Danny's graduation party--and the Cross in the Sky

As if we didn't have enough going on during the week and a half before our big move, we had four birthdays and an early graduation party for Danny!

 

We wanted to celebrate with the home school family friends we've had in his life the last several years before moving. Several families and friends joined us up at the park.

We didn't have any formalities except to ask Craig and Joella's family (who stayed that weekend on their music tour) to sing a couple songs. And Craig shared an impromptu word of encouragement and exhortation to the graduate and all of us.

Our dear friend Gordon, the best bass in the church choir and also a fellow Stage 4 cancer fighter (he's beaten it now for about 7 years) came. We got a picture of him and Danny together. 

And suddenly I noticed what was behind them. 

Up in the sky.  

Plain as day in the middle of the evening.

Others might have just seen chemical trails behind airplanes. 

I saw a cross. 

 Was it significant? Perhaps so, perhaps not. 

But the next morning in church, our last Sunday to attend before moving, one of the songs was "Lead On, O King Eternal." 

And this is what stood out to me . 

"Thy cross is lifted o'er us.

We journey in its light.

The crown awaits the conquest, 

Lead on O God of might."

 And while the young folks gathered to play games in the ball field that Saturday evening after the graduation party, this mom stood there, wondering and contemplating, and knowing that once again she must trust the life of her graduating son

and his future, and her own,

into the loving hands of a God Who knows all things,

and Who doeth all things well. 

"His cross," not a thing of beauty or comfort, but a thing of challenge and self-denial,

"is lifted o'er us," 

But while the cross may create a shadow in our lives, 

it sheds a glorious light to journey in.

A light to guide us exactly where God wants us to go. 

His crown awaits the conquest--and that means war.

Spiritual warfare--against the powers of darkness.

Jesus, we aren't strong enough for the warfare ahead of us; be our shield, our sword, and our great reward. Keep us, O Lord, and our sons and daughters, in Your holy care. 

So prays the mother standing under the fading chemical trails

crossing the sky above the ball field

while the dusk falls in the bluffs of the prairies of Colorado.