The Day After
Wednesday, December 25, 2013 Posted by Anonymous
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The “Day After” can be a let down
in many ways. It doesn’t just pertain to the Christmas season. It’s like that
climb to the top of a mountain: lots of preparation, excitement, and muscle
ache along the way. Once on top, the celebration climaxes. But it’s quickly
dampened by the glance down toward the dreary return. I remember my hardest
such look back.
It
was December 21st, 1989, early morn. Grinch easily could have stolen
Christmas, if I’d let him. My almost
two-year-old daughter slipped into a peaceful comma and passed into the arms of
her heavenly Father, four days before Christmas. Determined not to let her
death interfere with the acknowledgment of the Savior’s birth, we held her
memorial the day after Christmas. Because of her long struggle with a rare
cancerous disease, her memorial celebrated her home-going. But reality hit
thereafter.
I
pushed through my first two years of intense grief, and then God gifted me. He
touched me with uncontrollable laughter during a weekly prayer meeting I
attended. No one knew what to do; it was so uncharacteristic of me, the
serious-quiet weeper—to burst out in such laughter. But God knew. You see, I’d
been trying to fill my empty arms with a new baby to no avail.Yet, two months
later, I was pregnant. And instead of being born on his due date, January 14th,
Michael Cole entered the world four minutes after midnight, New Year’s Day,
1992. While my daughter died four days before Christmas, my youngest son, two
years later, ushered in the newness of the “days after.”
I
have a lot to be thankful for. The Grinch of the holidays holds nothing to the Gifter
of Christmas! Psalm 30:5b puts into perspective the day after for me: “Weeping
may tarry for the night, but (a shout of) joy comes with the morning.”