2020 and 2021 have been times where many have experience loss of friends, relatives, parents. Recently in one week I lost multiple family members close to me. I wanted to write something, but didn’t know what to say. This is dedicated to my family but particularly my younger cousins who lost a good man, their father.
Surreal. This feeling like things that have happened can’t be true and that in the next minute or two you’ll wake up and that which you fear has happened turned out to be some cruel imagination.
Scatterbrained. Thoughts roaming back and forth. Its like standing on the freeway with different different ideas, feelings, memories whizzing by. Unsure of where each thought goes but hopping from train to train feeling to feling, memory to memory only to be interrupted by mundane things like eating, sleeping and what I have to do next.
So how do you talk about death of a loved one? Every time I ask and begin to think, I become swallowed up in an ocean of thoughts.
One of my favorite activities is playing pick up basketball. What I like about pick up basketball is that you can always jump in a game because once one game ends a new one begins. Sometimes you may have a friend that invites you to the park to play but they get there before you. Sometimes when they get there before you they get picked up and end up already playing before you arrive. The other team may have needed an extra player, or they just wanted to get a game in before you arrive. They know you will eventually come and soon you will be able to play together. If not this game, the next one.They can run with you if you have next, or if one of their teammates leaves they can pick you up on their team. Sometimes when your friend arrives before you depending on their schedule they may leave before you. They may decide to call it quits because they are tired and they just want to sit out and watch you. During those times you play, even though your friend is not playing because thats what you came to do. You play and enjoy the game even when your friend is not with you because even though they are not playing you they are watching until you finish your game. Your friends will encourage you to play even if its without them especially if its a good run. They may be tired and will unloosen their shoes, but they will say play on and they’ll watch the game from the sidelines, rooting for you to win your match. Sometimes when this happens you will have to pick up a new teammate to help you finish the remaining games. Sometimes the teammate will be someone you know, sometimes it will be a random person waiting. However the challenge of the game invites you to play on, and you find a new way to work together in order to win. Here’s the thing about pick up. The goal is to win, but what keeps you going is the thrill of competition, and working together as a team to win.
The days immediately after Jesus’s death were very hard times for the disciples. Even though Jesus had repeatedly warned them and tried to prepare them for his death, they were caught off guard. They didn’t think it would happen. They were like Jesus, why would you die? You are the Messiah. The Messiah’s not supposed to die. See Jesus was the ultimate player coach. He took a bunch of ragged uncoordinated strangers and taught them the rules of the game. He taught them fundamentals, he went through practices and they began killing everyone on the court. When he was on the court nobody could defeat them, they were kings. So when Jesus passed away, for them everything changed. The disciples didn’t want to play anymore. They decided to retire and go back to what they were doing before. That’s until Jesus had to visit them and tell them that he was preparing them to take over. That he never was meant to stay physically with them, but that he would be with them. His coaching, his words and his example would be there and he wanted them to play. Because their play would inspire other people to live for more and to find greater meaning in their lives.
This metaphor obviously falls short, but there is a simplicity to it that resonates. When our loved ones in the Lord, in Christ step out of the game, they actually go into the big leagues and leave the park behind. They get to play with all the hall of famers and the maker of the game. So it would be foolish for us to not keep on playing. Our loved ones are in bliss, but at the same time they are encouraging us to stay in the game, get your head right and ball. Your game is not over. Its okay if you take a time out. But after a while its time to get back in the game. Lets ball out. Show the world how to play. You know the greatest thing about that is for us who believe in Christ, he is with us while at the same time with our loved ones. He is the one who binds all things together. So it is important that we rely on him. He is the forever coach. He coached our great grand parents, grandparents, our parents and is trying to coach us. He has given us a playbook and is letting us know. I still got plays to run for you.
Every day that we are alive is a reminder that God has plans for us still today. When our loved ones leave that means they have finished their game and they got promoted to a much better place. Its something that we strive for. We don’t live for this earth, but we live for the world to come. The only way that we can get into the next world is by following the plan of the God who made us and believing in him. Believing in Jesus doesn’t just meaning we believe he exists, but trusting in his game plan and not doing our own thing. We don’t understand everything the coach draws up, but when you have a championship coach, you better trust him.
What I enjoy about Jesus’ early disciples is that after grieving, they got back into the game and got back on the court. They realized they had alot to play for and a new mission. They wanted to make Jesus happy, because he was watching them and believed in them. Jesus believes in us, and though our loved ones are gone, we need to make sure we get live in a way that they makes not only them proud, but Jesus as well. I want to end with one of Jesus’s final prayers before he died. In this prayer he asks for God’s protection for his disciples who live on. This prayer is for us and its a prayer that we be able to overcome the trials of this earth and the Devil’s plan to keep us from walking with God. In the end he asks that we experience God’s love, presence and eventually glory when we finish our race and all of God’s family be reunited together; both those that passed away and those that are still alive.
“I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. 14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. 17 Sanctify them by[d] the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. 19 For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.
Jesus Prays for All Believers
20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
A voice in the wilderness 