When it rains it pours!

That's what Jerry said, tonight, when he called me. I thought it would be something about my family again, never dreaming what he was about to tell me.
Tom and Lynn are friends of ours. Jerry and Tom ran the sound system at our church in Little Elm, together. They also work together and have the kind of friendship where you confide in one another and support one another through the various trials in your life. Lynn and I don't know each other that well. But, I consider her a friend. We all love good fried catfish and have had several couples dates.
Tom had to rush Lynn to the hospital today. After examining her, the doctors told Tom the tragic news. Lynn had severe bleeding on her brain. They can't stop the bleeding. She is not expected to live through the night. Almost all brain activity has ceased. They are just waiting for her heart to figure that out.
The last time, I saw Lynn, she was sitting across the table from me, making jokes over a plate of fried catfish. It just doesn't seem real.
My only real consolation is that I know she is a Christian and that she already has a place set aside for her in Heaven. Her crown is waiting.
My selfish side wants all this tragedy to stop. First, Tish's best friend, Sage, loses her mother to a long debilitating disease, then my brother is hospitalized with a brain tumor, I still don't know any more that that and then a good friend is taken away unexpectedly by an anurism. Add to all of that, I still haven't got to play with my grandchildren and life seems pretty miserable.
But, I don't want to be miserable. That is why I have Christ in my life. He is the one who gives me the strength to deal with all of this. He is the one who gives me peace and hope when there is no where else to turn. He is my Lord and my salvation.
The Apostle Paul wrote:
"Therefore, having been justfied by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perserverance;
And perserverance, character: and character, hope.
Now, hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us." Romans 5:1-5

I grieve for my family and my friends, but I will not despair, for my Lord and Savior is with me and I have the Holy Spirit to comfort me. There are so many words of comfort in the Bible, it would take me all night to write them down here with my typical "hunt and peck" method of typing but there is one more that I would really like to share, "Sing praise to the Lord, you saints of His, And give remembrance of His holy name. For His anger is but for a moment, His favor is for life; Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning." Psalm 30:4-5

Pray for my family and friends that God will help them through these trying times.