***
Loss is rarely accompanied by forgetfulness, no matter how much we might wish it were so, and no matter how small, the feelings left behind sting for a good while. In fact, I still remember everything about the day my dog of fourteen years passed in our kitchen in my mother's arms some time back. Yet, I can't remember what his face looked like now. It's funny; time has a way of taking memories and distorting them, inserting emotion into the gaps to fill the void. But, when people die, other people remember. Emotion, when inspired by other people, especially when paired with pain, rarely does not surpass the fleeting.
***
I remember looking into the hazel eyes of Innocence as I weakly handed him a funeral home toy to play with. I had tried to hide the tears, but you don't miss much at five. Innocence accepted the toy but reached out to me in return.
"Are you sad for Daddy?" He asked me, quietly in contrast to the noise of the room, but directly.
***
They say you can feel it—really feel it, when your heart breaks and transcends beyond the realm of the figure of speech. I did.
***
"Yes, I'm sad for your Daddy," I whispered, a bit taken aback.
I couldn't look him in the eye after that. Those hazel eyes, with only five years of memories in their film-tapes, looked past my exterior and instilled an unsettling question in me. A question I wouldn't answer until tonight, three years and nearly a month later.
'I remember daily the death resulting in loss and heart-ache that affects my life, but do I daily remember the One who died to change that, Who died to give me life?'
At the time, I dared not answer what would require a change in heart.
People remember people. They remember how people made them feel, how they were treated, what they accomplished, what time they shared together, and people remember the time they missed out on. At the same time, God watches all of it happen.
The God who lost his Son to mankind's redemption, but held fast His own gaze into the eyes of Joy with omniscient understanding, remembers every bit of time this planet has been in motion and with it every battered, beaten, and broken heart that ever filled its void. Glory in the highest, His name is Immanuel..."God is with us". And with us always, God remembers the daddies and the sisters, the selfish, the beloved, and the outcasts. God, the one who holds the date of Calvary etched in His hands and feet, He, Immanuel, remembers the sinners; He remembers you and me. The difference is, unlike me, bound to hiding tears whilst looking into the eyes of Innocence, so taken aback by the directness and uncovered strength undoubtedly reflected off his mother on that day, God has promised that "there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no pain, for the former things [will] have passed away." Rev 21:4
So tonight I remember those beautifully deep hazel eyes that secretly instilled a life-changing question in the tares of my heart, and I remember my Savior who rescued me. Who rescued you. I remember that God will wipe clean the slate of this world and with it all the tears of the broken who remember Calvary and the Lamb Who was slain for mankind, holding on to the promises with their own lives. I also greatly look forward to the fact that there will come a day when Understanding looks into the eyes of Innocence and is no longer filled with envy, for Understanding will be paired with joy, not pain, for this is the way of the Lord and the Lord does not look back with pain, but onward with love, for love is hopeful. And this?
This is the way of love.
In loving Memory of James Craig Whitton who encouraged my love for God and for writing with his own.
John 15:12
