It was 5:45AM. I awoke from a not so restful sleep and looked at my clock. Realizing what time it was I glanced at my phone to see that I had a message from an unidentifiable number. I listened to the message; I didn't know her voice but she said to call the hospital as soon as I could. My heart sank. I wasn't panicked but I felt in my bones that my life had changed and this call was confirming what my heart already knew. See, the afternoon before, my family and I, along with close friends gathered at the hospital to have life-support removed from my father who had been in the hospital for the last seven months. Those months had been so stressful, scary even and now we said our tearful goodbyes as we gathered around his bedside. He was my protector, security blanket, trusted advisor but ultimately, now he was leaving me, forever. We left late that afternoon to get some rest as the doctors said nature and time would now take over. I went home sorrowful and confused. I tossed and turned in some type of emotional pain I had never known before. Something was being ripped from my heart and I wrestled in my sleep trying to hold on but that night I lost my ability to fight.
I dialed back the number and a woman's voice answered my call. I explained I was returning her call. She asked me to identify myself in relation to Nash Shaffer. I replied, "I am his son..." She informed me that he had passed away. I asked her when and she told me. She said to me, "I'm so sorry for your loss..." My voice paused, my voice was caught on something but I said thank you. We said goodbye and we hung up the phone.
Out of all the things I remember about that time in my life, I remember her voice. How soothing, how caring, how comforting she was. I wouldn't know her if she ever walked up to me but I will never forget that voice. What I remember hearing, feeling and sensing in her voice was the grace of God. I've tried to train my heart to recognize God's grace. I've noticed it's all around me and in everything. I call grace the love language of the Divine. Grace is the finishing of our souls. When life leaves us in want, parched for the waters of love and freedom, Grace is there to quench our thirst of the imperfect heart.
Grace is the love language of God; it is the native tongue of the Almighty. When God communicates with creation he speaks in grace. I have tried to fine tune my listening to hear what grace has to say. I have learned that grace is touching. Sometimes it touches me, and sometimes I get to touch it. We should learn to hear the God of all things in all things. If we live distracted, we will miss God's voice because it does not come to us in conventional ways. When we are conscious and sensitive to God, we can hear His voice in all things.
Psalm 19 declares "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge. There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard."
There is a declaration of grace for our lives. The voice of God permeates in all things. Grace speaks -- its tone and its cadence is love. In the moment I was to grasp that my father was gone, I heard God's grace in the nurses words. How could the most painful words I had ever heard sound so sweet? It is because we serve a God who manifests in our realities. God makes himself known in the most horrendous circumstances and causes us to know we are not alone. Even now I am not alone and I wasn't alone; when I received the call. We will hear God, when our ears are trained to listen for love.
The day my father transitioned, I understood there is grace in death. Death brings an end to sickness, without it we would be forever sick. I understand that there is grace in grieving, grieving means that I was loved, it means that I loved. Then I saw that there was a grace to stop grieving. In it we can find the strength to carry love in our hearts, when the lover has left our arms. Grace is in all things even on this father's day when I am missing my father terribly...
From the forthcoming book TOUCHING GRACE by Patrick D. Shaffer, Winter of 2016