I’d like to piggy back on my last blog and if you haven’t read the comment from Marty on that blog, please do, its filled with passion and he shares a real life experience of loving. His comment sparked an event that took place about twelve years ago now.

It was Saturday morning and at about 7:30 a.m. the phone rang. It was from someone from the Argyle EMS crew. They told me that they had responded to a 911 call from a couple in the parish and I needed to get up to the house, the husband had died during the night.

I jumped in my car and made it to the house in short order. When I walked in, I saw this widow of less than an hour sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee. She looked terrible. When she saw me, she jumped out of her chair and shouted, “Everything is going to be alright now!”

I didn’t know what to do or what to say. I stood there panicked. What could I do or say to make “everything all right”? She rushed up to me and threw her arms around me and began crying. I held her for a good five minutes, before she let me go and we sat down.

Looking back on that day I know I didn’t say anything profound, I didn’t raise her husband from the dead with a touch. I didn’t wave my Bible like a wand causing peace to permeate the house. Yet, I know when I did leave, this widow did feel that things were going to be alright.

Was it my words or wisdom? Not at all. It was simply arriving. It was letting her know I cared for her and so did everyone at our parish. It was standing in the midst of that situation and declaring that just as I was standing there, so is Jesus and because of that it is true, “everything will be alright now.”

The power of love is gigantic! It’s greater than the power of death.

I know sometimes we think “just” loving isn’t enough. That event has forever reminded me, it is.

Go forth and love, Dan.