Why Losing My Best Friend Was A Good Thing

I lost my best friend.

She noticed everything.

She knew everything about the myriad of issues in our home.

She understood the personalities and the exponential relationships.

Knowing that someone else comprehended the complexity of our family was a great comfort.

She did whatever I asked of her.

She never asked for much.

My driver. She drove everywhere we went, gaining a lot of experience and saving my back when it was hurting really bad.

The best big sister. She didn't ask to be the oldest. She has risen to the occasion and never complained. She understood the privilege of being first had its perks and trials.

She traveled all over the world to care for others: South and Central America, Africa, Haiti. She began her trips at 15 years old and I remember someone asking how we could possibly let her go since we were so "protective", you know homeschooling and all. Actually, we sheltered her until she was ready to be a light and then never worried because we knew her heart.

 

She has been a good friend to many, a people pleaser at heart and a compassionate one at that.

She is an extraordinary photographer. Once that passion began, it wasn't often that we could find her in front of the camera.

Except when she was with the babies.

Who bring out the best in her.

The very best.

She spent years ADORING this job that gave her a love for agriculture.

Her love affair with ice cream is a close second. Swedish genes run strong...

But I've never seen her as happy as here at the farm.

Taking care of newborns.

Midwifer-ing the ladies in waiting.

 Tending the teenage girls. Good luck with that!

Because she was home through high school and much of college, it gave us time to build a relationship that was the desire of my heart. I tried to be careful of her generous spirit and we checked in often to make sure she didn't feel taken advantage of. We traded babysitting for gas money and kept tabs on if it felt fair for both sides. We often went to movies and shopping, just her and I.

Now she is gone.

Because she was ready to go.

I've lost my confidant.

My second pair of hands that anticipated my needs.

Someone who gets me, my strengths and my weaknesses. 

I will miss her.

But I revel in the joy of her finding her own way and doing something that gives her "satisfaction in her toil."

And don't you know? 

There is another one ready, willing, and able to step up to the plate.

"This is the gift of God."

There is a time for everything,

     and a season for every activity under the heavens:

  a time to be born and a time to die,
  a time to plant and a time to uproot,  

     a time to kill and a time to heal,
    a time to tear down and a time to build, 

     a time to weep and a time to laugh,
    a time to mourn and a time to dance, 

     a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, 

   a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,

    a time to search and a time to give up,
    a time to keep and a time to throw away, 

    a time to tear and a time to mend,
    a time to be silent and a time to speak, 

   a time to love and a time to hate,
    a time for war and a time for peace. 

 What do workers gain from their toil?  I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race.  He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.  I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live.  That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.  I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him. 

Ecclesiastes 3:1-14