What becomes of all of this? What becomes of the passions we could not explore, the dreams we could not realize, the gifts we could not deploy for the good of others and the glory of God? Why would God give it only to take it away, bestow it only to have it go unused?

My dad loved to cook. This was a passion that began relatively late in his life after the kids had moved out. With an empty nest, my parents were able to live a slower-paced life and my dad began to dabble in cooking. He soon found that he loved it and that my mother was only too happy to pass the torch. He loved to freestyle and experiment, to forsake recipes to just see where his taste buds would lead him. It is one of the tragedies of his sudden and unexpected death that he had just treated himself to a new high-end range when he died. Never once did he get to cook upon it. Never once did he get to enjoy it. When I visited my parents’ home after he died, the range was resting in its place in the kitchen, but with the packaging still around it. He had never even opened it.

My son was in love. He had gotten engaged to a lovely young lady and together they had begun to plan their wedding. They had settled on a date and a guest list and begun to plan their ceremony and order their invitations. And then he, too, was taken every bit as suddenly and unexpectedly as my father. When I arrived at his college dorm room and opened his computer, I found his wedding planning documents open and active, the last tasks he had worked on before going to be with the Lord. He had died a fiancé but not a husband, his plans interrupted, never to be realized.

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