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Oh the goodbyes that we live through. 

 

Goodbyes that we welcome like the sunshine warming your face

on a brisk autumn day. 

 

Goodbyes that are forced upon us without our consent or warning. When we are cut off… no closure, no comfort to be found. 

 

Goodbyes that are sudden & shake our certainties

to a deconstructed bare foundation. 

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When we say goodbye fondly, gently

to something tattered, spent, and worn —

made real because of Love.

 

Now laid down to rest with gratitude & tenderness —

to make space in our hands & our hearts

for something new.

 

Oh may we have the courage to say goodbye

to what longer serves us…

and to what we are no longer called to serve. 

 

May we be brave enough to look boldly

at our ideology, theology & orthodoxy

to say goodbye to that which binds us & keeps us captive —

to say hello to the freedom of authentic story & Love

that breaks all barriers (including the ones that we

unknowingly that held onto so tightly).

To welcome this holy hello of belonging,

of celebrating the fullness of our being and the fullness of our gifts. 

 

May we welcome the Goodbye that looks like walking passed the chapel or sanctuary with its cold rigid pews and bleak silence…

to find sanctuary in the tears & laugh lines in the faces of another — this sacred hello, found in sharing life together &

finding God already present there…

just as bright & beautiful bright as any stained-glass window.

 

And oh the Goodbyes too that come as the calendar changes — months to years. A cycle of seasons.

Yes for the weather. And yes for our lives. 

 

We say goodbye to childhood homes, to cities that hold memories, to places we found a feeling of belonging, of community, of home.

 

We become all too familiar to the Goodbyes filled with tears of sorrow. We give silent space for the Goodbyes so deep for which there are no tears. And we give witness to the Goodbyes with joy-filled tears of promise, greeting something new.

When goodbye means hello. 

 

There are the Goodbyes that you didn’t see in the midst of getting by in the day-to-day: the last time your toddler wanted to be held, the last time they asked you to sing their favorite lullaby or read that bedtime story before they could possibly fall asleep. 

 

The Goodbyes of watching your child trade a tricycle with big wheels for a bicycle for a car — riding through the years of childhood to high school full of pride & independence.

 

Can you remember how that Goodbye felt — wearing a team jersey as an athlete on the court or field for the last time?!

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Or how bittersweet Goodbye sounded when the last notes of the last symphony were sung & played — and you carefully placed your instrument away and took a final bow of being part of something greater than yourself?!

 

And oh the goodbye & hello that happens simultaneously at graduations as one chapter ends & another begins. 

 

We must bless the Goodbyes of walking down the aisle at weddings:

walking & watching the memories in your mind

of tiny fingers & toes, of hands holding on so tightly to yours

as that child learned to walk, the falling down & rising again,

of trikes with big wheels, legos & play dough,

toddlerhood to teen years to young adult resilient triumphs

even in (especially in) failure, the falling down & rising again.

And now this Goodbye is again a Hello

as a new chapter, a new family begins. 

 

And of course there are Goodbyes that catch you off guard.

Not knowing that would be the last time your parent would remember your name & speak “I love you” before the darkness of dementia came to claim & bind voice & speech.

 

The goodbye of life as you hoped it would be,

dreams you once had of life yet to be lived… gone…

walking out of an exam room with a terminal diagnosis. 

 

And the last earthly Goodbye — of standing in solidarity at the graveside. With resurrection hope in something beyond what we now see — when we say goodbye here even as shadows creep in & tears fall. And yet — we are not saying goodbye here.

But as a people of promise believing in Light that shines in the darkness — even the darkness of death & the grave we say “God be with you until we meet again.”

 

May God hold you, keep you & carry you until we meet again.”

 

So blessed are you as you live out these goodbyes.

With courage & compassion. For yourself. For others.

For it is indeed all these goodbyes (so many more) that are the way through to hellos and new beginnings.

The only way forward… is through.