Thursday, September 16, 2010

Hard times

It's been over a month now that my sister-in-law died in Rwanda on a mission trip from a car accident. I think I can finally post about a few things. Or not.
She was such an accomplished person, an immigrant from Korea, PhD, professor of computer science or some such at San Francisco University, loving Pastor's Wife. Organizer. Columnist. In Rwanda she taught the teachers at the National University of Rwanda in Butare how to use computers in the classroom. She also taught the diggers at the daily morning worship at 6am. She was always kind to me.
My husband is now president of Come And See Africa.  His brother is going to build the Kim Foreman Bible Institute outside one of the gates to the NUR.
I have been sleeping a lot, for that is how I grieve.

Two days before attending her funeral I went to the funeral of my 98 yr old uncle-in-law. The military did a salute for him. I had forgotten he had served in the military. While in Morocco, he sent my mother a leather purse of many colors. My father did not go because he was afraid of falling while walking over the uneven sod of the cemetery.  He did hear the salute. When I visited him right after, he seemed confused.

Some time before that my sister and I attended our sister-in-law's wedding held in the nursing home in which she worked so the groom's mother could attend despite her Alzheimer's. I was surprised that I wept through the whole ceremony. She should still be making my brother happy, not this other man! Absolutely not fair since she can't help it that my brother died. And he died the way we should all like to go. They were cuddled in bed, he said "I love you." and then he died instantly of a heart infarct or something. Oh how we wish he could have waited another twenty years. We scattered his ashes around Mt. St. Helen. I may have mentioned all this in another post. I got ahold of myself, and in the reception line I was genuinely able to wish her well. It's good that she is able to grace another man's life.

Sometime in all this, my dad actually asked me to stay longer when I offered to leave after my weekly visit. How odd.
When I went to go see him yesterday, he told me to get out of the driveway because he had to go to a doctor's appt. So I moved and he drove off. I'm deaf, he's deaf, and it's hard to coordinate these things. I still managed to leave my purse at his house, so I had to drive up this morning and get it. I filled his bird feeders and we sat and talked a while. His feet are looking better. 

Our 86 yr old house guest is looking and feeling better too.
Our youngest son is in Afghanistan, and apparently enjoying himself. We celebrate his son's birthday on Saturday. Our oldest son emailed that the middle son may have gotten a job. I grouched back that I don't care about "looks like". I want to know when the papers are signed! I inordinately fret about the son with ankylosing spondylitis. I wish I could take some of his pain upon me.

I've been struck by something I've never noticed before or forgot in Deuteronomy. Moses, speaking for God, is telling the Israelites that He is not giving them the land because of their righteousness, because they don't have any. I suddenly realized I was reading about grace.  Praise God for His grace toward us sinners.

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