in Loss there is still Beauty!

I have not posted in a few weeks, and this isn't a post that will appear on my Facebook or twitter page.  This  is  not post many will applaud or click about.    On June 21st my dad passed away.  I know I didn't talk about him or write about him.  My parents divorced years ago, and I had not seen my dad in 5 years.  Though I called to check on him every so often.  His death for me was sudden and yet in so many ways was something I knew would come years before it every happened.  As you know in the last 5 years my focus has been on my mom's cancer battle and I will never regret that.  I was the last one to speak with him from here as far as I know.  My dad often would tell me that all of life,was about loss, to which I would say, but in loss you gain.  My dad was not a bad man, he was a man who loved in his own way, and on his own terms.  He was  a dreamer.  He loved me. For all the things I don't understand about his life, I know that.  When Jesus died on the cross his followers thought there hope was gone vanished without a trace, but it wasn't gone it was still ahead.  Jesus would rise from the dead, and fulfill the hope he promised. What does all this have to do with my dad?  Well, when I was young I lost my mom's car keys, and we never found those again.  Losses are strange, things you think you might not mourn, suddenly catch one off guard. So tonight I acknowledge the value of my dad's life, and who  he was.  I am thankful for for what he was able to offer me.  You see God shows me that he gives us permission to explore the losses we don't understand. And in every loss no matter the kind, there is something beautiful to be discovered, and hope to  be gained.  There is purpose and joy even I'm loss.  Tonight. I'm thankful, not because my dad lived a perfect life, but because he lived life period, and because his life is part of me, and that matters,  Have you ever found joy despite pain that caught you by surprise?  In my own way. I loved him too, and I'm thankful for the chance to have loved him as he was, for that yes was a gift I refuse to let be taken from  me.