Year of Jubilee

To be sure,
I am loosely translating this
to my life!
The Year of Jubilee
in the Jewish faith and tradition,

(Our LORD was Jewish

and while many of the customs of the Jewish faith

are null and void

with the death and resurrection

of our Saviour,

we can still learn and profit

from them!) 

the Year of Jubilee

is a year of restoration, forgiveness, and freedom.

Technically,

the Year of Jubilee occurred on the year following

the lapse of the seventh Sabbath of years.

So the Year of Jubilee is the 50th year. 

However, many consider it to occur

every seventh year.

In the United States

every seventh year,

bad credit falls off your report.

Many crimes have a seven year

statute of limitations.

In Jewish tradition,

the Year of Jubilee

meant the forgiveness of debt,

return of property,

freedom for slaves. 

Think about that for just a second!

Life changing freedom!

From that point forward,

no more slavery to the past.

Nothing will be as it was!

Never the same again!

This evening,

I will enter into the seventh year.

Today is the sixth anniversary.

At 4:59 p.m.,

I will begin the seventh year without my Al.

Yesterday morning,

while laying in bed,

talking to the LORD,

I was very suddenly impressed that

I was entering my Year of Jubilee! 

As I considered what that might mean,

I began to think about my grief journey.

The days when the pain of loss was physical,

when I thought I might literally be dying.

The days when I couldn't move,

couldn't think,

couldn't eat.

The confusion.

The tears.

Then came the days of desperation.

Anything to make it stop.

The frenzy of activity.

Running away from home.

Dating too soon.

Laughing too loud.

Forcing myself to move forward.

Then the days of stillness,

waiting on the LORD.

The quiet.

The solitude.

Choosing joy over happiness.

Moving at God's pace,

not mine,

not Al's.

Softening grief.

Beginning to see beauty again.

Genuine laughter.

Then my Lanny Love.

Restoration.

Happiness.

Love.

The return of the music.

And a different kind of sorrow.

The fifth year,

the one leading up to the fifth anniversary,

when the grief unexpectedly

consumed me again,

threatened my happiness,

hovered over everything

like a dark shadow.

Always,

over it all,

the constant knowledge.

He is gone!

Then last year,

the sixth one.

Softening once again.

The assurance that it was not just

okay

for me to be happy,

it was right under God!

The lessening,

then cessation,

of daily, actively missing him,

missing his presence.

The lessening,

and just recently,

the cessation

of feeling guilty for loving my Lanny Love,

for being happy -

not just happy,

but happily, joyously, lovingly married happy -

the end of jealousy on his behalf.

The end of the constant shadow,

the constant awareness that

he is gone.

Then yesterday morning,

the LORD's whisper -

"Your Year of Jubilee is about to begin!" 

Today,

as I remember Al

on this sixth anniversary 

of his Homegoing,

I think of a phrase about Heaven

that someone mentioned recently,

"We are homesick for a place we have never been" 

and I rejoice that Al is not homesick,

he is Home! 

Today,

on this sixth anniversary,

I feel a lightness,

a happiness,

a freedom

that I have not experienced before,

and,

as I have suspected for for a little while,

I believe I am no longer grieving.

Love has not ended.

I love him still!

There are those days when he should be here

and I miss him.

There are those moments I remember a specific thing

and I miss him.

But the constant awareness,

the sorrow,

the grief,

that has left me.

Now I remember and smile.

In gratitude that he was mine for those years.

In love.

My Year of Jubilee.

Freedom from slavery to grief.

Nothing will every be the same again. 

Thank You, LORD!