“Your Mercy”
Acrylic, 2013

One of the unique things about being a caregiver is that you continually bump into your sin. I wish I could report that the years caring for my Mom with Alzheimer's were all characterized with gentleness and peace but sin abounds in this fallen world.

Continually answering your loved ones questions over & over every hour is exhausting. Impatience, anger and frustration with their new in-abilities wells up. ....

"Secure."
Acrylic, 2013.


"Then the trees of the field shall yield their fruit, and the earth shall yield her increase.  They shall be safe in their land; and they shall know that I am the Lord, when I have broken the bands of their yoke and delivered them from the hand of those who enslaved them. Ezekiel 34:27

"You are secure not because you are in control or have understanding. You are secure even though you are weak, imperfect and shortsighted. You are secure for one reason and one reason alone: God exists and He is your Father." 
~ Paul Tripp in "A Shelter in the Time of the Storm."

Oil Painting, 2006
Psalm 71:14  
"As for me, I will hope continually for your help and will praise you yet more and more."

Something that really helped me in times of suffering was reading the psalms and praying them back to God.  In the book of Psalms, we have shocking honesty and glorious hope coming together. The Psalms encourage us to come to God we are, honestly, to a Loving Father who is near. The words of the psalmist gave words to my inexpressible feelings in such a lonely place as caregiving.