I was talking to my brother the other today. It was the first time in a long time we had talked without grandkids running around and usual twenty people that always seem to be coming and going in and out of their house. We were talking about the state of things today; the economy, the national debt, the presidential election, all of this discussion was in the context of the end times coming soon. I have always believed and still do that as the Bible has predicted the end times will be beyond our comprehension of pain and terror. The Bible doesn't say anything specific about America as a country during this time, but I believe we will go through great distress just as the rest of the world will. At one point in the conversation I said, "I can't wait to get to Heaven, I want to see Granny and talk to her again I have so many questions to ask her." But almost before I finished my sentence my brother came back with a quick retort, "Well how do you know she is there?" I think I almost stepped back a little as I stared at him in complete disbelief. It had never occurred to me that she wouldn't be there and it had never had occurred to me that my Brother thought this way. I almost didn't know what to say, I felt like he had just stabbed me in the heart. "Well, as far as I know Granny was a Christian." I replied with an edge in my voice. "Mom and Dad always said she was a believer in Christ and I believe she is in Heaven, waiting for the rest of us!" My brother looked at me with a blank expression, shrugged his shoulders and said, "Well, I guess we will have to go with that." Off he walked, end of conversation; which means in my brother's language, I don't agree and I am always right. As we left my brother's house driving back home I began to talk, to unload on my poor husband about what my brother had said, "Why on earth would my brother say such a thing?" I kept repeating. Our family had lived with Granny for almost ten years. As a child until I was about 6 years old I enjoyed complete access to her since she lived down stairs. I could never describe in words how wonderful Granny was, the kind of person who made so many things special. In fact it was Granny that took us to Church. She was part of our every day lives, not living in a rest home somewhere far away where we only saw her on holidays. And even though Granny died when we were very young; I was six and my brother was nine years old the imprint of her beliefs, and the way she lived her life made a major impression on me. I have always known she was in Heaven. Just like air. I breath it in, I don't see it, but I know it's there. I have always had so many things I wanted to ask her. Especially how she and my Grandpa eloped one night and then went back to their separate homes and kept it a secret for a whole month before telling their families they were married. I believe God has placed that longing in my soul to be with her, to see her again when we all go Home. For some reason I have lived long enough or I am now finally aware of how much God and Forever mean to me verses what this earth has to offer. I am ready to go Home. Maybe I have a few more incentives than some people. I have lost loved ones so dear to me that it has shaken my very way of life and I have had to much illness in my 50 years on this earth that I want to leave it behind. But one of the most difficult parts of my life is feeling like this is not really my home, I some how don't belong, or fit in, and finding other people who understand that feeling isn't easy. It seems like a wall when I talk to someone about the love of God. It's as if their ears have been closed and their decision has been made. No matter how I approach them, they just don't want to listen, with all their knowledge and self-awareness everyone already knows everything and God is a meaningless old idea not for these times. But since God has not taken me yet, I realize I have to keep trying to convince people that Jesus is the Only way to Heaven and none other. I admit I identify with Jonah, sometimes I want God to judge us and get it over with so we can go Home. But thankfully God has the mercy I lack. And as I get older the less tolerable I seem to be of the way people disrespect God and the way many people who call themselves Christians wipe their feet on God's Grace, outwardly sinning without a conscience. But it makes me all the more determined to stand up and say what I believe even when the ones closest to me try over and over to get me to lay down my convictions and "go with the flow" of the way things are now done. I know I don't have all the answers, but God does, and that gives me the hope I need to continue on with this life; knowing that soon Jesus will call us Home and I will be sitting by a beautiful river talking to my Granny and we will be laughing and holding hands and I can look into her eyes and see all that love she has for me, the love she showed me as a child, living together again in our True Home and then I can find out all about that night she eloped with Grandpa.

I have been writing all my life, I just didn't realize it until I was my late 40's.  I hope my experiences can help others who have gone through similar trials.