what's to come...

This weekend, my good friend Monica (who is working in Peru with an organization called “Word Made Flesh”) was in town, so naturally, the whole “crew” was in town to see her. There’s just something about those girls. I laugh so hard. I’m funnier. I feel so deeply. When we’ve all been apart for awhile, I can tend to forget just how much they mean in my life and I’m able to function well without them near. But then a weekend like this one comes along and the dull aching in my stomach resumes. Realizing how much they are missed as an everyday anyday typical part of my life. After they leave I suffer from what I will fondly call PFTD—Post-friend-time-depression. My gracious and loving husband has learned how to “deal” with me during these times through trial and error. He listens to me, buys me Starbucks, and then listens some more. Then usually by the third day the acute symptoms have subsided and I’m functioning at 90% normality.

However, in light of the current events that have been going on with some families from Taylor, I think my case of PFTD was especially severe. I am thinking of the Van Ryn’s who, in all of their God-given strength and trust are looking forward to and hoping for the day when they will be reunited with their daughter and sister. And I am thinking of the Cerak’s who, after thinking their daughter was buried and gone, have been reunited with their “resurrected” daughter. But, in reality, no earthly reunion can be a whole and complete reunion until the day that we are reunited on the other side of this earth within the perfect and complete Body of Christ. When there will be no physical pain, no emotional scars.

I think of the aching that I feel for the girls that were in this weekend who mean so much to me and the many many others of whom I miss the day-to-day memories and moments that fill my life with joy. People who have shaped, formed, and enriched my life. The aching begins. And then I realize, the aching I feel is not because of what I can not have, it is because it is what’s to come.