"The one you love is sick"

"My mother is gone."

My mom cried those words into the phone three years ago when her beloved mother, my sweet grandmother, passed away. It was especially hard for my mom, because she couldn't return to India in time for the cremation ceremony. I remember my brother and I both took a day off from work to talk about our Nani. Both my brother and I didn't want to interact with the outside world that day;that day was reserved just for us to mourn. My brother and I returned to work and our regular lives. One of my coworkers tried to offer comforting words, but I remember feeling incredibly upset. He said something along the lines of, "Well, she was old, right? She led a good long life. Her death may have been for the best." I was upset when he mentioned that her death may have been for the best. At that point in my life, I didn't understand. I could not comprehend how death could be for the better.

Fast forward to this morning. My husband and I are sitting on the couch, drinking our morning coffee. We just got off the phone with his mom and dad, talking about sweet gumballs, yard work, the stock market, and life insurance for young adults. We hung up the phone, only to have it immediately ring again. My husband's mom was on the line, crying. While we were chatting on the phone, my father-in-law's cell phone rang. It was the senior home where his mother, my husband's grandmother, lives. My mother-in-law told us that it was bad news, and that she and my father-in-law are on their way to the senior home. We were left with this information, and the knowledge that my husband's grandmother has pneumonia.

My husband's grandmother is a remarkable woman. She's 101 and incredibly feisty. She's strong-willed and also very funny. My husband's family jokes about her being the Energizer Bunny as she keeps going and going and going. Another comparison was a Timex watch, as "She takes a lickin and keeps on tickin."

My husband started to cry. This is his grandmother, who he has fond memories of visiting in Frankenmouth, drinking Verner's ginger ale. This is his grandmother who made meringue cookies every Christmas. As I'm holding my husband, he cries on my shoulder. There are no words to say that can comfort him. I cannot and will not tell him, "Oh, she's 101. She led a good, long, happy life." I cannot and will not tell him, "Well, it's her time to go." The only words I can say are, "This blows." Because it does.

In a new understanding, all I can really think about is "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die." My husband and I are sitting by the phone, not knowing of what is happening with his grandmother. We do not know if she is still with us in her physical body. But I do know that the Lord is with her, as He is with my husband's entire family as they await for news. I also know that the Lord is the resurrection and the life.