Wilderness and A Way Through

Sunbeam in Antelope Canyon - Fil & Sonia on Flickr

This is our wilderness, Joshua Christopher Alden, that your children and I don’t know where you are.

Day by day, moment by moment, I am charged with guiding these precious people though their lives while a large part of them is missing.  Tonight found us, the three of us, the mother of your children and your son and daughter cuddled up in bed asking God to open a divine connection from our hearts to yours.

One by one we offered up into the darkness our brightest, fullest, You-est memories and description.  As our words wove together, an exquisite incantation of Who You Are to us, we became aware of your presence in our hearts.  Across that connection we breathed words of loss, loneliness, hope, and love.  My words were simple, a basic template for the children to hang their own expressions on – their words for you were powerful and poignant, an outpouring of sadness, forgiveness, and deepest wishes.  Then we waited in the silence our hearts open to receive a message back from you. And afterward, they wept.  I sang them to sleep.

This is our wilderness.  There is a way through, treading the path of love and connection, open to forgiveness and healing.  We walk through hand in hand with a God who is big enough to be everywhere with everyone.  We dance through heart in heart with a God who is boundless love and effervescent joy.  Each day I look into those two pairs of blue eyes, we laugh together, we fight, we cry, we eat and dance, and delight in the smallest moments of life – each day I receive the blessing you shared with me and I pray that one day you will be whole enough to receive it too.  This is our wilderness and our way through – that we are a family of three… but we ARE a family.  Because God is bigger than all of it!