Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed,then you also will be revealed with Him in glory. -Colossians 3:1-4 (NASB)
I’ve lost count on how many days in a row I have been faithfully musing for 15 minutes each night. I’m thinking 12-ish. I’ve enjoyed trying to turn this into a habit, but it’s not quite there yet. It’s not coming easy for me. I typically stare at the screen and shuffle through the stacks of things I’ve thought about that day, trying to decide which to share. Only a few times have I come to this page to post knowing, for the most part, exactly what I want to try to say. I’ve come to realize that every single night’s post maybe doesn’t have to be a profound thought (after all, 15 minutes to write of deep topics is tough), and I hope to feel compelled to write light-hearted thoughts more frequently.
However… What you’re about to read isn’t light-hearted, but I strongly desire to share it with you in conjunction with last night’s post on the brevity of this life. I am bringing in a guest blogger, in a sense. The beautiful writing you are about to read belongs to my incredible (and incredibly pregnant with baby #6) oldest sister, Rachel. She wrote this journal entry on May 5, 2012, on her oldest son (my sweet nephew) Abel’s CaringBridge website. It forever impacted me after reading it, and I hope it does you as well. Even though it has been almost three years ago that I read it, there are days the wisdom in her words come rushing into the forefront of my mind.
I am posting the link below, but the link has failed me multiple times in test runs of posting it and then clicking on it to make sure it directs you to the right page. It may just be my Apple devices being glitchy, but in the event you encounter the same problem, I am copying and pasting the journal entry below the link. May you be blessed by it.
http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/abeltyson/journal/view/id/51c15b826ca0048d3211759d
(^ The link may appear invisible to you, but I promise it’s there! Just click above. ^)
Hello all, Rachel here. I’ve put up a new picture of all the boys that was taken just a couple of weeks ago. They are each unspeakably precious, and we are all enjoying the sweet gift of baby Jonathan, who is about to turn two months old. Just last week he started sleeping through the night — his gift to me!
When one is nursing an infant approximately nine times per day at regular intervals around the clock, one has time to think, meditate, and pray — if one chooses. However, in this marvelous and terrible day of technology, one can use that time instead to watch instantly on one’s “smart phone” copious volumes of reality television shows. I’ve done more watching television than praying because, let’s face it, passive entertainment is just easier and more comfortable than soul searching.
I was particularly enthralled by a show produced a few years ago by the Discovery Channel called “Out of the Wild: the Alaska Experiment.” The show’s premise is whether nine ordinary, untrained Americans are able to survive for an unknown period of time completely isolated from their homes, families, civilization, and modern conveniences. These guys were given a couple of days of basic survival school, then dropped in the heart of Alaska to survive. They had to find/hunt their own food and brave freezing weather while hiking their way back to civilization. They were not told in advance how long their journey would be — it could be days, weeks, or even months. There was no prize at stake, and each participant wore a communication device that would summon a helicopter to their rescue with just the push of a button. In other words, their participation was voluntary not only at the outset, but also every minute of every day because at any given moment they could push the button and go home. Hungry? Push the button and food is yours. Cold? The button promises warmth. Tired? The button will get you sleep. Sick? The button will bring medicine. However, push the button and you are out of the experiment for good.
I watched with fascination and, frequently, horror, as these guys muddled their way along. Their first meal was a mouse divided among all nine of them. Their second meal was a groundhog, which was skinned and cooked by a twenty-something attorney from Chicago. They were almost always in sub-freezing temperatures. The business of survival — gathering wood, preparing shelter, hunting, warming and drying themselves if possible, eating whatever and whenever they could although sometimes not for days — consumed every bit of their time, and every few days they had to keep hiking because making a home for themselves on the tundra was never the goal. It struck me as repulsive, miserable, and an experience I would never, ever volunteer for, not ever.
I watched as one by one freezing, sick, and exhausted participants pushed the button and were helicoptered off to warmth, rest, and safety. They all set out to make it to the end, to find civilization whatever the cost. I found it kind of funny that they all proclaimed that they were not “quitters” and always finish whatever they start — even the ones whose very next action was to push the button. Oh really, Mr. Perseverance, guess that was before Alaska chewed you up and spit you out! If you’re not a quitter, then why did you quit? Why do you proclaim an obvious untruth? Is that really a consolation somehow? But I digress.
Only four made it back to civilization after about thirty grueling days in the wild. They did it by finding train tracks and flagging down the next train to come by. None of them could adequately put into words their emotion at completing the task, at being rescued, at finding their way back “home” to civilization. They went from carrying sixty-pound packs on their backs while hiking slowly through deep snow — sometimes inches at a time through groves of alder trees, sometimes up steep and slippery mountains, sometimes across freezing rushing rivers — to being carried on a train a mile a minute as they rested and watched the landscape blur past, warm and sheltered from the elements. They went from being constantly hungry to knowing that their bellies were soon to be filled, and would likely never be empty again. They were able to truly relax for the first time in an entire month. Then, THEN when they finally pulled to a stop, they were shocked and overwhelmed to find their loved ones waiting for them, and nobody could stop the laughter or the tears of joy.
I cried freely, and it had nothing to do with the people on the screen. Their experience on the train and subsequent homecoming are but a fraction of what I am certain I will experience, what all Christians will experience, when we die. The transition of uncertainty to certainty, scarcity to plenty, cold to warmth, pain to joy. It will be all that, and so much more. And if Abel dies before me, he will be there to welcome me home. He’ll be standing, maybe running towards me, looking straight at me with the widest grin imaginable, he’ll throw his arms wide and shout a greeting — “Mom! You’re here!” This is reality. This is my future. I know it with absolute certainty.
And yet, life is still hard in the here and now, when I’m in the wilderness of humanity. Not all the time and not to the same degree, but on the whole it’s true. The other day Will, who’s four, had a bad dream that disturbed him so much that he kept thinking about it even though all he wanted to do was forget it. He asked me, “When will my imagination throw away that?”
I still want my imagination to throw things away that it never will, because they weren’t imagined. I’m still discovering scars I didn’t know I had. Will woke up at 4 a.m. and came to my bedroom, telling me “something had made him” throw up on his bed. He ended up vomiting several more times over the next couple of hours, and between vomiting episodes he asked, “What’s doing this to me?” I told him about viruses and upset tummies, explained that everybody got sick sometimes, and comforted him the best I could with assurances that he would feel better after awhile. Part of me wanted to revert to what I had been taught to do from childhood, to pray for healing. But I couldn’t do it. I didn’t believe God would stop Will’s vomiting because we ask him to, and I didn’t want what could potentially be one of Will’s first memories of need-based prayer to be asking God for a healing that did not come.
Regrettably, it never occurred to me in the moment to pray for wisdom. Next time one of my children get sick we will pray, but we will ask God for other things, like the bravery to get through the sickness and the ability to be comforted in the midst of it. I don’t know when or if I will be able to ask God for healing, for anybody, and the knowledge that sometimes his answer is “yes” and sometimes it is “no” makes no difference.
A few days later, Will began running a high fever. He didn’t seem to be feeling too bad, and it went away after a few days, but I was thrown off by the amount of anxiety it caused me. In short, I wondered if Will could have cancer or something equally horrible. I’m not an alarmist typically, and I never think or worry about the possibility of a neuroblastoma relapse for Abel. But apparently I’m still a “cancer mom” at the base because I’m pretty sure non-cancer moms don’t wonder about the C-word when a child has a fever. What a disturbing thing to realize about myself.
I’ve had enough reality television for the time being and have begun filling my nursing times with other things. Recently, it was a
sermon on the suffering of Christians on account of their faith (which I believe is a far different thing that the suffering of all humans by virtue of living in a fallen world). A tidbit from that sermon has forever embedded itself in my heart and it goes something like this, and I’m paraphrasing:
The human heart has greater needs than living a long time and being comfortable for one zillionth of our existence.
How utterly true that is! And even though the sermon wasn’t about grief or disability directly, I think this concept applies squarely to them just the same. The human heart has greater needs than living a long time and being — happy, pain-free, rich, healthy, insert-your-desirable state here — for one zillionth of our existence.
In the few short days since I listened to this sermon, I’ve already knit it inextricably into my life. For example, this morning Abel had a bowel movement that sloshed excrement all the way up his back. It stank, it was a mess, and it was hard work getting the nasty clothes off of him and moving him to his shower chair to get clean. I kept thinking, “This is one zillionth of our existence.” That’s hardly any time at all. I can do this for one zillionth of my existence.
Soon after Abel’s injury, someone who had lost his 16 year old son told us that the pain of losing him came back with renewed force whenever he encountered a boy either the age his son was when he died or the age his son would have been had he lived. Earlier tonight, Adam and I watched a movie in which one of the main characters was a beautiful, smart, sweet, engaging seven year old boy, who had two birthdays before the movie was over. Abel will be seven in July. I was filled with a deep sadness born of a longing to see Abel playing chess or chase or the violin instead of being in the severely incapacitated state he is in now. Through my tears I simply thought, “Zillionth,” and it helped stave off the sorrow.
However hard things are, however much I miss Abel, it’s just a zillionth of my existence. Praise God, that’s not much time! Whatever God’s plan for me is here on this earth, for better or for worse, it must be fulfilled in one zillionth of a percentage of my existence. God help me, that’s not much time!
There are people reading this who have experienced great loss. I am not saying the word “zillionth” is a mantra or has magical abilities that will somehow ease your pain. All I’m saying is that I’m finally at a place in my own journey with, not through, grief, that I’m able to find and keep at least a little bit of perspective to help me muddle on. This is God’s gift, one that I accept gratefully, and I want to call it what it is.
Thank you God for the gift of the zillionth. I pray that you use it to sustain me through the difficult times that lay ahead as well as motivate me to reach out in love to others day by day; and not only me, but as many as is your will for them. In Jesus’ name, let it be.
Journal the Journey 
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