Au Revoir Joyce

I heard yesteday that a sister in the congregation has died.  Joyce had just moved into a Care Home - she was not young - and I had been trying to ring her and not been able to get through.  The phone call told me why.   It is an odd feeling.  I feel sad, but yet relieved for her.  The painful struggles of old age are over and she is now sleeping safe in "the everlasting arms", and has such a wonderful awakening ahead of her when the time comes.

She will wake up and think how well she feels. Everything hurts when you get old and when you wake up in the morning its quite an undertaking to get yourself moving. I have a zimmer by the side of my bed so I can make a lurch for it first thing.   So the next time she wakes, Joyce will really notice the difference!  She will feel better, more alive, more full of energy than she ever has.  She will find herself springing to her feet. And you probably have to be in the Old Crocks and Crumblies Department as I am myself to fully appreciate what a miracle that will be.

Here is a promise of the resurrection of the dead - one of many. This one is from Isaiah:

“Your dead will live. My corpses will rise up. Awake and shout joyfully, you residents in the dust! For your dew is as the dew of the morning, and the earth will let those powerless in death come to life." - Isaiah 26:19

I think the King James says: "Awake and sing! all ye that dwell in dust."   It will be such a joyful awakening when it comes.

We heard yesterday that President Trump and his stunningly beautiful wife Melania have both gone down with Covid...  there has been some nasty gloating about it in cyberspace, which is very unkind.  It is a serious thing, can be life-threatening and life-changing. We should not be wishing it on anyone.

A letter from a friend about a rather disasterous camping holiday her grandson took - they were flooded out - reminded me of our faraway camping trips in our Expat years.  We used to go out with the Texans in the desert, in the Winter.  It was surprisingly cold at night - I remember the sand like snow on my feet in the morning.  We used to make a big campfire in the evening and sit round it eating Mary's wonderful Tex-Mex chile and cornbread.  And it did actually rain on us one time!  And it hardly ever rains in Saudi.  Though when it does it can be torrential, and you must never pitch your camp, or leave your car, in anything that could be a Wadi, a dry river bed, in case of flash floods.

How long ago it seems.

Captain Butterfly found an unusual, very old, and very tiny coin on his Treasure Hunt.  It will probably appear in his blog in due course. And Cheryl and Ian sent us another lovely Oz calendar with a letter card full of news. They too once lived on Planet Expat with us.  They left in style, sailing their yacht to a new life in Australia. There should be a blog somewhere in my collection about the evening we spent aboard when they were in Chichester.