Life & Death

This past Sunday my family and I go to visit my grandmother’s grave. We have lunch together first, and for the first time, my sister brings her three-year-old on this occasion.

“If she’s coming with us,” I say to my sister, “doesn’t that mean you have to explain to her what the gravestones are?”

My sister answers, “Yes, and she might cry after I tell her what they are, but she knows about heaven, and she’s a Christian.”

At the cemetery, the weather is beautiful, the warm breeze making it feel more like spring than fall. My husband and I arrive first, search for the gravestone, and set down our flowers. We look around—there had been many visitors that day, with so many colourful flowers lying atop gravestones.

The others arrive and set their flowers down. My dad brings up the lyrics to Charles Wesley’s hymn And Can It Be on his PDA and we sing five of the verses together (our family normally sings Amazing Grace). The first verse goes like this:

And can it be that I should gain
An interest in the Savior’s blood?
Died He for me, who caused His pain—
For me, who Him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be,
That Thou, my God, shouldst die for me?
Amazing love! How can it be,
That Thou, my God, shouldst die for me?

Then my dad says a few words to commemorate the godly life that my grandmother had led while on earth. My mom asks me to pray, then my dad closes with a prayer.

As we leave the cemetery, my three-year-old niece stares at all the gravestones on the ground. She is holding onto her grandfather’s hand. She points to one of the gravestones and says, “One day, mommy is going to be in there, right?” My dad replies, “Yes, we all come from dust, and we will return to dust.” My mom tells him his words are too deep for the child.

Then my niece starts pointing at all the other gravestones: “Who’s in there?” I read the name aloud to her. “Who’s in there?” She repeats, pointing at another one. I read the name aloud to her. This continues until we reach the cars. I can’t help but kiss her before we leave.