Helpless

My Grandpa is sick. He's been sick for a while, but in the last six weeks he has gotten progressively worse. He has Parkinson's disease, and as they increase the meds to control the symptoms of the disease, the side effects of the medications bring their own dark contributions: namely, hallucinations. I learned two weeks ago of the worsening of his condition, but yesterday received news that there probably isn't going to be a reprieve from this worsening.

I'm lost. I'm tired of people dying. I know I've had several years where no one in my family has died. Thank God for that. The strange thing is that in the time without death, it seems that I've grown weaker, less accustomed to dealing with this reality of life. I've dealt with death since I was seven years old, and until the last seven years or so, have dealt with it on a fairly regular basis. I feel like I'm out of practice, ill-equipped to deal with it.

And I don't know how to deal with it with someone else. I don't really know how to let Joe help. It's a new thing, this sharing burdens so deeply with another.

I'm not angry at God, exactly, but frustrated, perhaps disappointed. I come back to the same questions about prayer I've had through the years. How can the Bible say "ask and it will be given unto you," and prayer not seem to work? I have such a hard time with this concept. I can accept that God sometimes answers in ways we don't understand, or that His answer is, in fact, "no." And I know that God answers prayer. I've seen that so much in my life in the last year. I don't doubt that He does. I just don't understand how it all works. It seems easier to accept "no" as an answer, or "not yet" when it's for a new car or something like that. But when it's for someone's salvation or someone's healing or that someone's suffering would be reduced -- how can He say no?

I know that all the answers I want are not readily available right now. And that I can also accept, as much as I sometimes hate it. I look forward to the day "Farther Along," when we'll understand.

"Farther Along" (Traditional, from Mud on the Tires by Brad Paisley)

Tempted and tried we're oft made to wonder
Why it should be thus all the day long
While there are others living about us
Never molested though in the wrong

Chorus
Farther along we'll know all about it
Farther along we'll understand why
Cheer up my brother live in the sunshine
We'll understand it all by and by

When death has come and taken our loved ones
It leaves our home so lonely and drear
And then do we wonder why others prosper
Living so wicked year after year

Repeat Chorus

When we see Jesus coming in glory
When he comes down from his home in the sky
Then we shall meet him in that bright mansion
We'll understand it all by and by

Repeat Chorus
Yeah we'll understand it all by and by