The first week we moved into the neighborhood, she came over with some roses she and her husband had grown in their backyard. She was a beautiful person and I enjoyed getting to know over the years we lived across the street from each other.

I watched her (and her husband) suffer this last year as they treated her lung cancer, an aggressive disease. She lost her hair and often her breath, but not her faith or her hope in the Lord’s kindness. She and her husband grieved the loss of the future they had imagined together. She grieved not getting to watch her grandchildren grow up. She grieved for the pain she knew her husband would feel when he lost her.

Her beautiful black hair peppered with white began to grow back in the last few months. She started to try to walk the neighborhood that she had walked nearly every morning for years.

And then she was gone so quickly this week.

Here in the house of mourning, we, the living, should take heart.

Do you know how very precious your life is as a creature of God’s imagining, made in His image? Do you know that you were made for eternity? That you are not a passing jumble of dust, that your soul is eternal, made of the stuff of His?

Do you know that your worth is based on His design, not any standard pressed in on you by your culture? Do you know you can build a whole life around the worship of Him?

Do you know that you are beautiful and dear to Him and that He prepares a place for you for all eternity, the way opened to you freely in the Son, Jesus? That He delights to be with you?

Lila, my friend, what glory fills your eyes and heart now that you behold Him fully?

What work will He put in your hands to do that will fill you with joy and creativity?

Are you singing now with lungs full and expanding, a voice at times trapped in your soul as your body faded, but now free? The harmonies there must be beautiful.

Friend, I hope we can be neighbors again in the new heaven and new earth. The crazy pack of deer that roams our neighborhood won’t eat your roses anymore.

Maybe you’ll knock on my door again and bring me another vase of flowers from your glorious garden. I’ll marvel at how beautiful God made you and at how much you reflect Him. And we’ll talk for hours about how good He is and how good He was.

For now, I’ll miss you.