Posted on by walkingintheshadowlands

The Time Is Soon

Ethan’s Dad: Eight years. It has been eight years since we last saw Ethan — experienced him — alive. Eight years since I heard his cry: he would wail, scream, go on for quite a while, but also sigh. Eight years since I felt his breath. It could be halting and shaky, but it also could be very gentle. Eight years since I fed him those bottles of milk and formula. That was always difficult for me. I felt that I could never get him to drink enough. It was not for lack of effort — he tried very hard — but there was almost always some left. The best part of that was when he was finished and was tired. When he slept peacefully, he was like an angel. Eight years since I saw those eyes open: those dreamy, contemplative eyes that always gave the impression he was thinking about something interesting. I wish I knew those thoughts. Eight years since feeling his warmth. He liked to be held close. It was his love language because he could not yet really speak.

It has been eight years, but the time is relative — it both flies and crawls. It flies because in one sense it feels like an instant since that moment of loss happened; that time is frozen in our hearts. It crawls in the sense that each day without him aches, and we long to see him again. But the reality is that we live in this present time, each next moment, without him. God asks us to go on because our journeys in these earthen vessels are not finished. We have not spiritually matured to the point of being ready to see Him, which means we are not able to see him yet either. No matter how much we may wish it, we cannot change this reality.

It makes me think about the difference between how God experiences time versus how we do. Several of the stories I read to our kids revolve around altering time. Characters are able to jump back and forth — unwind, rewind, or see what is coming ahead. Of course, that is all fiction. God has made us to traverse time in one direction, always moving forward. But God does not experience time that way.

I recently finished reading C.S. Lewis’s Voyage of the Dawn Treader to our smaller kids. In it, there is a scene in which one of the main characters, Lucy Pevensie, interacts with Aslan the lion, who is (for those who may not know) an allegorical stand-in for Jesus in the Chronicles of Narnia series. At the end of the scene, Aslan tells Lucy that he must leave her, and he says:

“Do not look so sad. We shall meet soon again.”
“Please, Aslan,” said Lucy, “what do you call soon?”
“I call all times soon,” said Aslan.

That exchange is a not so veiled reference to Jesus’ words in Revelation 22:12-13 in which He says: “Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”

“Soon” takes on an enlarged meaning because of what Jesus says about Himself being before and after all other things. In Revelation 1:8, Jesus similarly says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.” In the same chapter, verses 17-18, He says, “Do not be afraid. I am the First and the Last. I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades.” Just before Jesus ascends into heaven at the end of His first coming, He gives the disciples the command to go tell everyone about Him, and He adds: “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28:20.
In the Old Testament, when God speaks to Moses from the burning bush, Moses asks God:

“Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”
“God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: I AM has sent me to you.'” Exodus 3: 13-14

Unlike us, who experience time as one forward horizon, God is present everywhere, all at once. This is why He knows the future and can speak with certainty about it, and why He can speak to anyone at any time. Lest you think that God has it easy because He is not immersed in time as we are, think for a second about what it means to see everything and to be everywhere. Could you or I handle the immensity of that? I know that I sometimes feel an almost overwhelming sense of dread when I read the news about all the calamities that happen around the world every day. It is too much for us to digest. Even though we only experience remote harms second-hand, the sheer number of them burdens us. Think about if you were there for each and every catastrophe — for all-time, throughout history. In that light, the fact that we live in time and have no choice but to move on to the next moment is a blessing because we do not continually or infinitely live through any moment all the time.

But God also chose to willingly experience time as we do when Jesus was incarnated. In that earthly life, you could practically hear Jesus’ heart breaking when he lamented over Jerusalem: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.” Matthew 23:37. When Jesus came to Lazarus’s tomb, He openly wept — twice. John 11:35 & 38. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus tells His disciples: “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.” He then prays earnestly: “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet, not as I will, but as you will.” Matthew 26:38,39. Jesus then goes to the Cross and experiences an agonizing and excruciating death that includes separation from God the Father. In all of those moments, Jesus knew the future, but He experienced time as it unfolded, just as we do, and so He felt as we do.

Likewise, when Jesus healed those in need, He made them well for their remaining time on earth; He did not rewind time such that those people never experienced the pain, harm, and loss they had known up until that time. He renewed and redeemed those individuals, as much on the inside as the outside, but they still carried with them what they had lived in their brokenness before they had met Him.

Why am I getting into all of this about time — for God and for us? Because in these past eight years there have been countless times that I have wished I could go back, or I have wished I could have known what was going to happen, so that somehow, some way, Ethan would still be with us. I particularly do this on each March 10th.

But we all do this for certain points in our lives, don’t we? Our fascination with time travel boils down to wanting to fix things, to make right what has gone wrong. We do not want to retrace our steps, but rather to redirect them. But we are not made that way or for that purpose.

In that same exchange between Aslan and Lucy in Voyage of the Dawn Treader, a little before the part I quoted above, Lucy asks Aslan if she has messed something up to the point that it can never be the same again, and whether it would have been different if she had not made the mistake. Aslan answers:

“Child, did I not explain to you once before that no one is ever told what would have happened?”

There is no “what if?” because there is no going back. For us, there is this moment, and the next, and the one after that. And what happens matters, for this earthly life and the heavenly one. This is why Jesus said, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me,” which paradoxically connects directly with His command “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth …, but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven.” Matthew 25:40; 6:19-20.

I cannot undo our loss of Ethan. I cannot unwind the pain and misery and missed opportunities of all we do not get to experience with Ethan for the rest of our days here. But because each moment in time matters — as do the losses that accumulate with each day that passes — Ethan’s presence here for even that brief two-month time eight years ago also matters. He matters and he cannot be erased because Ethan is a child of God. “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” 1 John 3:1

Yes, the knowledge that God is always present both hurts and helps. It hurts because it means He was there in that moment, and yet He did not stop it. He had the power to halt it or to unwind it, yet, for reasons we cannot know, He did not. But it also helps because it means God was there from the start.

“Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
“If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
“If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
“If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,’
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.
“For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
“My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
“Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.”
Psalm 139:7-16

God created Ethan. He created him with a purpose and a destiny. Part of that purpose was to be with us, even as exceedingly short as it was, and for us to love him and him to love us. We do not know what our lives would have been like if he had stayed with us, and we are not meant to know. But we are told where Ethan is and where, one day, we will be.

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, trust also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go, I will come back and take you to be with me that you may also be where I am.” John 14:1-3

So, when, exactly, is that? “He who testifies to these things says, ‘Yes, I am coming soon.'” Revelation 22:20. Yes, to Jesus all times are “soon.” It is not so with us, but we are meant to live as if that is the case — as if time is both present and imminent — happening soon. With the help of the Spirit, we are to become like Him as much as it is possible in our present, earthly, time-bound existence because then, one day, we will be like Him. “What we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when [Jesus] appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as he is.” 1 John 3:2. And we will see our Ethan too, at which point soon will be now. “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.” Revelation 22:20.

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A Tale of Two Sisters

Lenten Roses in Ethan’s Garden

Ethan’s Mom: Over the past year or two, I came to realize how many times we take stories from the Bible and make them about the people in the stories.  Be courageous like David standing up to Goliath, be obedient like Mary when the angel visits her, etc., etc.  In both the Old and New Testaments, we take the focus off of God and put it on the people.  Despite that in almost every case, a few chapters after Abraham, Noah, Moses, or David show great faith in God, the Bible will relate how these same men fail miserably in their ability to be the moral role models we make them into.  

Meredith Anne Miller, the author of the book “Woven,” has really opened my eyes to the extent in which we do this when we teach kids the Bible.  She advocates for a different approach, which she calls “God centered storytelling” – read a passage/story, make a list of things you notice God being or doing, teach the story focusing on one of those things, and end by asking the kids what else they notice about God.  She suggests this helps kids grow to trust God and lets the humans in the Bible be, well, human.  

One example of how I have internalized the “human centered storytelling” approach is in the story of Mary and Martha.  Growing up in and around church, I have heard many sermons and even read books about Lazarus’s two sisters.  In most situations, Mary is lifted up as an example to live by and Martha is the cautionary tale of being too worried about earthly things.  Let me give you a quick summary:

Mary and Martha are sisters.  One day Jesus and his crew came to their house.  Martha focused on welcoming them into their home and feeding them.  She was busy trying to make the house look good and generally give off a good impression so that she could be praised by Jesus for being the hostess with the mostess.  Mary, on the other hand, was focused on listening to Jesus.  She busted into the room with all the men, sat right at Jesus’s feet, and drank up all the wisdom from his teaching.  Martha gets mad, asks Jesus to fuss at her sister for being lazy and leaving her with all the stuff, and Jesus rebukes her.  Mary is the hero of the story because she chose the better thing.  Boo on you Martha for being worried about the stuff that doesn’t matter.  Be like Mary.  She’s awesome.  

A while later, Lazarus dies.  The sisters send word for Jesus to come.  Jesus stays where he is instead of coming to heal him.  When he shows up, Martha runs up to him and gives him a piece of her mind.  What were you doing Jesus?  If you had not taken your sweet time, you could have healed my brother.  Jesus starts talking theology to calm her down.  Mary comes out, asks Jesus where he’s been.  But this time, Jesus cries with her.  They go to the tomb.  Martha tells Jesus not to open the tomb because Lazarus smells.  Martha, we all know this, why do you have to point it out?  So uncouth.  Jesus says “Lazarus come out!” and happy ending.

Finally, Mary is also known to pour perfume on Jesus’s feet and anoint him with her hair.  Like her actions in the first part of the story, this is very brave and insightful of her.  Also, it is noted that Martha is serving the disciples when this happens.  Be like Mary.  Once again implied – don’t be like Martha.

OK, so that was a little tongue-in-cheek, but truly it’s not far off from my understanding of these two women.  I have always identified more with Martha than Mary.  I can say I am going to finish my BSF lesson or journal, but before I sit down, I’ll just need to put the clothes in the dryer or start dinner or run the vacuum.  One thing leads to another and suddenly it’s time to head to carpool or it’s past my bedtime.  I know I should be more like Mary, but somehow I default to Martha-mode every time.   And because Mary is the hero of the story as I have told it to myself, I am tempted to believe that Jesus loves the Marys and tolerates the Marthas – Marthas like me.  

But through the study, lectures, and notes from our BSF lesson on John 11 last week, I am starting to see how Martha is more than a cautionary tale; in fact, I realized that her siblings are not the only ones that Jesus loves.  Jesus loves Martha, too.

My teaching leader pointed out that the sisters send a message to Jesus that is simple and to the point:  Lord, the one you love is sick.  They don’t add any details or give any instructions.  Mary and Martha appear to trust that Jesus will help the one he loves.  The BSF notes also pointed out something I had never heard before.  The notes suggest that based on the timing of the message, Lazarus may have died that same day or even before Jesus received the message.  I have always kind of assumed that because the Bible says Jesus stays where he was two more days that he is intentionally waiting to come until Lazarus dies, which just seems kind of mean.  Either way, he receives the message and makes plans to head to Bethany in God’s timing, not in the sister’s suggestion.   

I thought there was something beautiful about being able to send for Jesus without needing a plan first.  We know that Martha is portrayed as the one working hard and taking care of things, but she doesn’t have to orchestrate this part of the crisis – she and Mary just tell Jesus the facts.  Nor do the sisters remind Jesus of why he should care.  Martha doesn’t give any reasons, like “Lord the one who opened his home to you or the one who donated to your ministry or the one who told all his friends that you are the Messiah…”  The only qualification is “the one you love.”  What if we did the same?  What if we came to Jesus, confident in our identity as his beloved, and just put the situation at his feet?  “Lord, the one you love is sick..or sad…or hurt…or lonely…”  Just sending that “simple” message to Jesus shifts the weight off of our shoulders and onto His.  In this situation, Martha and Mary both seem to get it right.

My brother-in-law and the BSF notes also drew out a different perspective on Jesus’s interactions with each woman after he arrives in Bethany.  First, Martha is the one who gets up and runs to Jesus first.  Mary stays put.  Maybe she was too sad to move, maybe she was the one who was angry with Jesus – we aren’t privy to the reason.  But Martha gets to Jesus first and says, “Lord, if you had been here my brother would not have died.”  I have always read that as an angry accusation.  As a person who has been hurt and confused by Jesus’ inaction when someone I love died, I don’t blame her for asking, even in anger.  But the notes suggest that “this if/only statement should not be seen as a rebuke of her Lord.  Martha expressed deep sorrow with confidence that Jesus could have prevented her brother’s death.”  Martha knows that Jesus could have intervened and does not question that he would have, had he only made it in time.  

But Jesus doesn’t leave Martha swimming in regrets and “if onlys.”  He starts right where she is and then engages her intellectually.  He knows how to talk to Martha and how to help her in this moment of despair.  He reveals himself as the resurrection and the life and guides her from “if only” to “I know” to “I believe.”   The BSF notes go on to explain:  “Our faith often stumbles when we lament the past or enumerate what did not happen…Like Martha, we can mourn the past and feel paralyzed in the present, even when we cognitively believe God’s promises for the future…What promise is God calling you to believe, not just to provide distant future hope but to find strength for today?”  

Once Martha is strengthened by belief, she goes to tell Mary that Jesus is asking for her.  When Mary comes out, we find Jesus engaging her emotionally, not intellectually.  As my brother-in-law pointed out in his lecture, Jesus doesn’t come at Mary with words of comfort, only his presence and compassion.  It is at this point in the story we get verse 35, famous for its brevity and profound in its meaning. “Jesus wept.”  He could not hold back the tears, despite the miracle that was moments away.  

Studying this passage and focusing on Jesus throughout the story was a very timely exercise.  Right now, we are in the ten weeks of the year that hold the most heartache.  There are always days during January, February, and March when I don’t operate at full capacity. In fact, today is one of them.  I don’t know why.  Nothing in particular is going on, just a cloudy day in February.  I have tried to go about my business today, but I keep finding myself staring off into space and wondering how the world can be so full of heartache.   

Looking back at Martha and Jesus’s first interaction helps me to know that Jesus loves me, even on the days when the weight of missing Ethan keeps me from “getting things done.”  He is troubled when his followers are grieving, including me.  The story of Lazarus shows that “the things that make us sad move Jesus’s heart” (BSF notes).  I can just say, “Lord the one you love is sad today” – no explanation or qualifications required – and, amazingly, the God of the universe is moved by my sorrow and meets me in it.  

And when the “if onlys” increase in frequency and intensity as we approach March 10th, I can remember how Jesus gently led Martha back to what she knew and ultimately what she believed about him.  Jesus is the resurrection and the life.  In 1 Thessalonians 4, Paul tell us what this statement means for those who are are “asleep” like Lazarus and for those who mourn them:  

Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope. For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.  For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.

1 Thessalonians 4:13-17

The final time we see Martha in the book of John is in chapter 12.  John briefly mentions that she was at her house six days before Passover, serving Jesus, Lazarus, and the disciples.  While the men are reclining at the table, Mary pours out her expensive perfume and annoints Jesus’s feet.  There is not a rebuke for Martha this time.  Judas is the one to try and get Mary into trouble with Jesus, who defends her actions again.  I have to think that Martha’s heart was different during this dinner.   I think my heart is different now, too.  Martha and I have come into a deeper realization of who Jesus is through our experiences with grief.  The following song is one that I have listened to on repeat the last few years.  I wonder if it might have resonated with Martha as well.  Martha, the one Jesus loves after all. 

Braver Still
I never saw it coming
There was no way to prepare
The world kept spinning 'round me
And left me standing there
And it's okay to grieve
A life that could not be
I'm trying to believe
In something better
Even if the dreams I had turned into dust
There's no wreckage that's too broken to rebuild
The world is just as scary as I thought it was
But Your love makes me braver still
Your love makes me braver
I spent my whole life running
Trying to find a place to rest
Why did it take a wound like this
To let You hold me to Your chest?
Now I can hear You breathe
You're singing over me
You're making me believe
In something better
Even if the dreams I had turned into dust
There's no wreckage that's too broken to rebuild
The world is just as scary as I thought it was
But Your love makes me braver still
Your love makes me braver
There is a valley
Where shadows are covering everything I hold dear
There in the darkness
I hear You whispering "I am here"
Even if the dreams I had turned into dust
There's no wreckage that's too broken to rebuild
The world is just as scary as I thought it was
But Your love makes me braver still
Your love makes me braver still
Your love makes me braver

-JJ Heller
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Catch You on the Flip Side

In my last blog post, I shared some about the beginning of my experience as a BSF discussion group leader. We are now almost 3 months into our class, and I have 14 ladies in my group, 6 of whom are currently pregnant. One is an unexpected 4th pregnancy, just like my twins, and that has brought up a lot of emotions. Leadership has been challenging in ways I expected and in ways I didn’t. It has been a blessing in ways I expected and in ways I didn’t as well.

As with my other 3 years of BSF, God seems to be zeroing in on the lessons I need in this stage of my journey through the shadowlands; however, that doesn’t mean that those lessons are easy to receive.

It’s been a tough few weeks here in my head and heart heading into the holiday season. In BSF, we have been talking a lot about suffering as we went from discussing Peter’s miraculous jail break in Acts 12 to his writings in 1 Peter. Suffering is a tricky topic for me. On the one hand it is really hard to fight the tendency to judge others’ stories of suffering against mine. On the other hand, I don’t want to really face the depths of my own suffering; the grief is still sometimes so raw.

The week we talked about the jailbreak was hard because it prompted a discussion about why James was executed by King Herod while Peter was miraculously delivered from danger the night before his show trial. Well, those sorts of questions are really tough for anyone to face head on, I think. When you can identify with James instead of Peter, it gets even harder. Both were “top 3” disciples; both were being prayed for by the church. Why the huge disparity in their stories? And why was James a little blip in the chapter that goes into such details about Peter’s rescue? He almost seems like an afterthought.

There is a family we know whose little girl was almost born while her mom was one of many, many people snowed in at work during a bad storm almost six years ago. But she wasn’t; Ethan and his brother were the ones born in an ambulance on the frozen highway. This little girl was diagnosed with a heart defect that was similar to Ethan’s. In fact, the day we found out about his VSD, her mom was one of the first non-family members I called, looking for advice and encouragement, knowing that she had a successful open heart surgery the summer before. After Ethan died, it was excruciating to see this preschooler living a normal life, starting kindergarten, even getting discharged from cardiology follow up visits. My son didn’t live long enough to have surgery to fix his heart. This is insane to admit, but I would find myself being jealous that Ethan didn’t “get to” have open heart surgery, like it was a prize that he didn’t win. Even though the heart defect was not the primary cause of death, it is still hard to think about all the prayers that were answered for her but not Ethan. It has gotten easier over the past two years, but I still have moments of secret bitterness towards this innocent little girl. That’s just one example. Every time I hear or read “God is so good!” in response to someone’s physical healing, I just cringe. Why wasn’t he good to my baby, too?

The next week’s lesson was from 1 Peter, and it was still hard but more hopeful. The lecture that week had several points that really resonated with me, but I want to focus on the section concerning “New life in Jesus shifts a believer’s focus to HOPE.”

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that is incorruptible and undefiled and unfading, reserved in heaven for us who through faith are guarded by the power of God for salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.” (1 Peter 1:3–5)

Our BSF teaching leader said that in suffering, God can “develop and refine our faith, loosening our grip on this world and leading us to trust the unseen reality of God Himself.” Nothing has loosened my grip on this world more than my child leaving it.

When Ethan’s dad leaves for his BSF group on Monday nights, the kids are usually still finishing up dinner. They have this game that has developed over time. Everyone tries to be the first to yell, “Catch you on the flip side!” when he comes in the kitchen to say goodbye. Whoever is beaten to the punch yells back, “No, no – catch YOU on the flip side!” They continue this back and forth for a few minutes, then Ethan’s dad will yell “Catchyouontheflipside” really fast and duck out of the kitchen.

This always makes me smile but the other day it occurred to me how profound this little game really is. They shift their focus from leaving to the hope of their reunion, and that makes all the difference in their parting.

My favorite quote from the lecture was “Eternal realities stabilize us and sustain us in daily realities.” I might consider getting it tattooed on my arm. If there is any other way to make it through the daily realities of traumatic bereavement, I surely don’t know of it.

I will never get a handprint turkey, never see Ethan in his preschool Thanksgiving program. Instead of thinking about stocking stuffers for Ethan, I went to Hobby Lobby to pick out new Christmas decorations for his graveside. I am planning ways to celebrate my twin boys on their 3rd birthday at Disneyworld, despite the fact that one will not be with us at “the happiest place on earth.”

Those are just a few examples from the past week. I could go on with a whole list of big and small daily realities that have knocked me off balance or made me want to quit altogether, but a pity party is not the goal of this post. The point is that the only thing that keeps me from utter despair when facing moments like these are, in fact, eternal realities stabilizing and sustaining me.

God is good, even though I cannot always feel or comprehend this truth.

I will not have a handprint turkey, but one day I will hold his hand.

I will not celebrate Christmas with him this year, but one day we will sing together in the presence of the Savior.

Jesus has made a way for my family to be together in a place that is so much better than Disneyworld I literally cannot conceive of it. And we get to stay, together, FOREVER.

Catch you on the flip side, my sweet Ethan. Catch you on the flip side.