Tag: love

Stones of remembrance

” What do these stones mean ?” Joshua 4:6

I have not long returned with some friends from nine days on the French Camino. I can only say what a fabulous time in so many ways and would encourage you, if possible, to walk it.

There have been many surveys done to determine the reasons people travel the Camino. The French Camino, a pilgrim trail, is one thousand years old but not everybody walks it for religious or spiritual reasons. Some look at the challenge of just walking 491 miles, some to maintain fitness and my friends’ comments when asked fitted into a number of categories.

Personally, I knew for me it was the continuing road to the healing of a broken heart. Jude has been in Paradise for nearly four earth time years but I still continue to miss my darl !. Yes, things are different now even the text books tell you that but grief is in the end still lived outside a book. 

Jude would have loved the Camino but I was reminded of three things while walking and I would like to encourage you if you grieve a spouse in Christ.

  1. Our lives are enlarged by the life of those that have gone before, we carry those precious memories.
  2. There is a spiritual communion. Jesus has Jude and Jesus has me. There is a very fine liminal line between earth & paradise……think upon that…. it’s beautiful and one day at the resurrection of the saints we will be re-united, the veil will disappear.
  3. No marriage is perfect but forgetting those things before we only carry forward the good.

I had collected some flat stones from Glendalough and had an idea what I would do with them so I wrote on seven of them along with a final round stone for leaving along the journey. There was no shortage of stone mounds so in my own away, often away from my friends I took a moment each day stopped and reflected on Jude, thanking God for her life, knowing she was safe outside of an ever increasing chaotic & hostile world……. Maranatha…Come LORD Jesus come!

The final stone ended up in a beautiful flowerbed, central Logrono!

Since my return I have had a desire to return solo and God willing I will return to Logrono on the 5th August and complete the remaining 381 miles!!

Buen Camino

Mizpah !!

Bangor Harbour, Northern Ireland is such a beautiful spot when the sun is shining !!.

I couldn’t help notice the boat in the centre, its name Mizpah which reminded me of the encounter Jacob had with Laban in Genesis 31.

After 20 years of serving Jacob, The LORD finally told him to return to the land of his fathers and God promised He would be with him. (vs3). The LORD had also warned Laban to be careful when catching up with Jacob. (vs24). On paper it looked like there was going to be a showdown but, in the end, the two parties made a covenant sealed with a heap of stones as they went their separate ways saying, “May The LORD keep watch between you & me when we are away from each other”. The word Mizpah literally means ‘Watchtower’. I suggest if you’re not familiar with the whole context to read Genesis Ch 31.

Certainly, in Victorian times, there was an interest in Mizpah jewellery and the language turned more emotional to describe the bond between two people who were separated either by distance or death. This is a far cry from the original context as Laban and Jacob were not really in love with each other !!. But it spoke to my broken heart that day I saw the boat and ministered to me in a way that only God knows-thankyou LORD.

I write this on what would have been Jude’s 61st birthday and I miss her incredibly more than words can say, but I am so glad I know where she is, “absent from the body but present with The LORD”, and birthday free !!.

As a token, I visited the ‘closet’ today and placed a stone, a very special one with the inscription ‘Mizpah’.