"When darkness veils it's lovely face, I rest on His unchanging grace." ~Edward Mote

Carry one anothers burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.  Galatians 6:2

To walk beside those who grieve you need to be committed to the journey.  The journey is long and arduous.  The end is not in sight.  Over time the pain eases, but it is forever present.  Until the reunion in heaven, grief and sorrow is a part of our life on this earth.

As the friends to those who are grieving and working through the loss of a child, be in prayer for them.  The best things that friends can do is pray for their hurting friends.  Pray with a vengence.  Pray that their faith will remain steadfast in Jesus-in God’s sovereign grace and mercy.  Pray that their hope will be in the One who created them and who has ordained our steps.   Pray that the Holy Spirit will hold them up.  Hold them up when their legs and feet are too weak to stand.  Pray that if they have other children, that Jesus will protect their hearts.  That their little minds will ask questions, but that they will also receive an amazing understand and trust in our God. 

It’s easy to be there for friends in the beginning.  Smother them with meals, flowers, words and love.  These things are wonderful and helpful, but the coming weeks are still hard.  The pain doesn’t ease quickly.  It takes time.  Reach out, but respect their wishes if they want to be alone and stay as a close family unit for awhile.  

It’s ok to not say anything.  One thing that people often think is that words will help the pain go away.  If we can say something to “help” then we’ll feel like we’ve been wise and helpful, when really they are empty words.  It’s ok to say that you don’t know what to say.  The Holy Spirit intercedes for us when we don’t have words.  Hugs and tears from a friend are at most times very comforting.

Listen.  Listen to friends who are grieving.  Be patient and listen to their hurting heart.  Pray as you listen.  Let the Holy Spirit guide your words and love your friends where they are at. 

Grief and loss is the hardest thing in the world.  The best thing we can do as friends is pray and be available when they’re ready to talk and listen with attentive ears and loving hearts. 

  And the LORD will guide you continually
   and satisfy your desire in scorched places
   and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
   like a spring of water,
   whose waters do not fail.   Isaiah 58:11

Though we go through suffering and grief, our Lord is with us.  He is guiding us and our friends who are suffering.  He strengthens us and makes us whole.  His Spirit intercedes for us when we have no words.   He prunes us.  He waters us.  He makes us into His beautiful garden.  That is hopeful, but at the same time painful. 

Pray my dear friends.  Pray without ceasing.

When I was in college, a boy and I broke up.  Looking back on it, it seems so trite and I wonder why it consumed a couple of years of my life, but there is one significant thing that I was taught. 

One day I was in my room, crying my eyes out, all sad and filled with self pity, when I felt like Jesus spoke to me.  He said, “This will not be the hardest thing that you ever endure.  You will feel much more pain then this in your life.  I’m using this to begin teaching you about pain.”  At first, I thought it was me just trying to rationalize how I was feeling, but over time I kept those words in my heart and I didn’t share them with anyone.  I didn’t share them with Mike until after Tullie was born and Eli passed away.  I didn’t always think about them, but I remembered the small conversation I had with Jesus that day over the last several years.   In all honesty, I never thought that those words would hold any type of comfort to me in the future. 

After Tullie was born, I had a friend who was asking about her.  Her diagnosis, what her life would be like and other questions that were similar.  When we were nearing the end of the conversation, she said, “I couldn’t do that.  I couldn’t be a mother to a special needs child.”  I thought, “And you think I can?!?!  I have sooo much experience in this area, right?!?!”  I nodded graciously to her, but I left that conversation thinking, that I couldn’t do it either.  Jesus didn’t ask me if I wanted Tullie, He gave her to me.  He just said that that was what we were going to do.  Mike and I were parents to a child with Down Syndrome.  He didn’t ask us, He just entrusted her to us, knowing that we would take care of her.  It was just the way it was.  We didn’t have a choice. 

The same thing happened 10 months later.  Jesus didn’t ask me to give Eli back to Him.  He took him back.  I’ve been angry about that.  I’ve been sad about that (especially today), but Jesus has taught me much through that.  He has broken  us in a way that we would’ve never been broken before Him, if Eli were with us today running and playing with Josiah in the dirt. 

When people look at my life, and they tell me they can’t do it, I tell them that they could.  They could because Jesus told them to.  They’d do it because they didn’t have any other choice.   They’d do it, because, His grace is sufficient and His power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Cor. 12:9)

With any trial and pain that our Lord asks us to go through, or sometimes tells us to go through, because it’s simply landed in our lap, He grace is sufficient.  It’s all we need.  Our Lord is enough and He will walk with us through the valley, because He brought us there.  He’s not going to leave us there.   We will mature and we will blossom if we keep our eyes and focus on Him.  He is the God of comfort and love.  He is gracious and merciful.

 I think about that girl in college who was crying over a boy, thinking that her life was coming to an end and I shake my head at that.  I think about how immature she was and trite, but how much that girl learned before she graduated from college.  I think about how God blessed her with an amazing husband, who loves her, cares for her and thinks more of the family then he does of himself.  This girl has been through much, but Jesus is the one who has brought her through.  It’s all Him.  Nothing about what she did or how she did it.  It’s all Jesus.  The pain of loss is there, but the comfort, hope and peace that wraps that pain like a blanket is from Jesus.  All glory goes to Him.

“But He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’  Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.  For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities.  For when I am weak, then I am strong.” 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

Lay down this principle as a law-God does nothing arbitrary.  If He takes away your health, for instance, it is because He has some reason for doing so; and this is true of everything you value; and if you have real faith in Him, you will not insist on knowing the reason.  If you find, in the course of daily events, that your self-consecration was not perfect-that is, that your will revolts at His will-do not be discouraged, but fly to your Savior and stay in His presence, till you obtain the spirit in which He cried in His hour of anguish, “Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will but Thine be done” (Luke 22:42).  Everytime you do this it will be easier to do it; every such consent to suffer will bring you nearer and nearer to Him; and in this nearness to Him you will find such peace such blessed, sweet peace as will make your life infinitely happy, no matter what may be its mere outside conditions.  Just think, my dear Katy, of the honor and the joy of having your will one with the Divine will and so becoming changed inot Christ’s image from glory to glory!  ~Dr. Cabot to Katy  (Stepping Heavenward, Mrs. E. Prentiss, p. 88).

I actually sat down to write something else.  Something else from this book that I read and I’ve been mulling over, but then when I cracked open the book to re-read what I was going to write about, it fell open to this page and well, the conversations that I had with some lovely ladies came flooding back to me.  In some crazy way, this portion of Dr. Cabot’s letter to Katy was encouraging to me.  Have I told you that I love, love, love the book Stepping Heavenward?  It is seriously, one of the best books I’ve ever read.

Suffering brings us closer to Jesus.  I think that this happens over time.  A long time. I’ve been thinking about this, a lot.  I was talking to Mike the other day, just kind of verbalzing what had been going on in my head.  I was thinking about where I was nearly 5 years ago.  Full of hurt. Pain. Saddness.  Helplessness.  I really thought that it would never end, but now looking back on the last several years, I’m not entirely sure how I got from there to here.  It just sorta happened.  Healing happened.  Is happening.  I can pick out several “turning points”, but not really sure when it happened.  Does that make any sense?

Through our suffering we have been brought closer to Jesus.  Just as He intended.  I don’t think that I really recognized that happening.  A lot of misconceptions were torn down during those years about suffering as a Christian.  About suffering as Jesus suffered.  We learned how growing nearer to Him we found peace in the midst of the darkest time in our life.  We found joy.  Not emotional, fleeting joy, but JOY!  The only joy that Jesus can give.  The joy that remains even in the midst of the yuck. 

Suffering brings us nearer and nearer to Him.  Honestly, I’m grateful for that.  Really grateful for that.  That’s not something that I would’ve said a couple of years ago.  Heck, even a year ago.  But as I think about it, I’m grateful that Jesus has brought us through.  IS bringing us through.  That He’s changed us.  Hopefully He’s receiving the glory, because, well, Jesus has done it (is doing it) not us.   He’s bringing us nearer to Him.  He’s bringing us peace and joy.  The kind that’s unexplainable.  Because He’s doing it, then He gets the glory.  All of it.

Last week was a bit crazy.  Not the whole week, but the last two days of last week.  Thursday and Friday. 

On Thursday morning, Mike was up feeling really gross.  He ended up taking the second part of the day off from work.  Josiah got home from school and was not himself.  Acting tired and irritable.  He had a dentist appointment and I told him that after the appointment he could take a nap when he got home.  So, after the appointment he hung out with Mike falling asleep watching movies.  By dinner neither was feeling much better.

Josiah had just finished 15 days of antibiotics the previous week for strep throat.  I didn’t think it could come back so quickly.  Especially after just finishing everything.  I looked down his throat and couldn’t see anything, so off to the ER we went.  He was complaining that he could only breathe through his nose and that his throat hurt really bad.  Josiah and I were there till about midnight.  He had strep again.  Got put on some killer antibiotics and home we went. 

The next morning, I made an appointment for Mike, because he was still feeling gross.  Josiah hung out at home for the day.  Tullie, Ellison and I were fine so far.  I put Tullie on the bus then ran off to the drugstore to fill Josiah’s prescription.  After 30 minutes, the drugstore didn’t have the killer antibiotic.  They called around to three drugstores and none of them had it.  So, I get home and call Children’s Pharmacy to get it going at the hospital.  A friend was so kind to come at the last minute so that I could keep the girls at home and I could take Mike to the doctor. 

I sit down to eat something at 1:30, and the phone rings.  It’s Tullie’s school.  She fell asleep on the bus.  Acting lathargic.  Sucking her thumb and just wanting to be held.  Can I come get her?  (I start laughing.  Couldn’t believe it.)  We need to leave for Mike’s appointment in 30 minutes.  So, I race over to the school (a good 10 minutes away), pick her up.  Keep her in the car, run in the house and get Mike so I can take him to the doctor.  I figure maybe I can get the doctor to look at her too while we’re there.  Josiah stays home instead with Ellison and our dear friend who is willing to hang out in our sick house.

We get to the doctor, Mike looks terrible.  They take his vitals and the nurses no sooner leave the room and Tullie pukes all over the floor!  I’ve never seen her puke so much.  And I’ve never seen Mike so sick.    Now there are three down.  Mike is diagnosed with strep throat and Tullie, they weren’t totally sure about, but put her on penicillin just in case, because she did have a swollen lymph node. 

On the way home, I pick up the prescription at Children’s, that almost causes me to have a heart attack when I saw the price of it.   Then we get to the pharmacy to fill Mike’s and Tullie’s prescriptions.  Mike’s is filled easily.  They don’t have Tullie’s.  So, Tullie’s is at another pharmacy that’s not far away.  At this point, I’m taking a few deep breathes and I don’t want to leave my house again and I had two sick people in the car.  

So, I brought Mike and Tullie home.  Mike got in bed.  Put on Veggie Tales for the kids and ran out to grab the prescription.  It wouldn’t take more then 15 minutes.  I got there and all they had to do with mix it.  Three minutes right?  They said, “That’ll be 15-20 minutes.”  What?!?!  I lost it.  I said, “I don’t have 15-20 minutes!”  I was tired and my family was sick.  I don’t like crying to get what you want, but I only waited about 5 minutes and it was done.  Maybe my minor meltdown helped speed things up???

Everyone is now on the mend.  Within 36 hours everyone was feeling better.  Not 100%, but better and still taking it slow.  Ellison and I have been feeling fine, and hopefully it’ll stay that way. 

When the family is sick it’s really stressful and really annoying.  Hard.  Everyone is sick.  Everyone is tired.  Everyone is cranky.  Everyone has a VERY short fuse.  It’s miserable being sick. 

I decided something before this last go around of sickness.  I had decided that I was going to try my best not to complain about the minor sickness.  It’s hard not to.  Instead, I’d try to take it in stride.  Little things in the grand scheme.  Colds, flues…etc.  Things that go away relatively quickly. 

I had been thinking about that verse in Proverbs: “Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she laughs at the time to come.”(31:25) On Friday afternoon, while I was picking up Tullie, I thought, “Am I suppose to be laughing now?”  Really, I was laughing in disbelief.  It was like everyone was dropping like flies and so quickly. 

There was a time when I couldn’t laugh at the future.  It seemed too bleak.  The idea of waking up each morning was daunting and overwhelming.  It all seemed so hopeless.  But now, over time, I’ve learned to “laugh at the time to come.”  I think that that really means, that I can embrass it.  No matter how annoying, sick or stressful.  It’s a day.  It’ll be over.  The real test I think, is my attitude toward the circumstance.  My family is sick and miserable, how should I act?  Annoyed that they’re here coughing on me and puking all over?  Or react lovingly and patient toward them?  I tried to this last week.  I don’t know if I did.  I know there were times that I snapped at Mike, because I felt tired and overworked.  I was trying to love my family, but there were several times I was counting down the minutes to bedtime.  When it would be quiet and peaceful and everyone would be in bed. 

Can we laugh at the days to come?  I hope so.  ‘Cause I don’t know what else is in store.  I know that Jesus will take care of us no matter what the circumstance is and I know that He’s sovereign and I trust Him.  It seems too simplistic, but I guess in a way it sort of is…

“Lay down this principle as law-God does nothing arbitrary.  If he takes away your health, for instance, it is because He has some reason for doing so; and this is true of everything you value; and if you have real faith in Him, you will not insist on knowing the reason.  If you find, in the course of daily events, that your self-consecration was not perfect-that is, that your will revolts at His will-do not be discouraged, but fly to your Savior and stay in His presence till you obtain the spirit in which He cried in His hour of anguish, ‘Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will by Thine be done’ (Luke 22:42).  Every time you do this it will be easier to do it; every such consent to suffer will bring you nearer and nearer to Him; and in this nearness to Him you will find such peace such blessed, sweet peace as will make your life infinitely happy, not matter what may be its mere outside conditions.  Just think, my dear Katy, of the honor and the joy of having your will one with the Divine will and so becoming changed into Christ’s image from glory to glory!” (Stepping Heavenward, by Mrs. E. Prentiss, pg 88)

If you know me, you know that I talk about the above referenced book way too much.  I rarely read books more then once, and I have read this book at least six times so far.  In the last couple of months, Mike will find me reading and he’s said on more then one occasion, “You’re reading that again?”  Stepping Heavenward is a novel, however, it is one of the most practical theological books out there for women.  By practical, I mean, PRAC-TI-CAL, real, honest and any woman (or man) will “get it.”  It’s life.   I love this book and I cannot say enough about it. 

So now that I’m done with my little intro….let’s get to why I’m writing this….

Every two weeks, I meet up with several woman who are the most amazing, gracious, godly, excellent, Jesus loving mammas that you’ll ever meet.  They are also real, honest and have had to deal with their own share of suffering and hardship.  A couple of years ago, Chris (one of these lovely ladies) put something on our church’s old school member’s site looking for other mom’s with kids with special needs.  Her son has CHARGE Syndrome and she was looking for support.  So, started our little group.  We started meeting once a month merely for support.  I think that we were all drowning.  We knew we were drowning, but didn’t have enough time to seek out and organize something to get the others who were drowning to help us float back up to the top.  Over the past two years, we’ve all slowly floated to the top and we’ve put some life preservers on in order to help.   Anyway, we began meeting together twice a month this past fall, to do the Bible study that goes along with the book Stepping Heavenward.  The Bible Study is AMAZING!!!!  So much good stuff, Jesus, Greek, Bible….just amazing.  If you can do it, do it!

As we were talking on Monday night, we camped out on Dr. Cabot’s letter to Katy.  Specifically what I quoted above.  ”God is not arbitrary.”  He does not do something by chance or on a whim.  Everything that we experience in our lives has been through His filter.  He has allowed everything that touches us for some reason.  We may not know it till we see Him, but He is sovereign and He has allowed it to be.  I think that this is a difficult concept to understand if we struggle with His sovereignty.  

God is good.  He loves us.  He sent His Son to die for us, and when we think that somehow we can be spared from suffering because we love Him we do not completely grasp why Jesus came to earth to suffer and die for us.  He came to give us life and salvation, yes, but we will also suffer as He suffered.  Because we’re Christians we’re not sheltered from this.  We live in a world that is FULL of sin and we are sinners as well. 

I don’t think that the question is, “Will we suffer?”  The real question is, “How will we suffer?”  Suffering is hard.  Suffering is brutal.  Dr. Cabot points out that we will not always respond well to our circumstances and in those time, running to Jesus is the only way to get on our feet.  Sometimes our feet are too tired and we must simply be carried for a long time.  Jesus asked for His cup to be removed from Him, but He was willing to go the distance for us. 

There were a series of sermons at church on I&II Peter.  Most of the series was about suffering.  I was convicted a lot that I did not suffer well.  I would get angry quickly.  I was full of pride in my suffering.  Thinking that somehow I had it worse then everyone else.  I complained.  A lot.  I was bitter.  I did not suffer well.  However, I also think that suffering is learned.  

“…every such consent to suffer will bring you nearer and neare to Him; and in this nearness to Him you will find such peace such blessed, sweet peace as will make your life infinitely happy, no matter what may be its mere outside conditions.  Just think, my dear Katy, of the honor and the joy of having your will one with the Divine will and so becoming changed into Christ’s image from glory to glory!”

Isn’t that a wonderful thought!?  If we are consentual in the suffering that Jesus in His amazing sovereignty and goodness and having simple faith in Him, that we will still feel joy.  Joy because He saved us and through our suffering we’re becoming more like Him.  We’re being “taught” to change into His image.  It’s really an amazing thought.

Suffering is hard.  It’s not something that someone wants to go through, whatever it may be.  Death, financial hardship, marital strife, relationships, sickness, our child’s illness or diagnosis etc.  But if through it we can stay focused on Jesus, remain faithful and receive it as something that has passed through the throne of God to us as a time to change us into His image and likeness and if we have joy and contentment in that then we have and are suffering well.