THE TEARS OF MY FATHER ~ 1/21/08
(written by Laurie as she returned home from the funeral of her twin grandbabies, Dylan & Lily Jean, who were born prematurely and did not survive. Previously, a similar situation had occurred with another grandchild named Hope.)
In the van, on the way home… I began to cry out….
“My family, Lord… my family… You know I love my family….
… thank You for the family You’ve given me ..
but.. those babies, sweet Jesus… my grandbabies…
I want.. my grandbabies.
In the van, on the way home…. the wrenching pain returned…
“Little Hope, Lord. Miniature Dylan and tiny Lily Jean… Lord.. Lord… Lord…”
I cried in silent sorrow. I cried with intense longing ~
“I want my children, Father!” I demanded it. ”I want my children’s children!
… never got to say goodbye… Lord, Lord.. how I long to touch them just once..
only one time… to hold them, kiss their tiny faces….”
And I wept. I wept quietly and infinitely long, as only those broken inside can do.
In the van, after an extended time… my sobs subsided, exhausted from my silent raging…
but even as I quieted, a heavier sound of sorrow filled my ears.
I quickly scanned the vehicle, but only noises of sleep or quiet play broke the midnight stillness.
Yet the weeping I heard embroiled me, spilled from my ears onto my face,
scorched me with hot tears that were not my own.
If these are not my tears, I mused.. they must be… tears from my Father.
In the van, on the way home, for an extended time… He cried with me.
Tear for my tear, sob for my sob, crushing blow after crushing blow ~ like an ocean pounding my heart
in it’s angry relentless surf ~ until I, reduced to jelly and purely exhausted, could wage war no longer. Drained and spent in silent warfare with frigid death, I discovered what others before me already knew. No one has the strength to withstand death’s merciless onslaught. No one.
I took respite from the battle, drinking in intense and unreal beauty from the brilliant stars stretched across the blackened sky. They spoke calmly to my chaotic, pain-racked world. The peace-whispering breathe of my sleeping child became a haven, but only for a moment ~ until His hot tears burned my face.
He took no such luxury in respite or shelter. His mourning continued, His lament deepened.
There seemed no escape for Him, from the sheer torture at the hands of one known as Grim Reaper.
There seemed something odd about this ~ that He, the very Author of life and creation ~ that He truly seemed without recourse in this tragedy of death and destruction. I could not accept it.
Lifting His tear-drenched face to mine, muscles twitching in agony, He began to cry out;
His voice an exact echo of my earlier plea…
“My family! I love My family!
How thankful I AM for all My family… but….”, His voice broke….
“The children… My children…..”
Waves of grief massively exploded across His chest… raking His flesh raw…
“How I long to touch them! To hold them… how I long to kiss their face… My children!”
His cry, so intense it rent my ears, rent the van, even the sky ripped jaggedly with His roaring ~
“I WANT MY CHILDREN! AND MY CHILDREN’S CHILDREN!”
I closed my eyes, not able to endure His pain. Like a clap of thunder, understanding broke my heart.
My own loss suddenly seemed so small compared to His.
Father was not grieving for Hope, not for Dylan nor for Lily. He is not.
In that moment of understanding, He silently asked me to trust Him, to believe Him.
“Know this,” He said, “Hope, Dylan, and Lily ~ they are not lost. They are here, with Me.”
Know this.. know this… death is not final. The truth of this seeped through my pores until it became part of my body.
This truth, not new, but never owned it like I owned it now. This new knowledge, excrusiatingly twice-purchased, empowered me.
Death is not at all the blow Satan intends it to be.
For Father has opened heaven’s door against it, using His own handcrafted key.
Those babies I love, those precious bundles I long to touch; they really are safe with Him.
As Understanding peaked, I saw the door of heaven wide open for them.
I see it also standing open for you. And for me.
The deeper and more painful blow ~ the cause of Father’s tears and grief ~ is that there are yet children, and their children’s children, who know nothing of His doorway.
There are those, incredibly, who refuse God’s invitation to trust, believe, receive.
When the hand of death wraps itself around them, it is this loss that Father carries.
His children ~ never to embrace ~ lost from His protection ~ forever.
It seemed, with that revelation, the winds of heaven slashed through the skies,
violently rocking the van and its contents with His lament.
Ah Father… I cannot fathom a grief deep enough to embrace this.
Later, in the van, on the way home, we are sitting close together, Father and I.
Time barely moves as we drive deeper into the night.
I am comforted by the Presence of this One, still weeping for His lost children.
Not once has He negated or minimized my own sorrow. Instead, He shares that deep loss and declares it to be true. True, but not eternal.
Abundant in all things, He has released a deeper truth in my heart than the one I carried. Truth upon truth, precept upon precept ~ He placed His greater loss and sorrow deep within me. Wheels hum steady on the icy freeway, and silence reigns through this last leg of our long and pain-filled journey. The new knowledge beating within me should bring pain, tears,and even terror; but as I soak in this Place of Presence, I am hauntingly warm, calm, quiet and filled.
And bold.
I pull His head toward me, making room for Him to rest it on my lap.
Don’t ask me how. Don’t wonder why… only choose to believe.
I stroked His magnificent hair, as a mother would comfort her distressed child.
The action comforts me further. Peace fills my sore heart enough to hear Him once again.
Deeper truth dawns only when I allow Him to expand my vision beyond life’s experiences.
Spiritual truth is seen only when my spiritual eyes are open.
And so, I ride home in peace. He is nestled in my lap. My hands play mindlessly in the curls about His head.
My mind is quiet for this situation is well past my mind. The liberty to do this intimate, tender act is so profound that Liberty takes on personhood and sits with us. Peace becomes so deep she joins us too.
There is an ownership that follows this caress. To play with someone’s hair… it is intensely intimate. There is a love released, a possessive ownership…
My mind shrieks a protest! How can all this… this… lap filled with God… happen… to me?
But Peace is already here and she will not be denied. She rocks my mind to sleep while I gaze, almost numb, at the God, who sighs deeply, contentedly, from my lap. It is too wonderful for me to understand. Like a sponge, I absorb His fragrance and it speaks to me.
“ I am not lame to save. My arm is not shortened.
My desire is for you to share My passionate love for lost children everywhere.
My lost children, young and old, everywhere. Will you find them?”
This truth enfolds me as I allow myself to experience just a sliver of His burden.
If I am honest enough, and allow my grief for them to run deep enough,
I enter His love realm. I begin to love the lost.
~ oh, increase my horizon ~ Lord ~ oh, expand the eyes of my spirit ~
For if I grieve to that love realm, I become moved with urgency to rescue those I love.
If I truly love them, I will act ~ even in ways foreign to my nature~ to find them.
“I am not lame to save. My arm is not shortened.
My desire is for you to share My passionate love for lost children everywhere.
My lost children, young and old, everywhere.
Will you find them?”
