As my mother’s health continues to decline and my years relentlessly advance upward, I’m reminded of the shortness of life…even as a vapor. On the other hand, I am reminded of the unending eternity that stretches out before us.
The Quilt’s Story
I sort photos and mementos of ancestors that have passed from this earthly scene. Yet the fragrance of their lives linger in these aged antiquities that I handle.
I wonder about the emotions they faced, the hardships they endured and the battles they won. What was the story of their life? What forged them in to the men and women that they became? How did the decisions they made have an affect down through the generations?
I trace the time-woven threads, almost a century old now. The forgotten quilt tells a story of a Grandmother’s love for her 4 year old granddaughter. Hours of hand-quilted labor and an embroidered stitching with name and age. Frances, my grandmother, was born in 1918. Consequently, from the the threads that form the number 77 under Grandma Bortzer’s name we know that her life spans back to 1845. These my ancestors, touch my life from back through the annals of time. The threads form a tenacious connection to lives lived in another century.
Forging Life in Hardship
Numerous grandparents, parents and children lived through the Civil War and the reconstruction of America. They faced World War I, the Spanish flu, as well as the Great Depression. Time marched on and parents were buried, couples were married, and new branches of the family started.
They faced poverty and war. Sickness and death were a part of their lives and yet throughout the hardships there shines forth the faithfulness of God. A God who was personally interested in each story that has since been forgotten by us here on earth. Certainly, this God is still the same today. The story of our lives is of great import to our Heavenly Father. He wants to embroider the story of our lives with His hope, love and forgiveness.
As we face our own hardships and battles in this century, our Heavenly Father continues to be faithful. Life will always hold its difficulties. Jesus, Himself, said,
“These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
John 16:33
The game changer is that in the midst of our adversities and calamities we have Jesus. We know what happens in the end. Moreover, Jesus has conquered sin, death and the grave. He has overcome it all. While here on this earthly sod, Jesus promises to impart to us the strength to be an overcomer.
Our Heavenly Father wants to be an intricate part of the story of our lives. Jesus can take the broken and bitter circumstances and work them for good in our soul. Furthermore, the desperate moments and situations we face can bring us nearer to the Father’s heart.
Life and Eternity
The forging of God’s man or woman may take one through the furnace of affliction or even the isolation of a pandemic. Whatever the case may be, a decision for God in spite of difficulties is most important. Those choices that are made in the midst, have an influence that will be heard echoing down through the hallways of eternity. Moreover, it’s in the hard times and in the lonely times that our mettle is defined. To clarify, life and the choices we make affect eternity.
As I search for missing pieces to the story of the quilts I unearthed, I continue to muse over the brevity of life versus the continuance of eternity. Names I have not known and years I have not lived are on the embroidered quilt. Ones that have lived and died. Their stories have already been told. Furthermore, the decisions that impacted eternity for them are finished. The transience of life is highlighted in the names I trace. Certainly, life here is but for a moment in the light of eternity. It is this short moment of life that determines our eternal destiny.
When you leave this world of time, will you have left a legacy behind? It may not be a time worn quilt like the one made by my great great grandma. On the other hand, a far more important legacy than that treasured quilt is a life lived for God. An indelible stamp upon the family members and friends you did life with. As the years roll by here on earth, our story may be forgotten. But if we let God be the author of our eternity bound soul, we will find that the threads of time will connect to an eternity with God which knows no end.
A Legacy for Eternity
I come across an obituary from 1818 of my great great great grandmother, Julia Ann Mealy. She left an eternal legacy that resounds down through the pages of time and reaches into the eternal.
“…She was a loving wife and a faithful and affectionate mother, and was greatly loved by all who knew her. Beyond all this was the noble christian character, when but eighteen years of age, she became converted and openly espoused the religion of the Lord Jesus Christ. From that time until the Lord called her from earth to heaven she lived a devoted soldier of the Cross and a faithful member of the Church. She has fought a good fight; she has finished her course, and kept the faith. To her death had no terrors, but was all gain. She met death while shouting praises in the love of her Savior.”
obituary of Julia Ann Mealy
It was Julia Ann’s daughter, Frances who made the quilt I found. The year 1922 finds Frances, now a grandmother, making a quilt for her namesake, 4 year old granddaughter, Frances Bortzer, my Grandma.
Though the quilt will become a treasured memento from generations past, Julia Ann passed on a far greater legacy to her daughter Frances Mealy Bortzer than the quilt I have acquired. The decision she made for Jesus impacted generations. To sum it up, her spiritual legacy continues to link time with eternity down throughout the generations of my lineage.
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