Thankful for the old; hopeful for the new

        It's been a whirlwind of a week.  After an incredibly busy four days of graduation dinners, dances, ceremonies, and a grand finale of Mother's Day/graduation lunch with all our family, Janie's finally an official Carolina grad.  Thank You, Lord, thank You!
        Just a few memories: One of my very favorite pics from the weekend--all the crew running to graduation since they were late (but they made it just in time!).  Love, love, love these girls!  Thank You, Lord.

        Our dearest Aunt May May with our grad.  So thankful for the priceless gift of brothers and sisters and family.  Thank You, Lord.

          Then there's the beloved Old Well in the background...with beloved brothers in the foreground!  Thank You, Lord.

           And all the fam for the grand finale of Mother's Day/Graduation lunch.  Loved so much being with cousins and aunts and uncles and grandaddy!  Thank You, Lord.

           And then there was the UNC hospital emergency helicopter landing right at the end of the ceremony.

I looked at my husband and sister, and we all smiled (and maybe shed a tear).  How fitting to end Janie's years at UNC.  Just such an emergency helicopter had saved her life nearly five years earlier.  I felt that rush of gratitude all over again--grateful for the nurses and doctors and emergency personnel who saved Janie and Tessa.  Thank You, Lord, for all those who work incredibly hard every single day and night to bring healing and help to so many in desperate and dark places.
          So much for which to be thankful.  But here's the thing--we're overwhelmingly grateful to God...but I have to admit that I also spent a good portion of that Sunday evening weeping.  Yes, crying my eyes out that it was all over and yet another one of our children was grown and saying good-bye to our home.  Weeping that these wonderful girls at 501 North would all be leaving and moving all over the place.  Lamenting that, once again, life was changing forever.  Oh brother, how can you be so thankful and thrilled...but at the same time so broken-hearted?
         I don't want all these girls to go their separate ways--I want to be able to continue to see them every week and enjoy their joy in all things Carolina.  What incredible and beautiful friendships they have enjoyed--thank You, Lord--but I don't want it to end for any of us.  Can't we just avoid all this change and transition and growing up and moving away stuff?  Seriously?  Sigh, guess not.
         I reckon it's time to take my own advice--repeated ad nauseum to my children and friends--that's a quote from the great Dr. Seuss: "Don't cry because it's over; smile because it happened."  Yep, the crying's now stopped and the smiling's recommenced!
       After all, there's not one blessed thing any of us can do to stop life's inevitable changes...and we surely can't--and mustn't--keep our children from growing up and moving out and away into God's glorious plan for their lives.  Gotta open up the old tight-fisted heart and hands, let those children fly, and trust that--as my dear friend Kelly always says--"God's got this!"  God's got our loved ones.  God's got us.  God's got the unknown future.  And God's got this crazy old world in His nail-scarred, loving, powerful, and perfect hands.
       "Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?  I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert." (Isa.43:18-19)  God is indeed doing new things every single day for every single one of us.  He's making new ways in the wilderness.  H's crafting new streams in the howling desert.  
       He's working and moving and transforming and redeeming and reviving and resurrecting.  And He's doing it today.  On this new day that He has given us.
      Let us trust Him and embrace the new--the new that He is doing and bringing.  Let's choose to be thankful for the old, trustful for the present, and hopeful for the new.
         To God be the glory.