life and death

The anniversary of my mother's death was 6 days ago. I've been thinking a lot about her this week and remembering her death. She had Alzheimer's disease for about 15 years, so she died an inch at a time, eventually unrecognizing and unrecognizable. My father used to say, "This disease is evil." And it was/is. Her greatest fear when she was younger, was losing her memory. And so her biggest fear came true and we know that she would have rather died than have Alzheimers. But Alzheimers is no respector of desires, dignity, or pride.

The last week of her life, my mother had a stroke. The daughters and granddaughters gathered to say, "Goodbye." Each day she seemed to age 10 years and her face distorted. All I could think was, "This is really ugly." I don't mean that on a shallow, "pretty people" level. Each day it seemed the disease took huge portions of her and left more of a stranger in the bed. Evil was stealing her/destroying her. I'd sit and think the evil was increasing and it was ugly. On her last morning as we sat by her side, I saw evil take total control. God's life in her vanished. She was gone. And it hit me that when the evil took over completely, it instantly lost it's power. She moved on to her new life, and it was beautiful. She was finally free. At the moment of my mother's death, I understood the need to die in order for new life to begin. I saw God use evil for God's purposes. She is free.

The funeral home staff tried to get us all to gather around her one last time to say our, "Goodbye." We were done. She was gone. Her broken body lay on the bed, but she was gone. She lost her life in order to gain a new one, and for that I am grateful.

As I think about this, I realize we can learn about living our own lives. We spend most of our lives clinging to the past, clinging to the known, clinging to our image of the future. Maybe if we'd give up all that clinging, we could move on to the new life that God keeps offering. Then again, God's not speaking to me right now, so I could be wrong.