"Makes You Think"

After hearing several people, in one week's time, use this phrase, or some semblance of it, it is dawning on me that somehow we are not learning the lessons, and I cannot imagine why not...I pray to God that I am! I pray to Him every day that my daughter did not die in vain, and that I am going to search, seek and find what He wants me to accomplish through this life, through His plan, through my remaining days. I am sure I falter, I take for granted, I don't use my time or talents wisely, always. I don't even know what I am supposed to do, half the time, well, most of the time, since Allison is gone. I just don't know. But I keep trying to know, and when I cannot possibly figure it out, I ask God to reveal the answers. And He does. Slowly, and on His timing, but He does.

So, when another is diagnosed with cancer, another dies from this dreaded disease, when lives are taken by others, when accidents occur and the person we knew is resumed to ash, why is it we are still stunned...why do we keep saying things like, "it sure makes you think", or, "it puts a new perspective on things", or "how can this happen", or "it changes priorities". I guess it is just something to say. It's another thing to really live up to the words. It's another thing to really change. It's another thing to live the life in a new way. It's another thing to really accept. It's just easier to use words, and yes, it DOES make you think. My hope is I do more than THINK. My prayer is I change, I GET IT, I LIVE, I HONOR.

Maybe it's easier to use the words when all this takes place outside of your own home. When it happens to someone else, that means it's not happening to us. I cannot really get irritated with those who claim to live life differently, or to make such comments, when they truly do not know. They only know when it is blatantly in their presence, when the door to the bedroom has to remain closed for awhile, for fear of change, when the family gathers for a family photo and that beautiful face is missing, when the house is so quiet, it echoes in pain, sending sounds that almost sound like a whimper. How can one know, until they KNOW?!!

But, a part of me wonders, what's it going to take? Why do we have to keep losing and hearing of pain in others before we begin to get it? Does God have designs on us, reigns held so tight that one day we will wake up and have our ah ha moment?! Why are we so surprised when our neighbor dies, our friends, our parents, our grandparents, our spouses and our children? Why? This is what we are here for, to live, to die. And when it happens, we change, we reflect, we contemplate, and sometimes we learn that next level of a lesson and we LEARN, maybe just through the service, maybe a week after, maybe for three months, maybe for a year. We walk away from the other one's troubles, back into our own lives, and we have choices, choices on how to respond, what to take from it, how to live the day we are now given, realizing all the while that life is so short. In the next instant, it can be gone.

It "makes you think" alright. But other than that, what does it do, all this dying, all this disease, all these murders and abductions, all these things that happen to others, then ourselves?! I hope and pray for me, that it does more than "make me think", I pray it "makes me act, live, hope, serve, and dream", I hope it "makes me pray, move, act, and keep the faith". I hope I do more than think. I hope I change and take the lesson for what it is, learn what I can, change what I must, and not wait.