Remembering Mom/Momo

This is a post that my sister posted on our family blog that I thought I would share...kind of lengthy, but couldn't explain my mom more!!

 "Leaves of forest trees can be said to be the planet's most important producer of organic material, since more than four-fifths of all plant tissue is contained in trees.  For all their importance, leaves are temporary fixtures."--from the book Forest

 I have been thinking about Mom and the legacy she left behind.   A book I really like is Where Roots Grow Deep by Bob Welch.  There is a chapter that spoke to my heart and I wanted to share some of it with you.  Sorry-- it is a bit lengthy but I wanted to share it just the same.

Only in death can our ultimate legacy be left.  "I tell you the truth," Jesus said in John 12:24, "unless a kernel of  wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed.  But if it dies, it produces many seeds."

It's not until a tree dies and its growth rings are examined that the biologist can truly understand its history.  Likewise it is not until a person dies that his or her legacy is totally revealed.

When I listen to Rich Mullin's  songs, I nearly always wonder why God allowed such a talented and faithful troubadour to die so young.  And yet just as I 'm moved by music, so am I reminded that his songs go on without him--as do all of our songs.

It's like that postscript on contest commercials :  Need not be present to win.  What we give to the world doesn't require us to stay in this world for it to have an impact.

Later in the chapter...

For those who have gone on before us, the privilege--and obligation-- of living with purpose is over.  But for those who remain, it is just beginning.  Consider the end of Steven Spielberg's gut-wrenchingly real movie based on the Normandy Invasion, Saving Private Ryan: Captain John Miller (Tom Hanks) lies dying beside the very soldier whose life, in essence, he saved.

His final words: "Earn this."

The scene fades to present day as a white-haired Private Ryan stands by the grave where lies the soldier who, more than 50 years ago, helped save him.  Well behind Ryan stand his wife, children and four grandchildren--his legacies.

"I didn't invent anything," he says.  "I didn't cure any diseases.  I worked a farm.  I raised a family.  I lived life.  I only hope, in your eyes at least, I earned what you did for me."

The scene, one of the most moving I've witnessed on film, reminds us that what we are now is often due to what someone else was then.

 ...Likewise, the world is different because of what our heavenly Father did for us.  He allowed His Son to die on a cross so that we could be unshackled from sin; so we could have it better; so we could be more than we would have been otherwise.  But the sacrifice is wasted if we squander the freedom He gave us.

Death is painful.  Still, it is necessary to bring us--and, in a sense, those who follow--to completeness.  In autumn, when deciduous trees paint the landscape with hues of red, yellow, and orange, their glorious colors suggest life at its most brilliant.  The transition, however, is triggered by an ironic twist: death.  For if leaves did not wither and die each fall, the tree itself would wither and die in the winter.  Green leaves would become a liability--thousands of extra mouths to feed in a time when a tree's food supply is at its lowest.

In October, when you fly into an area where the deciduous trees have lost their leaves, your bird's-eye view reveals halos of gold around such trees.  A month later, the same flight will offer no such grandeur; the leaves will be wet and soggy and will have blended into the muted colors of earth.

But just because we cannot see the grandeur does not mean it doesn't exist; legacies often work their way through nature and people in ways we'll never see.  Those fallen leaves still have purpose, enriching the soil for generations to come, their deaths not in vain.

In death, every part of a tree ultimately restores to the ecosystem the useful organic elements that were locked up in the tree during its lifetime.  Death supersedes life and life rises again from what is dead.

A leaf in transition...a soldier in Normandy...God's Son on a cross.  When I see the hues of autumn, I'm reminded of what death's most honorable legacy is: life.

-

It seems fitting that Mom was born and passed away in September.  Fall was Mom's favorite time of year and I liked what Bob Welch wrote about leaves changing and how death brings new life .  Mom's life enriched all of our lives.  Her life was colorful and good, and her legacy will be long reaching. While it is painful to lose someone who was so important in my life,  I am thankful for Mom's gift of family and for the seeds she planted in each one of us which continue to grow as we raise (tend) and teach (water) our own children.  As I think back to a year ago, I am still filled with sadness for myself and my loss--all of our losses.  But I am deeply thankful for God's presence as we walk through the valleys of grief.  And, I am thankful for Mom and how freely she shared her thoughts, advice, beliefs and her life with us. Those things continue to "fertilize" my life now and will continue to do so in the years to come.

Hope you are enjoying this fall day where you are.  I am planting daffodil bulbs today in honor of Mom and look forward to spring when I will see their happy, yellow faces.  I will try to post some photos of Mom from our old blog postings.  Our old computer with all of Mom's photos is frozen and I can't access the old photos.  If anyone wants to add some old favorites--feel free.

We love you and hope the sun is shining through the changing leaves in your neck of the woods.