As I shared in a previous post ---
my mother-in-law Elizabeth
had surgery to remove a brain hematoma
on July 15.
The surgery was successful.
However, she was very frail and
other health issues arose
and
she passed from this life to
Real Life
one week later on July 22.
As we have gone through all the things you do
when someone dies ---
making calls to family members to let them know,
putting together the plans for the funeral,
feeding the multitudes,
sleeping some of the multitudes,
smiling, laughing, crying ---
we know this: we are blessed!!!
and then
blessed some more!
We have been surrounded by friends, family,
church family, community
and lifted up and carried through
the entire past 2 weeks.
How awesome to have, not one or two people,
but literally dozens and dozens of people,
write, e-mail, call
and tell us what a grand lady Elizabeth was
and
what she meant to each of them every time
they were around her.
We have heard some sweet, sweet stories
of how they all remember her.
She taught Sunday school,
led women's classes,
taught VBS,
was a faithful choir member,
(with a beautiful alto voice),
she was a lifetime PTA member,
room mother for literally decades,
and active in everything
that happened in her community,
wherever that happened to be at
the time.
Amazing!
It's so strange to see your parents through
the eyes of others.
And that's especially true when you
see them through the eyes of those
who knew them when they were
much, much younger.
It's been quite sweet to get a glimpse of
the person Elizabeth was waaaaay
before any of us knew her.
I spent a lot of my early years
of knowing Elizabeth
kind of grieving
because she wasn't the kind of mother-in-law
I had always wanted.
I wanted someone who would call me just to visit,
ask me to go
shopping with her,
or to get a pedicure together.
Someone who would go to
"girl's night out"
with me. Or maybe to a movie.
A"let's do lunch"
kind of mother-in-law.
None of those things ever happened.
She was not that kind of woman.
And after several years, I gave up on that
"dream"
That just was not Elizabeth.
Thankfully --- many, many years ago I discovered
something absolutely phenomenally, wonderfully,
tremendously
BETTER
that Elizabeth had given me.
A way better gift
than doing any of those things together.
I discovered that she gave me
THE BEST
she had to give....
she raised a son,
took him to church,
laid a foundation of faith in him,
prayed for him faithfully
and then
handed him off to me !!!,
a silly and not so wise girl,
(at the age of 20)
and
Trusted in the LORD
to direct our paths.
Elizabeth gave to me
a loving husband,
a fantastic father to our kids,
a warrior,
a mighty man of God !
William Rosser
is who he is today
because of the kind of faithful
mother Elizabeth was to him.
For THAT and so much more !!!
I love her and I pay tribute to her..
Her children arise and call her blessed;
her husband also, and he praises her:
"Many women do noble things,
but you surpass them all."
Charm is deceptive, and
beauty is fleeting;
but a woman who fears the LORD
is to be praised.
is to be praised.
Give her the reward she has earned,
and let her works bring her praise
at the city gate.
Proverbs 31:28-31
Gwyn
