Time

I have written on this blog previously about how I have often found that I am at the right Mass at the right time, planning on going at one time only to wind up at another where I hear exactly what I need, when I need to. Call it coincidence or hearing what you want, but tonight, it was pure grace for me to hear a homily that I deeply needed.

Not very long ago, I suffered a miscarriage; it was very early in my pregnancy, and I am very blessed to already have a child. In many ways, I know if the baby was not going to be ok, it was easier than it could have been and also, I hardly know anyone my age who has ever tried to have a child who has not had a similar experience. And so I am ok, really ok. Except when I'm not -- except when I wake in the middle of the night from painful dreams of nursing a non-existent baby, or when I burst into tears in the aisles of Babies R Us. I suppose some of it is grief though I am not sure I experience it that way (I wish I would, I feel I have not actually mourned an actual life, and don't find that comfortable) -- it feels very much like the absence of hope, or the fear that a hope won't come to be. Other parts of my life have started to fall into place since my loss, and I wonder at times if God just decided we weren't as ready as we thought we were. But there remains a fearful nagging clock in the back of my mind and a biological frustration -- come on, God, get with my program here -- time is ticking and I need to get a move on with a new child!

And that was where tonight was so important -- the priest's words reminded me what I already know but what is often difficult to bear -- God doesn't care about time. Or, as he later came to and far more importantly, God's sense of time and the priorities in time is totally different to ours. We have thoughts about what we need and when, based on a combination of so many things, desire, need, expectations. God isn't worried about that -- God's concern is for us, the people we are, who we need to become, and the path back to Him. Often I find that frustrating, that I can't understand what it is that God wants, but tonight, I found it freeing. My life and my hopes are in the hands of a God who so loves me and so wants me to live the best life I can, that sometimes, for whatever reason, things can't happen as I command them. It is beyond my control. But what I can control is my response and my prayer, which tonight is this:

Dear God, Please take care of me and the beautiful family you have blessed me with. Please give us courage and hope together, help us to care for one another and have a fullness of life together. Please teach me better to live today for itself, in the moment I am in, grateful for all the good you have shared with me.
Amen.