"...at the end, I'm in need of resurrection.
Only You can take this empty shell and raise it from the dead.
What I've lost to the world, what seems far beyond redemption
You can take the pieces in Your hand and make me whole again."
-Resurrection, Nicole Smith
One year after my son's death, I feel like this is where I am. Lately, there has been this hollow feeling deep inside me that I can't locate or explain. But it's there. So may things I once knew, had, understood, did, and sought after have all somehow made it down into this hollow space and never to return. It's almost as though God has gotten into the control panel of my heart and life and uninstalled some programs and sent them to the recycle bin to be deleted. Now I am waiting for new necessary programs to be installed...upgrades, if you will.
And this is not a bad thing. I am thinking about what Paul said in Philippians about counting all things loss in exchange for the excellency of knowing Jesus, the One for whom I have suffered the loss of these things that I may ultimately win Him (whatmichaelbrownthinks paraphrase). With every loss there is a void that must be filled with something. It is becoming my belief that only Jesus can and wants to effectively fill these voids with Himself, but we have to allow Him to do so. What He fails to mention is the awful pain associated with these losses that are designed to get us to that place of need. If we don't allow Him to fill those empty places they will be filled with something. And without death there can be no resurrection, something He knows full well.
I do not believe that He gives and takes away, as Job stated, but rather that He is the One who replenishes what has been taken away. And in His sovereignty He allows things in our lives to be lost so that there can be a true redemption of those things, and even our very lives. If it is true that He chose us to bear fruit that will remain, then He must know what needs to be pruned from us in order to produce that fruit. We are not the gardener - nor the potter - only the new creation that He is trying to make. And being created in His image and likeness, He is the only One who knows what the end result will look like. (1 John 3:2)
