My friend left her daughter at college today, and my heart ached for the goodbye I knew would be so hard for her to say.
My oldest daughter is a wonderful wife and the busy mom of teenagers, yet all these years later, my heart still feels tender when I recall her first college goodbye.
During our six-hour drive back home from her college dorm, my other two daughters and I were inconsolable. My husband was mostly quiet, unsure whether to talk, crack a joke, or let his own tears flow.
I dreaded getting home, where I instinctively knew our heartache would rise to a new level. There’d be an empty spot outside the garage where she parked her car. Her room would no longer blare her favorite music. The squares on the kitchen calendar would be void of reminders of her endless string of activities.
The heartache was real. I even remember thinking, ”So, that’s why it’s called a heartache.” My chest literally felt sore from the stabs of pain inflicted by each reminder of a house my oldest child would never again claim as her permanent home.
Goodbyes are hard.
Yet, as moms we’re called to say them over and over again.
When my youngest granddaughter started preschool, I pretended not to notice the quiver in her mom’s voice when she called me on Meet-the-Teacher Day and described my granddaughter’s new teacher in detail. I knew exactly how my daughter was feeling. She was giddy with excitement about her daughter’s new adventures in kindergarten, but fearful about letting go.
When my middle daughter sent her little girl off to her first day of kindergarten, her sisters and I shed tears with her over FaceTime as she mourned the end of a delightful season of Chick-Fil-A lunches, grocery shopping, and playdates with her little girl.
Goodbyes are hard.
Nobody senses the fleeting of time quite like a mom. Infancy, toddlerhood, elementary, high school, college, and young adulthood are all seasons that come and go so quickly they leave us breathless. That’s why there’s a constant struggle to hold on when you know you were meant to say goodbye.
We hold on tight because we love our people. Yet, deep in our hearts, we know they’re only ours for a while.
So, we put on our big girl panties, choke back tears, and brave a big smile as we say goodbye to the life we’ve loved in anticipation for what we sense we’ll love even more.
It’s no different with God. As much as we love the life He’s given us here, the time will come when He’ll have us say goodbye for something even better—a place more glorious, exciting, and satisfying than this world could ever hope to be.
One day we’ll say a final goodbye. We’ll bid farewell to this world and the people on this earth we love and who have loved us. And, in Christ, the closing of that final door will mark the glorious entry into a life more meaningful and joyful than anything we’ve ever known before.
As moms, we can take heart, because our goodbyes are only on this side of heaven.
in Christ, there will never be another goodbye.
“And God has reserved for his children the priceless gift of eternal life; it is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay.”
“For this world is not our home; we are looking forward to our everlasting home in heaven.”
Hebrews 13:14, TLB
