Daniel Sostaita
Senior Pastor, Iglesia Cristiana sin Fronteras (ICSF), Winston-Salem, N.C.
“Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give, but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”
—Jamie Anderson
On February 23, 2024, my mom (born July 31, 1932) departed this life to be with the Lord. No one likes goodbyes and that painful agony, especially when it is a loved one. My mom lived the last 22 years in my home, along with Irene, my wife of 33 years and my three beautiful daughters Barbara (Barby 31), Daniela (K 29), and Victoria (Vicky 24).
Caring for my mom was not easy. Becoming a primary caregiver, without resources or legal status, automatically makes you the only source responsible for sustaining the life of the person who is in your charge (my mother). Within this context, a unique bond is also generated, being a provider child, a caregiver child and a child who gives love and receives love.
Understanding how the Lord took care of us all these years and understanding that suffering can be a sweet experience in Christ, leads me to another reflection: Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional. The love of my wife and my daughters are the elements that are saving me during this time of mourning.
Pray, Practice, Ponder
My prayer today is this: Thank you, Lord Jesus, for my beloved congregation of Sin Fronteras, friends, colleagues, neighbors, partners in our activism, community leaders; in short, all those who day-by-day commit themselves to be wipers of tears and washers of feet for our community. They also save me every day.
Pain aligns us with God’s perspective; everything is stored in the memory that often eventually saves or rescues us.
Pray. . .Give. . .Go.