A Better Country for S_

“Send out your light and truth...
let them bring me to your holy hill”
- Psalm 43:3

Dear E_:

Autumn has arrived. Every year this time, I harvest the fruits and clean the garden. Indian summers in October with temperature in the 80s. Now with the morning temperature in the 40s, I moved some cold-temperature intolerant potted plants inside the house last week. The furnace turned on two weeks ago.

Because of the numerous forest fires and associated debris fallouts, the air quality has been poor in this area. The annual October almond and walnut harvesting in nearby orchards stirred up even more dust in the air. For these reasons, I did not use the patio at all this year. Over the weekend, the final patio cleaning and covering up the furniture were done. The patio is now closed until next spring.

Seasonal house maintenance chores are a minuscule representation of God’s ordained truth. There is a beginning and an end to all things created. Mortal life is foretasting beginnings and ends in pairs of: life and death, sow and harvest, spring and autumn, war and peace (Ecclesiastes 3:1-11). To date by His mercy, God still provides the underlying stability world order in our turbulent tottering world (Psalm 75:3). In an undisclosed final end time, Christ will come again. He will hand over the kingdom to God the Father when every ruler, authority, and power are demolished, including the very last enemy - death. (I Corinthians 15:24-26).

It has been 14 years then since our foregathering at the Savannah-Charleston trip. For several seasons after said trip, you and S_ traveled to the Standing Rock Reservation to do short-term missionary works. What you both did in this area was unknown to me. Your gifts of talent, time, and treasure in this field would have pleased God, and to “whom [He] will look” (Isaiah 66:2).

In our mortal minds, S_’s death has saddened and lingered. Her passing is like a pleasing melancholy of an Indian summer. That our present sadness is blended with the joyful hues of a by-gone summer memory. (As you will recall, it was ten summers ago I visited you two in Roanoke. The blitheness of that visit-fellowship still vividly etched in our collective minds). All of us are much comforted, nothwithstanding our mortal lamentation. S_ is ever precious to the LORD even in death (Psalm 116:15). As an heir to God’s inheritance, she has gone home to “a better country” which the Father already prepared (Hebrews 11:16; 1 Peter 1:4).

So it is, “to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). For Christ has given to His people, His church, “rest by His sorrow, and life by His death”.

God’s grace and mercy abiding with you, and the Lord Jesus be with your spirit.

L’