Tribute

I lost a reader this weekend.

She read my blog faithfully.

She read my blog not because she thought that what I had to say was so clever but because she loved me. She always wanted me to write a book. She thought people would want to read what I'd written. I always laughed her off. "I'm not writing a book," I'd say. "I'm not writing a book!" This blog was my concession to her, my way of saying, "Ok, fine, if you think I should write, I'll write in this isolated little corner of cyberspace." (As if there can be anything like an isolated little corner of cyberspace.) But it was my testing-ground, a way to continue to hold her off while exploring the whole writing thing and see if there was anything to it.  "You should write a book," she'd say, and I'd say, "I'm not writing a book. I have a blog."

But she's not going to read this entry.  Or any other entry I might write.  Or any book I might write.  Because this weekend, she died.

She was diagnosed with cancer just 10 days ago.

And she's gone.

Just like that.

It's hard to explain what she meant to me.  She entered my life at a time when I was very broken, very vulnerable. Brand-new in my faith, I was struggling to learn what it meant to be like Jesus, what it meant to leave the brokenness of the past behind and become who He was calling me to be. I had walls around me so thick and impenetrable I had been told that life was easy for me because I didn't have feelings.  I did.  I just hid them well.  But she looked past that. For some reason that to this day I cannot fathom, she cared.

So I began the journey to trust.  It started with a letter, the old fashioned kind, with pen and paper and a stamp.  I mailed it off, and immediately berated myself for my foolishness.  As if she cared.  As if she would even care. I should never have mailed it.  If my arm had been long enough, I would have reached into the red mailbox to pull the letter back out.

But she did care.  She wrote back.  And I wrote back, and she wrote back, and I wrote back . . . . Each time, I shared a little more, opened up a little more, let her see a little more of my heart.  Each time, I became almost physically ill after I dropped the letter in the mail, wondering if this was the time that I told her too much, shared too much of my heart, and that this time she would turn from me in disgust.  I felt like I was throwing stones in the well of her grace, and I wondered when I would throw a stone so big that it would fill up the well and her grace would not be enough to cover it.

But it never happened.  Every time, her grace rose up to cover the stone. At some point, I began to realise that it would never happen.  For whatever unfathomable reason, she just cared. Under her care, my heart began its journey to healing.  I saw in her a model of Jesus. I knew that her grace was his grace poured out through her.

And she continued to care.  Letters gave way to emails.  There were visits over coffee at Tim Horton's in between.  There were phone calls and car rides and tears and prayers.  Oh, there were tears and prayers.  She moved.  I moved.  I moved again.  She and her husband began wintering in Florida.  Emails gave way to Facebook.  Coffee at Tim Horton's became far less common as distance separated us. Others entered my life and my heart to walk alongside me through the next stages of my journey.

But always, I knew she cared. Always I knew that she prayed. Always, I knew she read my blog.

She was just scheduled to come home from Florida. I was so eager for them to come home so I could see them again. Coffee at Tim Horton's -- even though I don't drink Tim Horton's coffee much anymore. She would have told me I need to write a book.

But she died this weekend. There will be no more coffees at Tim Horton's, no more quips on Facebook, no more emails. She'll never read this blog. Worst of all, she's not there praying for me anymore.

I know she's with Jesus; she loved him so.  I know I will see her again; that is the promise of Easter. But I'm stunned. I'm heartbroken. I think I'm ok, I tell myself I should be ok, and then I'm broadsided by sadness and want to sob out loud.  I can hardly believe that she's gone. She has meant so very much to me.

I lost a reader this weekend.

Far more importantly, I lost a prayer warrior, a mentor, a model, a reflection of Jesus. This weekend, I lost a friend.

I hope that, from her eternal perspective, she knows how much I love her.  I hope Jesus shows her how he used her in my life. 

I hope it brings glory to him.

Because that's what she would want.