The Countdown Begins

(written 8/9/2012) Three weeks and one day....when do we stop counting the days without Truitt?  It is just such a strange new life with him missing from it.  I know he isn't missing really.  It's just so hard to get used to the way things are now.  So many things have changed, yet so much will never change.  When speaking of my family do I still say "I have three wonderful grandsons", and have to explain that one is in Heaven, or do I just say " I have two wonderful grandsons", and just leave it there, knowing in my heart that I really will always have three.  Maybe I should say I have two grandsons on earth and one in Heaven.  None of it sounds "natural", but all of it is true.
  

Breylon is only 3-1/2. I wonder how much he will remember.  He misses Truitt so much.  The first week he cried for him at night.  He said he hated Jesus for taking him away. I guess it was a mistake to try and explain to him that his brother and best friend was not coming home...ever...because Jesus wanted him to live with him in Heaven, especially when he doesn't really have a knowledge of who Jesus is.  I wish I'd have thought that through better now, but what's done is done. I pray that as he grows Jesus will reveal Himself to Breylon and bring him peace and understanding where we have failed to do so. 

Only Breylon and God really know exactly what transpired on that fateful day. Knowing won't change anything, but for me, it could help to understand what Breylon is seeing in his mind, and what he is dealing with. However, I am trusting God to see Breylon through this just as He is the rest of us.

I am learning, as I've been learning for decades, that God doesn't want us to figure it all out. He doesn't want us to know the future, or every detail of His plan for our lives. If we knew what He knows then we might decide to try to bypass some of the harder stuff, like the death of a child, and in doing so placing ourselves outside of His will for our lives, and the blessings He has in store for us.  You might be asking "how can something this tragic and sad be a blessing?". I don't know yet.  All I know is I am choosing to trust Him, and I am holding him to His promises.  Romans 8:28 "For we KNOW that God works ALL things together for good, for those who love Him, AND are called according to HIS purpose."

We may never know why God allowed this to happen,  why He chose not to answer our prayers for a miracle.  Maybe it is for Breylon, maybe for Lacy, or Cody, or me, or someone else, or maybe it was to spare Truitt of some horrible event that was impending in his future, something worse than this. It's ok that I don't know. Because knowing would take away my need to seek God, my drive to search His heart so intently, and isn't that what pleases Him most, His children seeking Him and desiring to know His heart?  I mean He made David king after stating that he was "a man after mine own heart, who shall fulfill all my will".  And in Matthew 6:33, He promises, "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." to me, "all these things" means everything I could ever need, whether physical or spiritual or emotional or material, anything that I might have need for, will be added unto me. Right now I need peace, and He graciously gives me peace. I thank the Lord for loving my family and for carrying us through this storm in our lives.  I pray that all of my family, all of my children, can recognize His hand and experience His peace as I am learning to do.