Worthy of Joy

I bought this sweatsuit for myself some time in the last month while out running Christmas errands. Because apparently in this season of my life, self-care looks like treating myself to cozy clothes. I put it on for the first time the day after my Daddy died. My son, Samson, is learning to read, so he points and asks what things say a lot right now, when he can’t make it out himself. He asked about my shirt, the cursive script throwing him for a loop. When I told him the word was, “Joy”, he asked me why I was wearing that, if I was happy Grandaddy died.

I came close and I told him “Oh no, I am very sad.”

And again, we had a conversation we’ve had a lot in his small life – about how two things can be true at the same time. That while I am very sad Grandaddy died and we don’t get to be with him here anymore, that my Joy is bigger than what is happening today in my life. My Joy comes from the fact I know Grandaddy is in Heaven, and I know that we get to go there one day and see him again, and because of Jesus, we will never have to say goodbye to him ever again.

And I don’t just say this as a trite religious platitude. Something to sugarcoat the enormity of pain we are both enduring. Or to redirect or distract his young mind. I say it because it’s the only Truth I can hold on to which is holding me together also.

Sometimes I get fearful. I fear that because of all the hard and heavy things Samson has had to live through in these short 4 ½ years that he will doubt the goodness or existence of God. That he will question what’s the point? What good does believing in Him do anyway? Sad things still happen. Everyone you love still gets sick or goes away. That he might think God isn’t really in charge or has the power to change or fix or heal things. That He’s just a made-up character. Or worse, that He doesn’t really care about us.

I pray against my fear. I pray that Samson’s tender heart would be held so close in all the loss and heaviness he has endured. That He learns something unshakable of the love of Jesus, The Holy Spirit, and The Father which He can never forget or turn away from.

I pray that he sees, or I can show him, how it is only because of these Three I have survived any of the last half a decade. How They hold me in the heavy and the hard. How They come close and comfort me when death and grief are in the room. That I’ve never been left to take a single step of this journey alone. I pray he sees this imagery is real and authentic, the ideas are deep and immovable, sturdy and firm, not just empty words or nice thoughts. They are the Most Truth. More true than even death itself.

Because even though death is the end of a life here on earth. It is not the end of The Story.

And that’s a Truth worthy of the feeling of Joy.