear Him.’"

Corrie concludes,

There is an ocean of God's love available - there is plenty for everyone. May God grant you never to doubt that victorious love - whatever the circumstances.

******

11 For (God’s) unfailing love toward those who fear Him
is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth.
 12 He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.
 13 The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him.
 14 For He knows how weak we are; He remembers we are only dust.


15 Our days on earth are like grass; like wildflowers, we bloom and die.
 16 The wind blows, and we are gone—as though we had never been here.
 17 But the love of the Lord remains forever with those who fear Him.
 His salvation extends to the children’s children
 18 of those who are faithful to his covenant, of those who obey His commandments!

~Psalm 103:11-18 NLT

Corrie Ten Boom thanks to Corrie Ten Boom Museum

NLT = New Living Translation of The Holy Bible

Picture: Question mark on stained glass: http://www.fotosearch.com/IDX076/is297rm-00000007-001/

Monday's Mourning Ministry - Only Hope

Monday's Mourning Ministry

Only Hope

For your Monday's Mourning Ministry, I found this wonderful song again, this time on video. The story behind the song I have already shared in a post here on my blog on February 24th of this year. (If you want to read the entire post, I have noted it at the bottom of this post.) But today I really wanted you to know the story behind the song so that you would know just how special the song is for me. It means so much to me, I hope you will indulge me to repeat excerpts of the post here! I hope you will enjoy the song too!

******

Merry Katherine gave me another Valentines Day present this year. I stumbled across a C.D. she had made. She knows my heart, and she knows just what I need to calm a large part of this aching mother’s heart.

One of my big fears for her before she was killed on 8/2/06 (besides the obvious safety issue of a child with her high-energy, high-risk behavior) was that she would wander so far away from God in her acting-out that, without realizing it, her heart would harden more and more until she wouldn’t turn back to Him. (Her heart was already icing up somewhat toward us, her parents; she seemed to be living so many lies that I think she was starting to believe some of them.) Sin itself is destructive and alienating; it blinds you to God’s truth that could save you from its ultimate destruction. I could see her heart getting more and more hardened, and she was becoming more and more brazen in pursuing what she wanted despite its destructiveness.

So when she was killed in the midst of her estrangement, as a mother my next biggest question was, "Where is she now? Is she okay?" which means,

Is she in Heaven with God?

There are many questions rolling around in my mind of course—you go over and over the “what if’s” and the “why’s” all the time, but the “safety and security of her soul now” has been the most agonizing question for me.

So finding this cd on the 10th of February was a delight for me, to see where her heart was with God—she hadn’t totally tuned Him out; she was struggling with needing Him, yet not obeying Him, while still recognizing His provision for her . . . which she recognized was her “Only Hope.”

As soon as I heard this song, I knew she had wanted me to find this C.D., and how precious that it was in time for Valentines Day-- (Just like she managed to do last year! But that story will be for another time!)

What a sweet Valentines gift for her mommy!

A gift that met me in the crux of my heart's cry for her.

An answer to her mommy's prayer...

Here are the lyrics of "Only Hope," just one of the songs that was on Merry Katherine's home-made C.D. that showed this grieving mother what was really in her heart toward her sweet Savior and Shepherd:

My Only Hope

Caedmon’s Call

(Found 2/10/09 on a cd Merry Katherine had made for herself)

Depth of mercy, can there be

Mercy still reserved for me?

Can, my God, Your wrath forbear—

Me, the chief of sinners, spare?

It's my only hope,

You're my only hope!

It's my only hope of Heaven—

At the cross forgiven!

I have long withstood Your grace,

Long provoked you to Your face,

Would not harken to Your calls,

Grieved You by a thousand falls,

It's my only hope,

You're my only hope!

It's my only hope of Heaven—

At the cross forgiven!

There for me the Savior stands,

Shows his wounds and spreads His hands,

Face to face before the Son

And like Isaiah I'm undone . . .

Depth of mercy, vast and free,

So much deeper than the sea,

God of love, You heard my cry,

Now into Your open arms I fly!

It's my only hope,

You're my only hope!

It's my only hope of Heaven—

At the cross forgiven!

Jesus was her "Only Hope" of Heaven (just as He is my only hope of Heaven). With Him in her heart and crying out such songs to Him, I know my precious baby is now safely nestled in her Heavenly Father’s arms where I’ll someday see her again. Thank You, Lord Jesus, for such a precious Valentines Day gift, sweeter than anyone could ever give to me!

Exerpts from my blog post of February 24, 2009

Merry Katherine’s Valentines Day Present For Me, 2009

Friday's Faith - 19 Good Things about My Child Being with God

Friday's Faith

19 Good Things about My Child Being with God

1.) She now has a right to the tree of life and is allowed go through the gates of pearl into the City of God.

2.) She is dressed in a robe of white that has been washed in the blood of the Lamb.

3.) She is cradled in her Savior’s arms because her name is written in the Lamb’s book of life.

4.) She can praise her Lord face-to-face. There is no church in the City because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are her church.

5.) She is at perfect peace. When she is thirsty, God gives her drinks from the spring of the water of life.

6.) She is released from her pain; there is no more of the curse that was on earth.

7.) She walks on streets of pure gold, transparent as glass and sees the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb, down the middle of the great street of the City. On each side of the river, she sees the tree of life, yielding its fruit routinely.

8.) She is free from all sin forever. She no longer can be hurt by sin. She no longer can be enslaved by sin as nothing impure is allowed to enter Heaven. With all sin fallen off, her spirit is free to soar.

9.) She feels closer to me now, no longer encumbered by sin on her beautiful heart and spirit.

10.) She is pulling for us from Heaven as she is now a part of the great cloud of witnesses who surround us.

11.) She sees and knows Him even as she is known.

12.) All things are made clear to her; things make sense.

13.) She can see beyond our present grief.

14.) She is freed from human limitations.

15.) She has zero worries.

16.) She is in God’s presence all day long.

17.) She has no darkness—God and Jesus provide light always.

18.) Resting in God’s love, she loves us uninhibitedly from Heaven.

19.) She will not be hurt by the second death; she lives with God forever!

From Hebrews 12, 1 Corinthians 13, Revelation 21-22

19 Good Things about My Child Being with God - Angie Bennett Prince - 11/20/09