the Threshold

Good morning! I can’t believe it is July 1st. This is Martha Dorr. Philip and I came down to Texas a week ago today to help take part in Dad’s care and I am so thankful. We came prepared to stay awhile, but I don’t think Dad has much time left. We are in his last hours or days. He was still mobile and conscious on Thursday, but has been bed bound since Friday and non verbal since Monday. I am so thankful we were able to come. I am treasuring these last days with Dad and to be able to use the background I have with end of life care to just pour out love on Dad and help him be as comfortable as possible. Some days he seems very at peace, others like there is something he is still fighting to hold onto. Please pray for the Lord’s extraordinary peace over Dad, for no pain, for his faith to become sight and to gently sleep in this world to awaken with the Lord. 

He has fought the very good fight, he has loved generously, he has given freely, he has sacrificed courageously. I am so honored and thankful to call him father and we are trusting our Heavenly Father that he knows all the days ordained for Dad before they were written. Dad has been long suffering and so ready to be with his Lord. We are honored to be witness to so faithful a father, a brother in Christ, a loyal companion, a caring friend. 

As Hannah has included bits of “Every Moment Holy”, I’ll share one here that we have read multiple times over the past few days and has given us lots of comfort. 

A Liturgy to Begin a Bedside Vigil 

Watch with us now through this night,

O Christ our King, sympathetic as

You are to those who love and grieve, 

And to those who are weak and suffering. 

I’ve ever there were a holy vigil, O God, 

It is this - to watch beside the bed of one so 

Near the end of their pilgrim days, here to watch

And wait, to tend, to pray, to barely sleep that

I might sooner wake to tend again when this, 

Your child, knows need of comfort, need 

Of service, need of a friend to aid them

Through a troubled night. 

Good father, let me find in these sometimes

Fretful hours a rhythm of prayer, of care, 

And of rest. Let me love by watching and by

Serving well, despite the sorrows of my soul;

Despite the protests of my weary flesh.

O Holy Spirit, inhabit now this room, these

Hours. Breathe upon my hands, my heart. 

Quicken my compassion. Increase my empathy. 

Make me mercifully attentive that I might sense

Any need or discomfort before they are named, 

Moving at once to meet them, even as you in your

Mercy move to meet your children when we are

Yet too broken to know what mercies we require.

Let my nearness through this hard watch be 

A comfort to this dear one, as a candle flame

Might prove in darkness, or a warm haven in a 

Winter’s chill, or as a good companion hailed 

Unexpectedly on a perilous and lonely road. 

O Lord, let my small offerings of 

Lovingkindess rise like the pleasing prelude

Of a lone instrument voicing fragments of 

The grander melodies soon to be joined. 

So multiply your mercies through me that

My devoted service in these coming hours

Might bear the strains of that better song, 

Anticipating and flowing forward toward

An eternal symphony of relentless, divine love

Which will soon embrace and surround your 

Child, raising and drawing them up from their 

Present distress, and into a place of eternal 

Flourishing and delight.

So let the small acts of embodied worship

I offer this night, echo the emerging theme of 

those glories to come, bearing bright witness 

To your dying child that this threshold

Of their death has already been claimed by

The compassions of their Christ, and forever

Broken, reversed, transformed, rebuilt,

And remade into a threshold of life.

Amen.