Printable PDF of Today’s Reflection  

Recently I found myself experiencing the loss of another friend who passed away. In reading the reflection on HopeForNiagara.org, I found great comfort in these words from Rev. Kathleen Ordiway, in her reflection titled Reconciled. Rev. Ordiway wrote:

So, we raise our hands and accept God’s love and forgiveness.  We raise our hands in praise of Him that knew no sin but died for us.  We raise our hands in celebration and joy when we hear that our friends and family have come to know and be in Christ, too!  We sing Alleluia because Christ has died for us and He is risen so that we know that we, too, are born into this newness and our promised home.  Though I might know sorrow, and trials, and fear, it is well with my soul because I know that Jesus died for me and I am reconciled to the Father for eternity.

This reminded me of the many blessings God has given, especially that, because Christ has risen, we too shall raise!

Although the pain and grief sometimes seem too much to bear, the gift of God wipes away all our fears. In Christ, God has destroyed the very sting of death. I can lift my hands and my heart and sing “it is well, it is well with my soul.”

In being given this reminder, it brought to mind a poem I wrote about the experience my mother (Effie Sconiers, or Miss E. as she was known) and I had at the death of my brother, Louis Sconiers. Rev. Ordiway’s words helped me remember how the grace of God helped me work through some of that grief through writing the poem Am I My Sister’s Keeper?. I hope that, perhaps, it may help see God’s grace if they are experiencing loss.

Am I MY Sister’s Keeper?
By Joyce Sconiers

Am I my sister’s keeper, watching over her, seeing to her needs, bound by a sisterhood hard to understand, the beauty and joy of being born a woman?

Her faint cries sometimes barely heard in the natural, sound alarms in my spirit, setting the warrior on a flight, she has entered into her dark night.

Her face now entranced, engrossed, and bewildered, cannot hide the pain, the emptiness inside

Behind her eyes lies sadness, grief, and gloom, what to say, what to do, this has happened way too soon…

Something was stolen; something rips from her heart, now she is broken torn apart

Reach high my sister and grab hold of His hand, look up, see His face, the awesomeness of His grace.

Your steps have been ordered; the path is set, come out of that dark place, don’t die yet.

Pain is part of the game but so is the abundant grace, given us to run this race.

While I wait with you, we sit, we listen and hold hands, I am my sister’s keeper and her number one fan . . . love you Miss E.

Am I My Sister’s Keeper, © Joyce Scoiners. All rights reserved. Used by permission. Joyce may be contacted through Community Missions.Reconciled, by Rev. Kathleen Ordiway, can be found here: https://www.hopeforniagara.org/reconciled/

Joyce Sconiers is the Assistant Pastor at Chosen Fellowship Church in Niagara Falls & the Recruitment Specialist at Community Missions.

Image: Swanson, John August. Story of Ruth, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=56561