choice

So New Comunity last night...amazing...Trace did an awesome job with worship, just amazing, and then Dr. Bob spoke, and the whole time he was speaking I felt as if it was just me and him in the room and God was catching our tears. Dr Bob spoke about his father, his fathers choice he made. This brought up memories of my grandfather. The parallels in Dr Bobs father and my grandfather are kind of scary to me...I forgot at moments the Dr Bob was talking about his dad not my grandfather. My grandfather too had a choice to make, and he made the same choice as Dr Bob's father made..however it was different in the sense that he was too sheepish to completely shut us out of his life, he faked it, for 20 years the man i thought was my grandfather, really wasnt. I didnt learn of his choice he had made until i was 16 or so, but once i learned this everything became crystal clear to me, actions that he had made started to make sense and the pieces fall into place. See my grandfather was a deacon at a local catholic church, he chose to put church 1st, and he chose to hide behind the church. he chose to abuse his family and when confronted he chose to keep running. i will never know whether or not my grandfather loved me. he told my mother on one occassion to her face that "i just cant love you" i cant imagine what my mother felt. One difference between my grandfather and Dr Bob's dad was my grandfather never said sorry, he never regretted his decisions, i remember sitting at the funeral home when you get to spend that hour or so before people start to come and see and i remember feeling my heart break into a million pieces. I remember feeling awful for not seeing him much, i remember the last time i had seen him he was in the hospital about a year earlier and i remember kissing him on the cheek and telling him i love you, (this after he had spent a week there, i had literally dropped everything in illinois and flown home to be here) i remember his last words to me, may God bless you.

Last night was good. Dr Bob has a world of strength and courage to be able to get up there and say what he said, but it was an important message. It was a message to anyone out there who is struggling with this choice...