In Grandma's Honor

Thank you all for your kind and encouraging words concerning my Grandma's passing. Josh and I are taking off for her funeral in Cincinnati tomorrow. Please pray that God will be our portion, and Christ will continue to be more sweet and precious than ever. I am looking forward to seeing an assembly of the large Benzing family -- please pray that we will be a great source of encouragement. It is amazing how much more dear Christ has been to me this week. Any thought of Him -- His incarnation, atonement, resurrection, etc. -- has nearly brought me to tears. In a way, as sad as I have been, it has been a sort of holy week for me, meditating on the goodness of God.

Here are a few links and words in honor of my grandma:

• Her Obituary

• Josh's post

• My Cousin Rebecca's post

• My Cousin Elizabeth's post

• My Cousin Elise's fine words: "I am always in awe to be part of this family. God is so merciful, so gracious, and has blessed so abundantly. ... it thrills me to sit and think of my Grandmother in Heaven, even as I cry and recognize how time has passed and everyone - my own parents, myself - has gotten older. But to think! Heaven!"

• The incredible words of C.S. Lewis at the conclusion of The Last Battle:

"Have you not guessed?" said Aslan.

Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.

"There was a real railway accident," said Aslan softly. "Your father and mother and all of you are -- as you used to call it in the Shadowlands -- dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning."

And as he spoke, He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. Al their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before."