I have always taught my children to live with an attitude of gratitude. I have 4 children - 35, 33, 29 and 26. And I have 5 glorious, beautiful absolutely wonderful grandchildren. Sometimes, no, often it is hard to remember to be grateful, especially when the chips are really down. Because we live in big city which, like New York, never sleeps people are very busy. My eldest is business manager of a huge corporation, my second has a communications business, the third runs an extreme adventure company and the fourth is in a business where he can be called out at any time of the day or night. I am grateful that they are all doing so extremely well. But the downside is that because they are so busy we don't see them as often as we would like. But last night my eldest called - could we look after the children? Wow, what a break! I hesitated, why? It was a school night and she was all choked up, talking way too fast. Her sister-in-law's father had just killed himself and they needed to get there fast to comfort the rest of the family. This was a dreadul downside to my upside of seeing my daughter, her husband and their children.When they got back to our home the children were fast asleep and we talked deep into the early hours of this morning. Gone were the cares of work in the morning, business contracts, end of year business decisions and the workaday worries that lay ahead.
Quietly we all realised that we still had each other to have and to hold. We were still a complete family. We indeed had reason to be grateful that, while in this terrible world of turmoil and grief and hardship and awful grief that had struck that part of our extended family we were still one. We mourn, grieve and pray for the peace of God that transcends all human understanding for that little family that has lost their dear father. But in this world where we never know what tomorrow brings we must always have an attitude of gratitude. The physical pain that I feel, no matter how extreme, is absolutely nothing compared with the emotional pain that that little family is experiencing this morning. May they allow the God of all understanding and peace and love to abide with them now and forever more.