I listened for the soft pitter-patter of feet on our dark, laminate wood floor, but it didn’t come. It wouldn’t come. But how I missed the sound. For 17 years we had established a routine and habits, this little dog and I. Now, my life felt emptier without her company throughout my day.
“Lord, is it silly I get so attached and my heart hurts so much? Please help me get past this. Don’t let the grief pull me into depression. I have no strength to fight through it again, especially without my little four-legged comforter.”
Rejoice.
The word echoed in my mind, then repeated as I shook my head back and forth.
For the last several years I have prayed for a word to start each new year. It was a fun trade-off from making a New Year’s resolution. You simply ask God for a word and then study the word through scripture over the next 12 months and watch for how it shows up in your life. This year I didn’t feel like asking God for a word, so I didn’t. Instead, I sat at the dining room table staring toward the calendar on the wall that still read December even though we were days into January.
Rejoice.
What an odd thing to hear in such a sad moment. I squeezed my eyes closed, willing the power of the word to take hold and change the deep ache.
Nothing. Maybe it takes a few days.
I focused on what the word might indicate. Maybe it means the rest of the year will be filled with nothing but happiness, and the hard things will be kept away. My heart leaped at the thought. And God let me sit in that glow for a moment before He reeled me back in to hear the rest of what He had to say.
“It is not going to be an easy year. But you will be able to rejoice in all things. It won’t be done through your own strength, but through Mine.”
Over the next month, I poured through my Bible and wrote out every reference to rejoice I came across. Scriptures I’d read many times before took on a new light. I read different teachings about rejoicing and, by the middle of February, I had a colorful, hand-doodled arsenal in my journal. I still missed my little dog, but the sadness lifted, and depression did not win.
The rest of the year was one of the most difficult I’ve ever experienced. In March, we discovered Mom’s heart was functioning at about 50 percent. Doctors gave us the hope of another year with her, but we only received a few weeks. They were unbelievable weeks filled with love, laughter and family. There were lots of tears, too, but there was an unbelievable undercurrent of joy.
We held a memorial service in April. As a family, we each wrestled with different emotions in saying goodbye to Mom — again. Some of us weren’t ready to have the service, others were desperate for the closure it might bring. Once again, a hard thing ended in rejoicing as friends and family came from near and far to celebrate. They loved on us, we loved on them, and we rejoiced in the memories we shared.
The confusion of dementia caused Dad to talk about Mom as if she was still with us. More hard stuff. But then there was a shift in my heart, and as Dad continued to talk about Mom as if she was still with us, there was joy.
We faced lots of hard firsts without Mom: birthdays without a call, Mother’s Day, Mom’s first birthday in heaven and holidays.
In October, our 99-year-old maternal grandma was moved into hospice. Family and friends surrounded her with love and prayer as she passed from this world to the next. We couldn’t help but celebrate the bittersweet goodbye, knowing she was ready to leave but now missing another member of our heritage.
I used to think “rejoice always” meant even in the heaviest of sadness I should fake my way to happiness and pretend everything is OK. I don’t think that anymore. I now believe what it might imply is we can receive a spirit of joy in all things. Rejoicing isn’t something we force; rather, it is given to us in the midst of our sadness. Maybe it is meant to come alongside tears and pain, to give us the strength to endure these hard things.
“Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!” — Philippians 4:4 (NIV).
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