Longing for Heaven with Alicia Holmes

This weeks unsung story is Alicia's. Alicia has two little girls and over the last 4 years has experienced much pain and heartache as she walked through the journey of her mum being diagnosed with Parkinson's disease Disease and eventually going to be with the Lord. Alicia shares her grief and hope with much vulnerability and honesty. We hope that you may find solidarity in your own grief if you are facing a similar situation. For the rest of us, it is a helpful reminder on where our priorities lie and how we can love our grieving sisters and step into their pain.

For anyone who is experiencing grief or depression, there is always someone to help and hear you. Beyond Blue is a great resource for anyone with anxiety, depression or suicidal feelings. 1300 22 4636 or visit beyondblue.org.au



"I'm not really sure if it gets easier. And I'm okay with that because I love thinking about mum and I love talking about her."

"I felt God's presence in my life the most when I've just absolutely been like just brought to my knees."

"But our hearts are so sinful and corrupt and we're so easily distracted, when we have a beautiful life. Things are easy and we kind of just, you know, plod along. But when things are kind of pulled beneath you, it was like the first time I truly, earnestly prayed. Like, "Come Lord Jesus, come.""

"It was the first time I could so clearly see this huge fracture in the world that Jesus came to mend. And I just wanted things to be how he planned them to be, whether it is in death. And where our feet don't stumble, or our bodies don't fail us. We have a God that wants us to be gathered under him in the perfection of the new creation. And he made that possible through Jesus. You know, as Christians, we talk about longing to be in his presence. And we pray that his kingdom comes, but do we really like feel the brokenness and the sin of the world and the weight and the burden of that? And the reason that it needs restoring? "

"His plan will prevail. That he's faithful and trustworthy and good. Even though we don't always understand why."

"I have no doubt that my mum is with the Lord, that she's healed and she's whole with him. And it wasn't because she was the perfect mum, the perfect wife, and was faithful 100 percent of the time. That makes it about her. But it wasn't about her. It was about what Jesus did for her. And she knew that to just the core of her being, even in all her frailties and brokenness, he just wanted her to be in a relationship with him."

"It's not about what we do and don't do, but it's just completely what Jesus has done? I mean, reflecting on lots of the Bible, but in particular on Lazarus's death and his resurrection, the fact that even though Jesus knew he was about to raise Lazarus and he knew that one day will all be raised, he still wept for his friend."

"I lift up my eyes to the hills from where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth."

"I find it hard to reconcile longing to be in his perfect presence, but also loving good things in the world that he's given us. But I think I've just come to realise that I don't think they're mutually exclusive, like God made this world. He called it good, but it was broken by the fall.
I love that this stuff is included in the Bible. It's not omitted because it's messy and uncomfortable and hard. It's so that we can see. Believers struggling and asking God for answers, and searching, and in pain because, yeah, we're still people."


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