This makes me SAD...

President Faust passed away. (The title of this post is a link, if you want to read about it. Your choice.)

For you non-LDS-ers out there, President Faust isn't our prophet. That'd be President Hinckley. But he serves ... I mean served ... with President Hinckley.

Still, I kind of always expected that I'd always be hearing him at General Conference (the twice-annual broadcast that our church does. Lots of people give talks ... and although I used to think it was really kind of boring, I do enjoy it more and more now. Well, when I can actually listen, since the munchkin brigade aren't exactly the most conducive to reverence. At present, anyways). I kinda assumed that President Hinckley would pass on before any of the other apostles. (Even though we've had a few apostles pass away during the last few years. I still miss Neal A. Maxwell).

So, when we got home from visiting family last night (which is [and will be] another post in and of itself), I was checking my email before heading to bed. And ... there it was. A whole email message sent through one of the LDS lists that I'm subscribed to ... saying that James E. Faust passed away. And I'm all, "What the chicken?!?"
Yeah, to say nothing else, it was rather unexpected.

I mean, we all knew that he was getting older. He delivered his talk at April's General Conference sitting down ... which, I'll admit had me rather worried. But I still didn't expect it quite so soon. *sigh*

So, yeah. I'm a bit bummed out. And it just feels so surreal. Like when you wake up from a bad, bad dream that feels so REAL ... and you have to sit there, panting in bed, trying to work out if it really happened ... and, when it's a dream, you come across some small detail that definitely IS NOT true in real life ... but there's not that detail here. In fact, there's proof that it has. And that makes me sad.
I hope that President Faust's family is doing okay. I mean, yes, we have the gospel and we know that death is not the end of a person or of a relationship or of love. And that is, indeed, quite a comfort. But, sometimes, it's still really sad that we don't have that person still here with us ... only a phone call or an email or a visit away. And that hurts.

Thank goodness we have the opportunity to have an eternal perspective on this. We WILL see our dear ones, friends and family, again. And I'm so glad for that. It would be a cruel God to order us to create families, and the deep affections therein, just to rip them away at our deaths. I'm very glad to know that we do have a loving Heavenly Father. Because he does love us. Each one of us. Very much. Better than anyone else ... well, except maybe Jesus. Because he did make the greatest sacrifice, which enables us to live again, to repent, to have our families last past death ... And that is good. Very good. And an extreme comfort to know.