Precious Memories, how they linger

The centre left photo (below) is how I remember my brother. This was about 1986, long before he ever got sick, his children around him like young olive trees, tender and joyous. To the right, he's surrounded by his music on the top photo, acting the fool for his kids in the centre one, (is that the flamenco he's trying to do??) and hugging his best girl below that.

A long-time friend sent me a Scripture reference by email yesterday. When I was sharing the reference (I'd not looked it up yet) with my honey this morning, he looked it up and read it to me.

"For you shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace. The mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands." (Is. 55:12)

I sobbed like a child. The memory that Scripture brought to me was as clear and fresh as if it happened yesterday. There was no warning - I was caught completely off guard.

Years ago, in the New Christian Singers when we all sang together, I used to sing an arrangement of Wonderful Peace where there was an instrumental. Skip picked the verse (didn't strum) on his acoustic guitar, and Sandy read Isaiah 55:6-13 before we all did the last chorus as a group. It's recorded ... somewhere. I should dig out that old LP and get it digitalized if it still has no scratches. The songs we sang, so simple, still so true. So many lives were touched. So many more can still be.

Jesus is so very near, as near as breath itself.
.