The loss of life. How do we respond?

  I am by no means an expert on death.  However, I feel led to write this blog for a special young lady that is close to mine and Miriam's heart, as well as our kids.  This young lady I speak of has already experienced losing people that she knew and that she adored.  

Ecclesiastes 1:9

New International Version (NIV)

⁹ What has been will be again,
    what has been done will be done again;
    there is nothing new under the sun.

  My family doesn't really talk about the "skeletons" in the closet.  I suppose not many people do.  I only speak of the skeletons to help people and not to seek sympathy.  Plus, as my wife will attest to, I am very guarded.  I constantly have my defenses up.  I calculate almost everything I do.  I guess that's just a trait I learned as an Air Traffic Controller.  Who knows.  I try not to be that way around her, but I fail miserably.  I know my faults and try to change them.  

  When I was 12 years old and living in the Tidewater area of Virginia, my family got a phone call.  My Grandfather had murdered my Grandmother and my Uncle in Colorado.  We don't know why my Grandfather snapped, but what I do know is the pain of loss I felt.  I will never know the same pain my cousins felt in losing their dad until years later.  

  When I was 15-16 years old, my dads mom, my Grandmother, took her last breathe minutes before we arrived at her house to say our "Good-bye's".  She lost her battle with cancer and it was tough seeing her become frail and weak.  The numbness I felt would be there for some time.  I was close to my Grandmother and my dads dad, my Grandfather Jack.  I spent most Summers at their house, cleaning and doing yard work, and doing whatever job my Grandfather would find for me to do.  

  And last, but surely not least, I lost my dad when I was 20 years old.  The last time I saw my dad alive I was 18 years old.  This will not be the last time I see death in my lifetime, but there was always a nagging question.  Why?  

  Suffering, in many ways, remains a mystery, one that we will never fully understand this side of eternity. We can, however, glean these truths from God's Word:

• Suffering produces intimacy with God (Job 42:5).
  Job, who endured unspeakable suffering, said, "My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you."
  Intimacy with God is often borne in the furnace of affliction.
  "There's an opening of the soul that happens during times of stress or duress," says Dr. Hager, an associate minister in the Washington D.C. area.
  "During times of suffering, we experience God at a deep, profound level."
• Suffering equips us to comfort others (2 Corinthians 1:3-5).
  Suffering gives us compassion for others who are hurting, enabling us to minister more effectively.
  "Sufferers want to be ministered to by people who have suffered," writes Stephen F. Saint in his essay, "Sovereignty, Suffering, and the Work of Missions."
  "People who suffer want people who have suffered to tell them there is hope. They are justifiably suspicious of people who appear to have lived lives of ease." Those who have suffered make the most effective comforters.
  
• Suffering refines us.
  We can read in Isaiah 48:10 that "…I have refined you, though not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction."
  The meaning of this verse makes it clear that pain and suffering have a way of bringing our strengths and weaknesses to the surface. When the dross floats to the surface, God skims it off; he purifies and refines us to be the radiant bride of Christ.
  
• Suffering produces growth and maturity (James 1:2-4).
  If we turn toward God in our pain, He can use our suffering to mature our faith. We see this biblical truth illustrated through the persecuted church. After hearing their testimonies, few would deny that suffering produces beauty and maturity of spirit.
  
• Suffering conforms us into God's image (Romans 8:28-29).
  We may be tempted to read these verses to say that God will bring good out of everything. While He can and does redeem pain in our lives, these verses speak of being conformed to God's image through our suffering.
  
  
  
  I have felt the pain of what I would consider Hell itself.  You may or may not have suffered loss the way I have, but it doesn't mean that the pain you feel is not real.  We don't understand why God allows the things He does to happen.  I do know that when sin entered the world, so did death.  The pain will go away, and the saying "time heals all wounds" is pretty accurate.  I encourage you to the read the book of Ecclesiastes.  There is profound wisdom in that Book.  Please pray for those who have lost someone close.  As believers, we can celebrate their life and have comfort knowing that one day we WILL see them again.  Right now those believers are in Heaven. Amen!
  
  In Him,
  The Clouse
   

Make your own family. Key ingredients: God, Water, Love, and Sarcasm. Mix well. Serve chilled.

   As an Air Traffic Controller, we tend to miss a lot of important events.  We work rotating shift work.  We work Weekends and Holidays.  We miss the Thanksgiving dinner and we miss the Christmas morning madness.  Many of us are Veterans and know what it's like from our time in the service.  But like those who serve in our military, Controllers chose to do this job.  We knew what were signing up for.  We miss parties, graduations, weddings, funerals and church.  We miss working those "normal" hours where it's not such a beating on our families and our bodies.  Many of us still struggle to get into a routine of working out because we are just plain exhausted at weeks end.  Many of us also live away from families.  However, not many share my story.

   I was 12 years old when I was introduced to Air Traffic Control and I knew then that that was the job I wanted to do for the rest of my life.  I was also in a hurry to get away from home.  I needed to get away from an abusive and alcoholic dad and a mom who it's hard for me to explain in words the type of person she is.  I love my mom, because she brought me into this world.  My dad died when I was 20 years old but the last time I saw him I was 18 or 19 years old him before seeing him the casket.   All I remember is that I was in Air Traffic Control school at Keesler Air Force Base, Biloxi, Mississippi and I was there from Nov. '98- April '99.  I had already cut ties in my mind with my mom and dad because I was free from abuse and free from exasperation.

  I am now 33 years old with a family of my own an I have a wife who desperately longs for "family."  She is close to her family, while I don't rely on anyone to get me through.  However, I am starting to realize the affects a family can have on my kids.  Living in the great state of Texas, and away from family makes me aware that I don't want my kids to be anything like me.  And this is where God comes in.  Growing up in Norfolk and finding any means to get to church at First Baptist Church, Norfolk, God allowed a young married couple to come into my life.  I still tell the story today to youth that getting to know the names of those around you and introducing yourself to new people who visit your church or Sunday School is very, very important.  That's what Greg did.  He took the time to know my name.  He took the time to learn who this young, teenage punk kid was.  I was blessed enough that Greg had someone smarter than him to help him.  His wife, Vicki.

  After graduating High School and joining the Air Force, and with Greg and Vicki moving, I didn't give anything or anyone a second thought.  I was free from Norfolk.  Though the Tidewater area may be a nice place, in my mind I wanted nothing to do with it.  It wasn't until a chance "Friend Request" on Facebook that Miriam an I learned that Greg, Vicki, and their daughter Katie lived just mere minutes from us.  Here.  In Texas.  Of all the places, and all the locations, they lived close by us.  And this is where God uses his large mixing bowl and throws in some water, love and sarcasm.  They make up a family.  Katie is a little sister who I remember as a baby no older than my son is now.  I harass her like an older brother would and I am very protective of her. I refer to Greg as Dad and Vicki as Mom.  My kids call them Mimi and Apple.  I don't know how Greg got stuck with the name Apple, but it has stuck and that's what they call him.  Proverbs 18:24 says "One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother."  This is very important to learn and to meditate on.

  Me and Miriam have also been blessed with great friends.  I have tons of friends, but only a few whom I can truly be real with. Ecclesiastes 4:10 says "If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up."  That hit me pretty hard, because I was constantly running solo.  I didn't need anyone.  When I fell, I picked myself up, which only contributed to my heart being hardened.  I obtained my college education on my own.  I am not a perfect man, nor am I a bible scholar, but I do love God with all my heart.  Just like King David.  But unlike David, I haven't killed anyone.  I continue to fall and stumble, but I now have "friends" and "family" I can turn to.  I have D, Jason, Cus, Scott, Gift and Fowler that God placed in my life.  Different dudes, with different ways of living life, but whom I consider my core group.  God has placed women in Miriam's life whom I consider sisters from another mister.  One of those being Anna.  She's about as crazy as they come and I swear one day she will drive head on into me and I will have to make a choice.  Drive off a cliff or brace for impact.  But she too is like a sister.  I'll stab a person who jacks with her or anyone else I consider family.  I kid, I kid.  But seriously. 

  God has mixed in love in my life, and that love of my life is the one person who really, really knows me.  She knows how jacked up I am.  She knows all my jokes and will finish them before I can.  She is the only woman who will put up with my crap, and the strongest woman I know.  Miriam has MS, stays home with our children, whom probably should be placed in a Zoo at times, and is still the hottest woman I know.  No, she is not standing behind me while I type that.  Putting up with me is enough, but throw all that in and she is Wonder Woman. Proverbs 31:10 says, "A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies."  Without Miriam in my life, I am nothing, and God knows this.  Yes yes yes, I know God is the most important being in my life, so you can save yourself the trouble of counseling me. 

  God is smarter than me.  God knew the steps I would take and placed people along my path to help me.  I didn't do all those things.  I mean, I did, but not with help from the Man upstairs.  If all of us just take a few minutes to replay our life, you'll see where God was the whole time.  Think about your growing up.  Think about your friends, or that marriage, or that divorce.  Think about the job you have, the job you've lost, the money you have and the money you've made.  Think about the good times and the bad times.  It's not easy to think of God being in those bad times, but look at the story of Job's life.  I can see God in the midst of all the bad times in my life.  With the gun in my hand, to the murders in my family, to the miscarriage my wife had, to the job I have now.  I see God now, but it's never easy to see God in the bad times.  Hindsight is always 20/20. 

  I encourage you all to make your own "family" if you're not close to yours.  It takes some time and effort, but a great meal usually tastes better when you take your time and don't rush.  Think of it like a Crock-pot meal.  That's why they refer to it as "Slow Cookin'". 

In Him,
The Clouse