March 9 was Annie’s sixth birthday.
Knowing how to celebrate Annie’s birthday is always such a tricky thing in our family. Believe me, I have to fight the urge to just ignore the whole thing— because celebrating it takes effort and gearing up and memories that are hard. Actually, on the day of Annie’s birthday, I talked Peter into letting me clean his church office. As in spend the whole day going through papers and dusting shelves and trying to keep Eliza from bugging our assistant Pastor all day. See? I was avoiding.
But avoiding takes away beauty that’s hiding right behind my brokenness. Not celebrating what we’ve been handed, however hard it is, makes me bitter and inward.
There’s something about her birthday that makes it so hard for me. Maybe because she was never old enough for me to know what her favorites would have been— what she would like for dinner or what her favorite cake would be. I don’t get to put up the banner and light the candles. This year she would have been six— SIX!— and I’ve been watching all her little friends have their birthdays in their kindergarten classrooms and for some reason, it just knocks me back. Six seems so old, so long ago since I looked in her eyes and felt her soft skin.
But we’ve learned a lesson sure and without fail— the best thing to do is to use our pain, to not just let it settle deep and sad, but to instead find a way to be thankful for the ways Jesus allows us help others in our grief. It takes the sting out of suffering, remember?
So the kids had the day off on Friday and we loaded up and went to the place we always go… the city where we said goodbye to her in the hospital. (You’d think we’d hate going there, but no, we love it. I know it’s weird) We spent the day doing things we have made into traditions without even meaning to— having a treat at the cupcake store, going to the bookstore and picking out a brand new book. We went out for dinner with our dear friends and spent the night crammed in a hotel room made for two people. We laughed a lot (and we also disciplined a lot, but let’s just let that memory slip away, shall we? Nevertheless, you should know that there were plenty of “those moments” during the weekend.)
In between the fun and crazy, we planned to do something we’d never done before. We packed a whole bunch of $5s, $1s and little envelopes. We stuffed money in the envelopes and wrote on the outside, “Finders keepers! Have a great day!” Whenever we felt like leaving an envelope somewhere… we did. There was no rhyme or reason to it, no expectations on how much we would leave. We just did it. And we had a total blast. Kate left one in a mug with the name “Kate” written on it. We left several in a little courtyard where university students were constantly walking to and from class. We’d watch from the car and go crazy when we thought someone was going to kneel down and pick it up. Seriously, you should do it sometime. So fun. We bought a cupcake for the lady next in line at the cupcake shop and we gave $20 to the sweet girl working up a sweat trying to keep the “free breakfast” at our hotel stocked.
All the money that we wish we could have been spending on a little girl turning six, we instead used to brighten the day of several strangers. Honestly, we could’ve spent that money on a million different things. We could’ve spent her birthday at home being sad. It certainly would’ve been easier and probably less dramatic (seriously, our kids can fight at the tiniest thing), but it wouldn’t have been as joyful.
Choosing to redeem our grief into something that will help others will never come back empty. Jesus uses every single little hurt, every single little thing for His glory. Even if it’s giving a stranger $5. Or paying for a Mom’s cupcake (we found out she had just dropped off her daughter on campus). Or letting someone know that their job is not unnoticed.
Also, it’s a blast.
P.S. We do our best to do something for others every year for Annie’s birthday. One year we took a package to the nurses who cared so tenderly for her. Last year we made bracelets for a maternity home in Kenya. We’ve taken a load of books for kids who have cancer. If you’re facing a hard day, maybe taking a deep breath and doing something for others is just what you need to get through the day.
A week ago, I received a text in the night that my Grandpa had slipped away from this world. It’s been a bittersweet week saying goodbye… a little bitter, mostly sweet. He was quite tired of living in a body that had more problems than he could keep up with. I’d say 89 isn’t too shabby.
My Grandpa only had an 8th Grade education, but the wisdom of what he taught me far exceeded his reading level.
My Grandpa taught me to love my family. Just a few months ago
Grandpa convinced my Mom and Aunt to drive him up to my house (they
turned a four hour drive into seven). They loaded up a mountain of
oxygen tanks, a breathing machine, and a walker. He was so excited to
walk into my house and my kids could hardly leave him alone. All in one
day, he made it to Kate’s soccer game, then drove to William’s football
game. He cheered his guts out and we beamed that he had made it. When
we got home that afternoon, we let him rest, the oxygen lines running
like railroad tracks all over the house.
Then the
electricity mysteriously went out. Seriously. At first, it was an
adventure, but as the hours went on and the dark started to come, we
began to get a little worried. It didn’t come back on for the entire
night. We put Grandpa to bed in William’s room and I set the alarm
every two hours, hoping the oxygen would stretch since we couldn’t
recharge the tanks. I had to keep a candle lit in the bathroom for his
frequent trips to the bathroom. I spent the night praying that he
wouldn’t die in William’s bed since his various machines couldn’t be
plugged in.
In the morning, I looked at my Mom and
Aunt– none of us had slept and we were all three exhausted. But
Grandpa? He was pretty tired, but still raring to go. Mom had to gently break
it to him that they had to leave early since we’d had to make a serious dent in the extra oxygen. I
mean, I’m certainly not a nurse, but breathing is kind of important.
It was the last of many, many, many visits from Grandpa and Grandma. When I think of all the places and all the ways they made it a priority to visit us in between our trips home, it makes me feel so loved.
My Grandpa taught me to be generous. I have a little collection of silver dollars. They all have a piece of white medical tape on them, with my name and the year written on it. I remember Grandpa dressing up in a Santa costume that Grandma had made, along with a beard that was made of quilt batting and elastic. Every Christmas they would come up with some kind of creative way to give us a little envelope with $20 in it and I thought it was the best thing ever. One year it was taped inside a little plastic horn, and inevitably, they would pretend that one of the in-law’s envelopes was empty and would laugh like it was the funniest thing in the world. Even this Christmas, when he was so sick, he took joy in handing us those little familiar envelopes. He loved to give and he taught me the joy in giving to others.
But most importantly, my Grandpa taught me about longing for Jesus. Just a few days before he died, when we still thought that he might pull through, he looked at my mom and said, “I can just see my welcoming line in heaven. I can see Jesus waiting for me… and behind Him is Gracie (that was my Grandma) and then Annie. I just can’t wait to see them.” His words have echoed in my brain many times since Mom relayed them to me. When we face death, whether our own or someone we love, we long for heaven and for those we know who have gone before us. We miss them and rightly so. Heaven becomes so much more vivid to us when we can picture the faces of those we’ve loved so deeply. But Grandpa had a sacred longing for Jesus, not just for those he had known in life, and that is so profound to me. When I think of the promise of heaven and all that it holds for me, I don’t want to gloss over what Jesus has done for me by limiting my longing of heaven to just those I have lost here on earth. Someday in heaven, we will be in the fullness of Jesus. Together with our welcoming line, we will sing “He is worthy to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing!” (Revelation 5:11-12). We will look to Jesus, our desires for Him fully satisfied, and it will be far beyond our wildest dreams.
I love the legacy that my Grandpa leaves: to love others, to live generously, to long for Jesus. He may not have thought he was a smart man, but his actions and the way he ordered his life proved otherwise. I miss him dearly already, but I am so glad to know his deepest desire has come true. He is home.
P.S. That picture is one of my dearest treasures: My Grandparents with Annie, just two months before she died.
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“When they walk through the Valley of Weeping, it will become a place of refreshing springs. The autumn rains will clothe it with blessings. (Psalms 84:6 NLT)
Five years ago today, I held my sweet Annie Jane for the very last time. And while the memory of her still makes me weep, when I look at the path of our lives since that day I am overcome with gratitude at the ways God has guided and changed us, loved us and comforted us.
Many of you have lived this story with us. Thank you. As an offering to Christ, would you tell us a way Jesus has changed you as a result of her life? Let’s take the sting out of our suffering today. Only Jesus can take our dry valleys of weeping and make them into refreshing springs.”
It happened that as he (Jesus) made his way toward Jerusalem, he crossed over the border between Samaria and Galilee. As he entered a village, ten men, all lepers, met him. They kept their distance but raised their voices, calling out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”
Taking a good look at them, he said, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.”They went, and while still on their way, became clean. One of them, when he realized that he was healed, turned around and came back, shouting his gratitude, glorifying God. He kneeled at Jesus’ feet, so grateful. He couldn’t thank him enough—and he was a Samaritan.
Jesus said, “Were not ten healed? Where are the nine? Can none be found to come back and give glory to God except this outsider?” Then he said to him, “Get up. On your way. Your faith has healed and saved you.”– Luke 17: 11-19 (The Message)
For months now I have been thinking about the story in the Bible about the ten lepers. For so many years of my life, I remember feeling disgusted at the ungrateful nine who didn’t thank Jesus for healing them. After all, He not only saved their lives, but made it possible for them to be normal again. So many things changed for them on that day.
Leprosy is a disease that kills the nerves in the body. Essentially, those with leprosy feel no pain. This explains why they lose fingers and toes– because they often injure themselves, but don’t realize it until it is too late. I keep thinking about the 10 lepers who so desperately wanted to be healed and I imagine the moments following their healing, when they stubbed their toe or stepped on a sharp rock or burned their finger… and actually felt pain.
Don’t you think that the glow of being healed might fade a bit in those moments?
I’ve written about the fog of grief and I’ve written about longing to feel the pain. Now, with almost five years under my belt, I can see myself articulating my feelings differently, living with the ache of Annie like a familiar friend almost. I can’t imagine life without it, really.
I certainly can now relate to the nine lepers who didn’t return to Jesus to thank Him. Because learning to live with pain is one of the hardest realities of life. And you know as well as I do that it’s true. Chances are, you’ve had your share of pain. You’ve had life hit you hard and it knocks the wind right out of you. Maybe you get up quickly the first time, but by the second, third, fourth blow, you’re ready to pull the blankets over your head and spend the rest of your days in the safety of your bed.
And so I think about the leper that returned to Jesus and the courage it took him to be thankful for the pain.
I was running a few months ago through the baseball field that is behind our house. Hank had given up on finishing with me because he is an old dog now, so after he ran one lap with me, he sauntered off to the neighbor’s burn pile to check out what leftovers they had after dinner (Welcome to country living) and then found a cozy spot smack in the middle of the diamond, watching me circle around and around him. For me, running is more about shaking off the cobwebs of my brain and getting a chance to just have 20 minutes of coherent thoughts without interruption. I clearly remember that day, looking up to the sky and realizing I had never flat out thanked God for Annie’s death. It was a new and strange thought to me.
Thanking Him for something so costly to me, something I will never get over, seems to negate my pain. Isn’t that like me saying, “I’m glad it happened?” Because I’m not.
However, thanking Him sucks some of the bitterness out of it for me. It allows me freedom to see how He uses her life and redeems my pain. It shows me His bigger plan and His sorrow in a world groaning for His return.
Peter and I are trying to be more intentional in the way we live and we recently found ourselves writing out the negative turns in our lives and the redemptive perspective to them.
We’re using Donald Miller as a basis of our discussion. He writes,
“Every human being experiences suffering and challenges. Our attitude toward suffering, though, can redeem it and perhaps even allow us to see it as something beneficial. The temptation to play the victim is intense, but (Victor) Frankl* believed stopping to make a list of the many ways a hardship also serves as a blessing takes some of the sting out of our suffering. Suffering and challenges often require grieving, but we can also celebrate our uniquely human capacity to rise above those painful experiences, redeem them, and turn them into something beautiful.”
God started something in me during that evening run many weeks ago when I had the courage to speak my thanks to Him for the death of my daughter. I was surprised that it didn’t make me angry at Him or throw me into despair. Instead, as I later made a list of ways that God has walked with me, given me opportunities and love for people that I can’t imagine having so fully without experiencing grief first…. I was in awe. It doesn’t take away my love for Annie or my sadness or even those hard days that I thought would be over by now. But it does give me freedom and peace to search out the redemption and to thank Him for His sovereignty as He works in my life.
That brings me to you, my friend. I don’t know where you are in your life or what has happened to you. I may not even know who you are. I’m also very mindful of the fact that you may have to thank Him for a bad decision that you’ve made yourself…. which takes a whole different kind of courage. Today I am praying for you, that you would be brave enough to come back to Jesus. To kneel at His feet and find something to be grateful for, to allow Him to redeem the wounds in your life.
He will make something beautiful if only you, like the leper, return to him in courageous gratitude.
**Victor Frankl was a psychologist and spent years as a prisoner in Auschwitz Concentration Camp during World War II. In my brief research about him, I found this paragraph (On Wikipedia of all things!) that I really liked: “Frankl believed that the meaning of life is found in every moment of living; life never ceases to have meaning, even in suffering and death. Frankl concludes from his experience that a prisoner’s psychological reactions are not solely the result of the conditions of his life, but also from the freedom of choice he always has even in severe suffering. The inner hold a prisoner has on his spiritual self relies on having a hope in the future, and that once a prisoner loses that hope, he is doomed.”
Back in December, Peter was amazing and took the girls to the Library on Gingerbread House day. Truly, he is Super Dad because he willfully walked into a room filled with candy and frosting and dozens of hyper children all so I wouldn’t have to face the whining of my offspring claiming that they’re the ONLY ONES in the history of the world who don’t get to (1) do Elf on the Shelf and (2) Make Gingerbread houses.
I will never forget that first Christmas after Annie died.
This littlest girl of mine, she wants to be able to read in the worst way.
She’ll plop down on the couch, ankles crossed, book propped on her sweet chest, just yakking away. She’s in her own little world, creating a story that only she can understand.
And she gets to the last page and always says, “Good End.”
Not “The End”.
It’s “Good End”. . . like she approves of what she’s just created and the “Good End” is her last stamp of approval before she shuts the book and grabs the next one on the pile.
Every once in a while the kids will correct her and I cringe and think that she’ll change the way she says it, but so far, she keeps forgetting.
Sometimes I feel like I need the reminder of the Good End in my life.
A few months ago, I started praying that God would help me to have compassion. To truly, deeply care for others. After Annie died, I couldn’t cope with a lot and as much as I tried to have an outward focus, I realized that much of my life had been turned inward. I decided to pray that my eyes would be opened and my heart would be soft . . . and I was stunned at how quickly and deeply He answered my prayer.
Do you know how much hurt is out there? Too much. I sit and I listen to people’s stories and I am overwhelmed. How will the pain, the heartache, the craziness ever get unraveled?
And then I hear two whispered words, “Good End.”
Somehow, someway, there will be a Good End. Our world is trembling, groaning from the weight . . . but Someday it will all be put right. I don’t even pretend to know how. It seems insurmountable to me, but I cling to Jesus and I believe it is true.
Wherever you are today, hold on to the Good End. It’s coming.
P.S. My other favorite word of Eliza’s right now? All-body. As in “What is all-body doing out here?” and “Where did all-body go?”