Thank you, Hedy

I found out this morning that a friend of mine passed away. Hedy was a grandma or friend or mama or sister to everyone. You pick. She’d be what you needed. I don’t know that Hedy would have been comfortable being called a Prayer Warrior. Prayer, in her life, was just something she did. Every day. Early. Very, very early.

It seems fitting that she passed away early this morning. 

Here’s my feeble attempt to share her with you. You would have loved her just as much as I still do.

My heart is heavy and light. Both at the same time. Grieving and joy-filled.

I’m so happy for Hedy. She’s been looking forward to this day for a good long time. I know. She told me. She told everybody. For all the time she spent with Jesus in her prayers and in her reading the Scriptures, now is different, I’m sure. It’s more other-side-of-the-world different.

It’s complete.

You know how it feels when you watch a mother-of-the-bride? She’s so excited to see her daughter unite with her new husband. At the same time, there’s a longing, a knowing that she’s going to miss her girl. There’s a big change. New name, new home, new…everything. But the joy of the day wins. The mother, because she loves her daughter so much, lets the sweet overwhelm the bitter.

That’s how I’m feeling right now.

Hedy would have giggled at that analogy. Then she would have said some kind of down-to-earth and beautiful truth about her love for Jesus. She would have called Him her groom. I’m sure tears would have filled her eyes.

She loved Jesus.

And Hedy loved people.

When someone she loved walked in the room, her big brown eyes would crinkle up in the corners and her smile would spread all the way across her face. She’s reach for them. Hug them. Ask about specific things in their lives that she’d been praying for.

Hedy never forgot a prayer request. Never did a prayer-promise go unfulfilled.

The last time I saw her she asked about my writing. When I told her that my books were published, she wasn’t surprised.

“I knew they would be. I prayed for them,” she said.

That wasn’t out of ego or thinking she had an exclusive hold on God’s ear. It was out of her unwavering faith in the effectiveness of prayer.

In prayer and supplication, she made the requests of hundreds known to God. And, in doing so, held up a whole lot of people in troubling times and rejoiced with them in good times.

Hedy was small, but she was big with love.

I have faith that she’s hearing, “Well done, good and faithful servant”.

And I imagine she’s blushing with true humility and putting the glory right back onto Jesus.

Because that’s what she always did.

Thank you, Hedy.

And, Thank You, Jesus for sharing her with us. In her way…which was trying to be like You…she changed the world.