Tuesday, December 18, 2012

good & kind

With Christmas approaching so close, I am like many of you - hurried and quickly trying to finish prep for holiday gatherings and baking.

This year is so different, though, when I think to those parents who have recently experienced such deep pain.  The loss of a child, from what I hear, is one of the most difficult emotional traumas in this life.

A little bit of my joy is replaced with grief over these sweet smiles that they will sorely miss on Christmas morning and every morning thereafter.

Like so many of the horrible things that happen in life, when you hear of them....and continue to hear of them for years to come, you never forget where you were when 'it' happened.  The Columbine shooting, 9/11, Chardon's shooting, etc.

This last tragic event took place last Friday.  The horror of that day will never be minimized.  However, something else good and beautiful and kind took place that day as well.   A dear friend of our family gave birth to twins...twins that biologically belong to another family.  This friend had been, for so many years, desiring to give this gift.  Her love of her own 4 children and her enjoyment with all things that pregnancy brings made her such a lovely candidate for this process.

I'd been keeping up with her facebook posts as the baby's progressed - I always thought, "Wow, I love how she's loving and caring for these little ones even though they aren't hers...."  What a gift, what a kind and precious act of kindness to change the course of a family's life by offering her body and strength and time.  After several years of my own struggle with infertility....I remember the thought coming to me, 'What if I needed someone else to do this for me?"  I am so happy for this couple, whose babies they have been dreaming of are real and perfect and their own.

Just want to acknowledge that those twins (both of which are perfect and bigger
than my first two sons-HUGE for twins!) are an example of the purity and innocence still left in this world.  Kindness is so unexpected....and yet when you shed it on others, YOU are the one who is blessed.  It's a guarantee.  I plan to use these current events to spark up conversation in our home on how to be the change - as it always starts with the family.

May you all be blessed this holiday season - filled with love for one another - choosing to be slow to speak and slow to become angry - understanding how much more blessed it is to give than it is to receive.

Lord - please continue to wrap your arms around those aching Mommy's and Daddy's....sisters and brothers...Grandpas and Grandma's....as they mourn.  Give them beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for their mourning.

Merry Christmas!

xoxo
Joel & Jess + boys

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