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Stephanie Rische

Blogger and Writer: Capturing Stories of God's Grace

July 31, 2019

In the Season of Raspberries

In my memory, it is forever summer at Grandma and Grandpa’s house. The desert sun is always beating down as we run through the sprinkler. The Columbia River is always cold and clear. The homemade ice cream tastes like spoonsful of heaven. And there are always raspberries in the garden, deep red and begging to be picked.

Every summer when we kids visited my grandparents, we looked forward to picking raspberries with Grandpa. We could have been out playing, but we followed him to the garden, Pied Piper style, even though we knew that meant we’d be put to work.

Green baskets in hand, we’d alternate between filling our baskets and popping the sun-ripened berries into our mouths. As we made our way down the meticulous rows, Grandpa plied us with riddles and puzzles to solve.

Railroad crossing; look out for cars. Can you spell that without any r’s?

Although Grandpa spent nearly his entire career as an analytical chemist, he was truly a teacher at heart. Before being recruited by a nuclear plant at the height of the Cold War, he spent several years as a high school chemistry teacher. But he never stopped teaching. The raspberry patch became his classroom, and we were his students.

When Grandpa finished picking his rows, he’d head over to help with mine. “I got them all,” I would say confidently. He’d just smile, and then, to my utter amazement, fill several baskets’ worth of berries from the bushes I was certain were bare.

***

I got the news that Grandpa’s heart beat for the last time on a hot June day. The raspberries in my own garden—a weak nod to Grandpa’s legacy—were just starting to ripen.

A decade and a half ago, dementia started pulling my grandfather away from us. It began as a slow trickle at first, until eventually the current picked up and swept him away, one memory at a time.

The last time I saw him, he said, “Am I supposed to know you?” When I told him I was his granddaughter, he cocked his head and squinted at me. “No, that’s not it,” he said, as if trying to solve a riddle. “But I do think I know you.”

He gave me a hug anyway.

How do you summarize a life of 90-plus years? If I had to pin Grandpa down to a single attribute, I suppose I would say he was a study in faithfulness. He was married to the same woman for 66 years. He was a member of the same church for 61 years. He worked at the same company for 37 years. He tended the same raspberry patch for four decades. And under his meticulous care, all manner of things flourished.

In the days before his death, the thin space between heaven and earth became increasingly gauzy. Near the end, he could hardly breathe, but when my mom and her sisters said the Lord’s Prayer over him, he opened his eyes and mouthed the words right along with them.

On earth as it is in heaven . . .

Now Grandpa’s mind has been returned to him. He has been reunited with his memories. And I like to think he’s sharing his riddles with a whole new audience beyond the pearly gates.

As I teach my son to fill up his own basket of raspberries, I’m struck by the rich bounty we’ve been given. The raspberry harvest is sweet. But not as sweet as the harvest from a life faithfully lived.

***

What’s lost is nothing to what’s found, and all the death that ever was, set next to life, would scarcely fill a cup.

Frederick Buechner

Did you figure out the answer to the riddle? It’s that.

8 Comments Filed Under: Family Tagged With: death, dementia, Frederick Buechner, grandfather, grandparent, heaven, riddles
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December 16, 2016

Waiting with Joy

One year ago, exactly, I was waiting for a phone call. I was ready, bursting with anticipation, my phone glued to my hip all day and all through the night. My sister was expecting her second baby, and the plan was for Mom and me to jump in the car as soon as we got the call. We’d make the two-and-a-half hour drive so we could watch big sister Addie while her mom and dad were in the hospital.

It was an Advent like no other, waiting for this baby son to come into the world.

Oh come, Oh come, Emmanuel
And ransom captive Israel
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear

The call came at 2:00 a.m. in the dark quiet of a snowy morning. I leaped out of bed before the second ring. “It’s time,” my sister said. “We’re headed to the hospital.”

After all the waiting, all the expectation, all the hope, it was time. This long-awaited baby was coming.

Rejoice, Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, Oh Israel!

The arrival came with pain, to be sure. But when Baby Grant came into the world, there was indeed much rejoicing.

This Advent I found myself waiting again. But this time, instead of waiting for a birth, I was waiting for a death.

Once again I kept the phone beside me night and day, waking and sleeping. But this time my heart weighed three hundred pounds each time the phone rang.

My grandfather had lived a good life. He was a man of the greatest generation—a hard worker and a man of quiet but deep faith. He never would have abided my saying so, but he was a hero: first as a B-17 pilot over Europe during World War II and then as the faithful father to twelve children. He had been married to my grandma for almost 71 years—a lifetime in itself. His was quite a legacy: a legacy of faithfulness and wit and wisdom and love and dozens upon dozens of people who share his name.

And now he was ready to go home. I kissed his cheek last Sunday, aware that it would likely be the last time on this side of heaven.

I knew it was time—we all did. And yet somehow 94 still seemed too young. God has planted eternity in our hearts, which means that death always comes too soon. We are made for life, not death.

Oh come, Thou Dayspring, come and cheer
Thy people with Thine advent here;
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
And death’s dark shadows put to flight

The call came one evening after dinner, and somehow I missed it. I must have been in the basement, throwing a load in the wash. My dad’s voice was on the message: “I have good news and bad news,” he said. “It’s bad news for us, because we’ll miss him. But it’s all good news for him.”

At Advent we celebrate the gift of Emmanuel. God with us, to comfort those who mourn in lonely exile. God with us, to disperse the gloomy clouds of night. God with us, to put death’s dark shadows to flight.

As we inhabit this weary world, we grieve and we wait and we ache. But we also rejoice, because death isn’t the end of the story. The pangs of death make way for new life—the kind of life that never ends.

Until then, we wait. And we wait with joy.

God with us. Us with God. Emmanuel.

Rejoice, Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, Oh Israel!

6 Comments Filed Under: Family Tagged With: Advent, birth, Christmas, death, Emmanuel, grandfather, joy, legacy, waiting, World War II
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October 15, 2014

It’s Going to Get Better

A few weeks ago, Daniel and I went out to dinner and got seated by a table of 20 or so kids celebrating homecoming. We sat there and just watched them for a while (not that we had much choice—we couldn’t have heard what the other person was saying above the teenage racket).

Now that we’re about two decades out from homecoming ourselves, we found the scene fascinating, like some kind of sociological study. The guys were all on one end of the table, jockeying to be the loudest or make the funniest joke. The girls were pulling out lip gloss at two-minute intervals, adjusting their teeny dresses and trying to get the attention of the guys, who had eyes only for their burgers.

After they left, Daniel and I looked at each other, slightly dazed, ears still ringing.

“So,” Daniel said finally. “If you could go back and say something to your 17-year-old self, what would you say?”

We laughed as we considered tips for our former selves:

To the former Stephanie: You know, those high-waisted, tight-rolled jeans are not really as flattering as you think they are.

To the former Daniel: Dude, you should really cut your hair.

But most of all, when I think about the 17-year-old me, I want to cup her face in my hands and say, It’s going to get better. Those things that seem to matter so much right now—the girls who are mean to you in the locker room, the boys who seem to think you’re invisible—it’s not going to matter that much someday. There is so much more to life than you can see right now, and those things that make you feel out of step with the rest of the world . . . you will recognize them as gifts one day. Yes, maybe you’ll get teased as the yearbook’s biggest bookworm, but someday you’ll get to read and write books for a living. And there’s going to be a really handsome man (he with the once-long hair) who will love you just the way God knows you need to be loved. And best of all, you’ll be comfortable in your own skin.

***

Last week a beautiful woman from our church was taken from us after the tumor in her brain gained too much ground. She was one of those people who was sunshine in human form—always offering warm hugs and greetings, beaming her genuine smile, making people feel loved and welcomed.

Daniel and I stood in a three-hour line at Kim’s visitation, surrounded by hundreds of other people whose lives had been touched by this woman of God. Story after story poured out about how her life had been marked by love and service—to God, to her family, to her church, and to anyone whose path she crossed.Kim McCart

As we looked at the photos around the room—the one of Kim with her husband’s arm around her, the one of her laughing with her children and grandchildren, the one of her hugging kids on a service trip in Ecuador—it struck me in a fresh way what really matters. I get so caught up in the things that seem urgent, the things that clamor for my attention and keep me buzzing from one item on the to-do list to the next.

I have to wonder if Kim would cup my face in her hands and say, “Things are going to get so much better. And those things that worry you, the things you think are so important? They’re not going to matter all that much one day.”

I’m not so different from those high school students, I’m afraid, so focused on the here and now. But I want to hang on to the legacy Kim leaves behind: Love God. Love people. This is what really matters.

I have no doubt that when Kim went home to her Father, she was greeted just as warmly as she’d greeted people on this side of eternity. And I’m confident these words echoed off the streets of gold: “Well done, Kim, my good and faithful servant.”

Forget the sequined dresses and the loud table talk. That’s the ultimate homecoming.

11 Comments Filed Under: Faith Tagged With: Christ, death, eternity, Faith, faithfulness, heaven, Life, perspective, priorities
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November 13, 2012

Beauty in the Dying

I was walking through the woods the other day with a million things on my mind—making mental to-do lists, replaying recent conversations in my head, worrying over the usual things I have no control over. Then I glanced up for a moment and literally stopped in my tracks, right there in the middle of the path.

My jaw came unhinged as I took in the sight. Fiery maples, golden elms, and burnt-orange oaks melded together in a kaleidoscope of colors just in front of me. The October-blue sky peeked out from behind the trees, and the sun shone a spotlight onto the autumn-hued rainbow.

I couldn’t help but think about the quote by that endearing redhead, Anne of Green Gables: “I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.” (Don’t ask how many times I’ve read the books and watched the PBS special. Suffice it to say, often times enough to quote liberally.)

As I stood rooted to the spot on the trail, a cyclist whizzed past me, no doubt annoyed I was blocking the path, but my feet were rooted to the spot. The scene was so beautiful I ached. Partly because I couldn’t hold all that beauty inside of me. And partly because the thing about fall is you know it can’t stay.

Then a rather morbid thought occurred to me: the leaves are beautiful because they are dying. Their chlorophyll is slowly leaking out, no more sustenance is going their way, and the trees are slowly shutting down the processes of life.

We think of death as the worst-case scenario. But we rarely stop midstep to acknowledge the beauty that often accompanies it.

Jesus, in his usual upside-down way, made this counterintuitive statement:

If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give up your life for me, you will find it.

—Matthew 10:39

My grandpa was just in the hospital again. He and Grandma have been planning their 90th birthday bash for some time, and now it’s just weeks around the corner. They have a guest list that’s fitting for a couple as charming and delightful as they are—200 of their closest friends, their dozen children, and a slew of grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Thankfully, Grandpa is home from the hospital now. He’s a pretty tough guy, and just stubborn enough (having 12 kids will do that to you) that I have no doubt he’ll be raring to go by party time. But Grandpa’s recent stint in the hospital was one of those moments that stopped me in my tracks, causing me to reflect, autumn-style, on his life.

As his strength on this side of eternity fades, his faithfulness for all these years—to his wife of 60-plus years, to his family, and to his God—blazes all the brighter. His life is an example of the beauty that can come with endings. The knowledge that his time here is wrapping up only directs a spotlight on those lovely, shining parts of his character.

If I hope to ever have a life that blazes like Grandpa’s, I first have to die to my own way of doing things, to my own agenda. Because it’s only when I surrender that I can embrace the beautiful life Jesus offers. It’s only by dying that I truly live.

Thanks for your life, Grandpa. Thanks for the beauty. It’s going to be one grand party.

How beautifully leaves grow old,
How full of light and color are their last days.
—John Burroughs

 

 

I’ve taken the challenge of reading the Bible chronologically this year and tracing the thread of grace through it. These musings are prompted by my reading. I’d love to have you join me: One Year Bible reading plan.

8 Comments Filed Under: Seasons Tagged With: Anne of Green Gables, autumn, beauty, death, Family, grandpa, Matthew
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