The Gift of Compassion: A Guide to Helping Those Who Grieve

Perfect and punctual!

I have read all of Becca Stevens' books. I bought five to give as gifts at Christmas. I was going on faith because I still grieve my father who died in 2010. When I had told Becca back then she had said she had never heard of anyone dying from greif because I felt I would. I had remembered her speaking of her mother's death, the dogwood in her front yard as memory, and an eight hour bath. I read the book and found it comforting. What I did not know is how it would impact the lives of those I gave it to. The first was an English friend I adore. At the time I wrapped it, I had no idea, she would lose her last sibling in England, a brother, Christmas Eve. She ended up in the hospital unable to attend his funeral due to the necessity of oxygen. The second was a author that lives a few streets over I met by chance in a antique store. She had written a powerful book about losing her father and she was still greiving. I wanted to comfort her though she was a stranger so I left the package on her doorstep. The third was another freind I cherish who recently shared she was going to have her fourth child. She has been extremely sick. The beginning of the book speaks from the Bible, where God blesses Jacob and says I have called you by name. Her first born is named Jacob. He is six. She lost her grandmother this past Monday whom she was close to. The fourth I gave to a senior couple who mourn that their grandchildren being so far away and their inability to be closer. I think it is amazing God works with such precise synchronicity. Becca has a powerful ministry, but the fact that God works through her art and words gives faith a new dimension of power personally. I then learned a close childhood mentor died in 2010. I mourned him, but having read the book and seen its ministry at work in other's lives I could greive with a new understanding. That being that we all must greive, even Jesus and God greived and it is our responsibility to use this common factor to form community and faith. Not only that, it is our job to stand with the greiving and walk through the valley knowing it is only the shadow, for there will be life and renewal through God's promises. Thanks, Becca, for another touchstone for those in need of comfort. I was one of them.(E)