Countdown to 30: Day 22

My grandfather died during my junior year of high school. Although I had known people who had died in the past, it was really the first time I dealt with grief in the context of the death of a person I was close to. I was old enough to understand the reality of death, and the pain that comes from the knowledge of knowing that I would not see him again in this life.

My grandfather was diagnosed with cancer around the same time of the Oklahoma City bombing. I do not remember if it was that day or the day before or if the news was broken to me and my brother only on that day. It was a pretty odd time though with the family sadness and the national tragedy overlapping. The next few months were filled with treatment and the realization that the cancer was terminal. Eventually he got to the point where he had to be hospitalized, and then basically slipped further and further away as he was unable to communicate. My family traumatized me by forcing me to go in to see him when he was so bad the day or two before he died. I swear that I have had a fear of hospitals since that time (parents – don’t force your children to do things like that please!). It takes a pretty big event for me to go to a hospital to visit someone, and I usually will not go to a maternity ward even to visit a new mother and baby. I will not go to a hospital alone, and I am a BIG baby when it comes to actually walking into a hospital. Just ask my boy in New Orleans who had to come downstairs and outside to coax me in to see his new baby in the freezing cold.

It is odd to lose a family member to cancer. As you watch the person waste away in pain, you actually reach a point where you are praying for them to die so that they do not have to suffer anymore. It was an incomprehensible feeling for me to have at the time, but it is the point that you come to. Since that time, I realize it is OK for us to pray for God to allow someone to be released from pain at the same time that you are praying for God to heal them. It is a good lesson in learning to pray that God’s will be done in a situation.

I would not say that each death of someone close to me since my grandfather’s death has been easier, but I have dealt with each death better as I have learned more and more about God and the comfort He provides in that situation. I have also learned to see God’s grace in death. God did not allow my grandfather to suffer long. His cancer was quick spreading. However, we had a chance to prepare for his death and say goodbye. My grandfather lived a good life. God allowed me to have a relationship with my grandfather who was a godly man and good example for me. God also allowed my grandfather to see how his faithfulness to God contributed to the spread of the gospel down to my generation. All these things are blessings that God has enabled me to see through the life and death of my grandfather, helping to shape my theology of death.