Here’s some thoughts I sent to a friend as they remember their spouses death today.

Names are omitted. We all need the strength in hope. Salvation is hope!

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Dear _____, Greetings in Jesus’ Name.

I just saw your email. I can relate. It’s been 11 years since my sweet Benjamin departed for glory, and in some ways, it seems like yesterday.

• What I’ve learned since then — adding to that reality, the loss of my sister, my mother, good friends and other relatives in the last years is that death, more than birth is defining.

It’s powerful. It is a teacher. It changes us. It’s sobering. It is almost like a severe mercy, yet God’s Grace and comfort is always there.

Its finality brings a Wisdom and Understanding we never sought. In God — it purifies us. It’s clear.

• We see things with more transparency.

Life holds no illusions when we face our mortality. That’s not a bad thing.

In God’s hands, separation cleanses.

Death erases any lies or false presumptions.

Our need for God, for hope, for eternity, stares at us now.

• As Scripture declares our life is but a vapor, we see the truth of it now.

Salvation is more precious now, because death exposes our helplessness and utter dependency.

Now, our sure faith, the Word of God, Jesus atonement for us, is priceless.

• Life feels different- because life is different now.

We were created to experience life- living from a place of relationships.

Be it sinner or saint, all human beings need family, identity, purpose and vision to be truly human.

Truly alive. It is from relationship (our heavenly Father) we got here to begin with. Death refocuses our priorities.

• Being a believer in our Saviour does not exempt us from the vicissitudes of the human condition.

In reality — it intensifies it. Remarkably, even in our losses and ensuing life’s changes, we live by His grace more deeply now.

• I don’t subscribe to the maxim grieve, forget it, and just move on, for people, the heart, and relationships are more complex than trivial sayings or idioms.

• Everything takes time, yet becomes more beautiful, when we see its final purpose — from Father God’s perspective.

It was when my sweet Benjamin left this earth — I got who Benjamin really was to God.

I knew my husband, best friend, ministry partner better than anyone, yet I never truly knew what he meant to God, till he left earth.

Absence reveals, because the empty places can’t be covered. Wisdom takes her seat and speaks volumes when all else leaves the room.

• It was as if Holy Spirit downloaded the essence and purpose for him on earth.

I can’t explain it, but it was like the scriptures in 1 Corinthians 15:47, Philippians 3:21, 1 Corinthians 15:49, 53 became alive.

Something was downloaded into my spirit— and I understood how the two-really-do become one in God, in the holy union of marriage.

I got how we really are connected— even family members — in the larger Body-family of Faith.

There was a knowing about what family really means to God— that I didn’t know until loved ones departed. The teacher is in.

• Even my almost 101 year-old dear mother — who exited earth for heaven two years ago — it changed me.

I got a glimpse of how my life forever was changed, because of who she was. I was a part of her.

I remember when The Holy Spirit whispered to me at that time, “Yes, Liz, she is your mother, but don’t forget — she is My Daughter!”

God’s personal possessive-pronoun. The accent was on my daughter.

This showed me how dependent we are on God, yet through this life, we remain interdependent on others. And nowhere is interdependency more fragile or necessary, than family.

• Death showed me things like the deeper we love and more intense the purpose, the more acutely aware we are of the separation.

The more we hunger for heaven. To reunite with our loved ones in His Kingdom.

It was loss that caused me to deeply know, identify with — the loss that Heaven had known all along — that death is not natural. It’s an aberration against life. (1 Corinthians 15:26)

• We come from a river of life — we were born in God — out of His heart.

We were never meant to know death. And the Cross remedied that forever — as in Him — we have life. Glory to The Lamb.

Hallelujah to Jesus – for choosing to become death for us so we could become life again. All praise to Him.

Shalom, to Life. No more death. The sting is gone. (1 Corinthians 15:55-57).

 

~ Elizabeth Cassutto

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Rev. Elizabeth Cassutto
Lightbeacon Ministries, Millsboro, Delaware.

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