She stood in worship, clapping her hands in joy as the lyrics of the song pierced her very soul.  If you asked her what she felt most in that moment, she would have been hard pressed to give an answer.

 How about everything?

How about all the emotions:  happy, grateful, contemplative, reverent, hopeful, fearful, overwhelmed, determined and mostly weepy. 

The tears streamed down her face as she contemplated how good God had been; hard to believe it had been a lifetime already, how could that be?  She stood next to her grown daughter, oh, how she loved this girl.  She prayed constantly for her growth, her safety, her future and her happiness; what a privilege to stand next to her in worship.  A cold chill ran down her arms, goose bumps, God was near, she could feel Him all around her. 

How do you say thanks for all the things he’d done? 

How do you adequately express the overflowing joy that threatened to send her into the ugly cry right there in the middle of the auditorium?  

Life had been a kaleidoscope of joy and sorrow, hard and easy, good and bad, truly the best.  Never did she think, when she was a very young woman, that she would thank God for the tough times, but looking back she realized that’s where she grew most. 

Now she wouldn’t trade them for anything, and she would tell that to every person willing to listen. 

Why was it that some Sunday mornings sent her into an emotional wreck, honestly, it seemed like it happened more often these days.   Perhaps it’s true, she thought, with age comes a deeper reflective kind of gratitude; life is so precious.  So, as she’d done so many times lately, she bowed her head and thanked the Lord from the very bottom of her heart for his relentless goodness.  

It had chased her all her life.

“All my life you have been faithful, all my life you have been so, so good, with every breath I am able, I will sing of the goodness of God.”  Cece Winans

What a privilege to be her mom.