Where You’re Supposed to Be

I am fortunate to live nearby the ocean. I can drive from my home to the frigid New Hampshire coastline in under half an hour. Winter visits to the beach often surpass their summertime counterparts for my peace of mind.

With far fewer people on the beach, it’s easier to engage my senses. The susurration of the surf gently peels away my stress. I play games of chicken with incoming waves as I walk across the fine gray sand. I nudge tightly woven bundles of rockweed and horsetail, common to the rocky shore. I peek underneath to see if there might be any intertidal creatures seeking shelter, or maybe a gold doubloon? I pause to scoop up a small stone, a tiny cousin to the distinctly banded boulders that guard the coastline like ancient sentinels. Using the rock as a pencil, I write my sister’s name in my most elegant cursive. I then write my nephew’s name. I draw a heart above it. He’s watching over me from heaven. I whisper my love as the crisp January wind sends my hair flying in every direction.

My sister is grieving her son, and it’s easy to feel helpless in the face of such an enormous loss. There are no ‘magic words.’ So I recently offered her the one thing that I knew would bring her some happiness. The beach. Not my beach, as it’s always cold. A warmer beach, more in line with her birth month. She was born in the height of summer, and that is exactly the kind of beach experience that suits her. The kind of beach that requires waking early to watch the sunrise, putting on flip flops, sunscreen and large brimmed hats, drinking slushy drinks with tiny paper umbrellas. The kind of beach that invites you to enjoy long days with late sunsets, fireworks and fireflies, wild horses, seafood dinners followed by drippy ice cream at the local shack, ending in air conditioned dreams.

January is my birth month, so I am at peace with cold, with winter, with the idea of a hibernation time. I was not at peace with my sister feeling sad, so I lured her to enjoy my birthday at a ‘her‘ type of beach.

Plan in place, I purchased plane tickets. I had only forgotten one… little… thing. I hadn’t consulted with God.

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” James 4:13-16.

David Guzak explains, “James asked us to consider the fragility of human life, and the fact that we live and move only at the permission of God. James does not discourage us from planning and doing, only from planning and doing apart from reliance on God.”

I had not sought the Lord’s will for my sister. I had sought MY will for my sister. I’m aware that my will was good and kind, and well intentioned. Nevertheless, it was mine.

I pondered this carefully as I lay in bed last night, wracked by the pain and weakness of the flu. The thought of getting on an airplane in 48 hours was laughable. I put on a movie, as I was too weak to read. In the movie, an injured man is being cared for by a kindly Italian doctor. The injured man had lost consciousness and he wakes and asks the doctor, “Where am I?” The doctor responds, “Where you’re supposed to be.”

It was then that I realized, I am where I am supposed to be. Sick in bed. My sister is supposed to be healing at the beach. I was only meant to assist in getting her there. Thankfully, my brother and sister in law will share the week with her. I will, God willing, heal at home. For today, making breakfast was too taxing for me. The rest of my day was spent in a chair.

This week, my sister will probably write her son’s name in the warm sand with a heart next to it, she’ll whisper that she loves him, and he’ll be watching over her from heaven.

My nephew is where he is supposed to be, as hard as that is to accept. More importantly is Who my nephew chose to be with for eternity. My nephew is in the arms of Jesus, whom he loved and publicly professed as his Savior at his baptism.

“That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” Romans 10:9 -11

I believe Jesus is Lord. I am where I am supposed to be.

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