Diana Kennedy | | I wanted to pass this on to all of you, it is
A Season of Hope from Bev Swanson
During the advent season she sends out a
brief weekly letter that coincides with
the lighting of the advent candles each week.
I know this is a difficult time for so many who are grieving and thought some extra support would be helpful. In some spiritual traditions, advent is divided into four sacred pieces.
Each week a new candle is lit and each candle represents a unique part of this season of waiting for Christmas. In such a season of waiting...we wait...we wait for hope, for peace both within and without, for love that runs deeper than all our pain and for that elusive joy.
And so I welcome you this advent season; this time of waiting for healing during a season where your feelings can be so incongruent with the events and lights and goings on. I welcome you to stop and take a moment or two to reflect on these symbolic candle lightings in hope that they bring new life into your grieving space and a little bit of peace and love and joy into your heart.
The four Advent Candles are: Hope, Peace, Love and Joy. Then, the fifth candle which is lit on Christmas is the Christ Candle.
The first candle was lit on Sunday Nov.30.
This candle we call Hope
Hope...
When folks are grieving, hope is something that can almost seem pretty unreal and far away. After all...what is there to hope for?
Your loved one is not returning. Death feels so very final and indeed for our duration on this earth, it is so.
You may feel desolate and often depressed. Your world and hope has been dashed. The candle of the life of your loved on has gone out and now it threatens to extinguish our emotional candle of light and life as well. Perhaps you just feel so lost. So...where is the Hope? Is there hope?
Good question, one I most certainly asked the day our little
daughter left this earth. But over time hope came into the
blackness.
Hope comes in the strangest of places. The first being the hope of seeing our loved one again perhaps after our time of this earth is over. But this tends to feel so very far away. But a comfort and hope just the same.
For us there was the hope of healing. Did I dare to believe that healing would come? Was it even possible? Will we even get through this?
And yet in the unfolding and embracing of the grieving process and in the slow and painful process of letting go, life seems to return and with it comes this hope. The hope that even in death, all is well. Such a dichotomy. How could this be?
And the greatest hope is the presence that is felt in God, family, friends....the hope that love still reigns in this dark world.
This presence, this love brings hope that all is indeed not lost. The hope that one day there will be reasons to get up in the morning.
A day when life will once again seem to be worth living and hope that breathing will come easier and days will not be interrupted with tears. Hope that healing will come; and indeed is already a holy happening this moment.
This is Hope...
* Hope that one day the sun in your heart will shine again
* Hope that you will see your loved one on the other side
* Hope that you will find the song in your heart and soul once again
* Hope that those that are still with you will bring you the love you need
* Hope that you will heal and that all your tears will be worth the shedding
* Hope that the healer of your heart and soul will be close at hand
* Hope and a knowing that you are held by something and someone so much larger than any of us.
I give thanks for this loving message by Bev Swanson...
Diana Kennedy, Divine Life Coach
http://www.dianakennedy.com
P.S. Check out my site where you can receive my Ezine and get the call info for my free Divine Intentions Teleclass, Mondays, Jan 5 and 19th at 9pm EST.Private Reply to Diana Kennedy |
