God's Lent Child

Elli's grandma and aunt read this poem at Elli's memorial service. It was sent to us by a friend, from another friend who had lost a child recently. It expresses well the way we understand parenthood -- that we are stewards of the children in our families, not their owners, and that God gives them to us to raise for a time.

God's Lent Child
by Florence Correa

I'll lend you for a little while a child of mine, God said,
For you to love her while she lives, and mourn for when she's dead.

It may be six or seven years, or forty-two or three;
But will you, till I call her back, take good care of her for me?

I'll bring her charms to gladden you, and should her stay be brief,
You'll have the lovely memories as a solace for your grief.

I cannot promise she will stay, since all from earth return;
But there are lessons taught below I want this child to learn.

I've searched the whole world over, for teachers kind and true;
And from the throngs that crowd life's lane I have chosen you...

Now will you give her all your love? Nor think the labor vain?
Nor hate me should the angels call, to take this child back again?

To which the parents did reply, Dear Lord, Thy will be done.
For all the joys thy child will bring, the risk of grief we'll run.

We'll shelter her with tenderness, We'll love her while we may...
For all the love this child will bring, forever grateful we will stay.

But should the Angels call for her much sooner than we've planned,
We'll brave the bitter grief that comes and try to understand.

Suffering and the Healing of Our Spirits

My dad shared the following at Elli's memorial service. I asked him for permission to share it here because I so appreciated what he had to say.

In the 9th chapter of John’s gospel, the apostle records the disciple’s question about a blind man’s blindness. Like many today, they assumed that bad things happened to people who had sinned against God as a kind of punishment. Jesus’ answer revealed the shallowness of this kind of thought and provided a positive outlook on all manner of suffering. He said, “It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.” One of the great works God displayed through Elli was to use her in the lives of many to make them more like Christ.

God uses people like Elli to challenge our preconceptions and wrong ideas about God as well as to draw faith and obedience out of God’s people. Following Christ does not guarantee a life free from trouble. Her care givers had to come to grips with real suffering and helplessness. All of us had to learn to fight our natural selfishness. Literally everything had to be done for Elli, with almost no likelihood that it would ever be different. We had to learn patience in order to communicate with Elli. Because her responses to conversation are much slower than normal, we had to become good listeners.

Her parents sacrificed normal family vacations in favor of simpler plans that could include Elli. Resources that could have gone elsewhere were spent modifying cars and homes so Elli could get around more easily. We rejoiced over progress which in others might be thought small. Sometimes the reward we got was the way her beautiful brown eyes sparkled or by her gentle touch. Those who took the time serving Elli grew and learned to serve Christ by serving her.

Why has God so arranged things that we grow in Christ’s likeness through sorrow and suffering? Elli endured many surgeries to correct her improperly formed heart as well as to correct other problems that resulted from confinement in a wheel chair. The amount of planning that went into each of Elli’s operations was enormous. If all we ever saw was the blood and the cutting, the labored breathing and cries, no one would ever opt for such surgeries, much less put their beloved daughter through them. Yet, we do it because we trust the intentions and the skills of the physicians, and because without the operation, we, or our child, will die.

You see, we are very quick to treat the ailments of the body, but often oblivious to the more serious sicknesses of the spirit. The care and healing of a human soul is far more complicated than any physical surgery. Some of us do not even want to admit that we are sick and so do not come to Christ to be made well. Followers of Jesus Christ have had the first and greatest of the heart surgeries absolutely necessary to save our souls, and all of the pain of that was borne by the Physician Himself. But God in His wisdom has chosen other means throughout our lives to complete the work He began. It is through these often painful events that hard hearts become tender, and selfish men and women become Christ centered. Proud people learn humility by accepting God’s dealing with us, however pleasant or painful, as directed by a loving, wise and all powerful Creator. God matured Elli’s caregivers this way. What Elli learned and became through her life may not be fully known today. But we know from her responses to music, hymns, and the stories and prayers she heard from Joy and Scott, that she loved Christ as much as any 8 year old girl can.

Christians follow Christ because we have concluded that He is trustworthy. We follow Him because our God proved His love for us beyond all question by putting His Son to death in our place for our sins on a cross. Because He is beautiful and magnificent beyond description. Because He is wise beyond all imagination with His brilliance evidenced by the extraordinary design of this vast and beautiful universe. His splendor and majesty are only hinted at by the marvelous gifts of human love and creativity. And so we submit, sometimes with fear as we might to any serious operation, to these secondary surgeries so necessary to correct the twistedness of our persons. And we know, that one day, in God’s perfect time, we will find ourselves in a different sort of recovery room. For Elli, this happened last Sunday morning when she heard a gentle voice say, “It is time to wake up, Elli.” As she opened her eyes she saw the Jesus that her Mommy and Daddy had told her about. The Great Physician took her by the hand and Elli, who has always loved music, found her voice and sang her first song – a song of praise to her God.

To Elli, from Your Daddy

This was written and shared by my husband at tonight's memorial service for our daughter Elli. As always, he wrote and spoke beautifully. Elli was so blessed to have such a man for her earthly father.



I miss you, Elli. The sound of your voice is still fresh in the house. I can almost still hear them. My head has whipped around more than once since Sunday when I thought I heard you. My grief runs deep. My big girl is gone to be with Jesus.

I’m writing this in the living room next to your empty wheelchair, with your name embroidered in purple (your favorite color) on the back rest and your pink flower backpack still draped over the handles.

Your chair is so sadly empty, yet so gloriously empty at the same time. The Apostle Paul said, I am “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.” There’s no better way to express how I am feeling right now.

Next to sending His Son to die on the cross, choosing me to be your daddy was one of the most precious gifts God could have ever given me. I was 26 when I became your daddy, and my life would forever be changed.

I want to tell these people what this precious gift of being your daddy means to me.

Being your daddy meant understanding that parents are caretakers, not owners. That meant two things: 1) I would not have you forever, and 2) I would one day give an account of how well I took care of you.

Being your daddy meant opening your bedroom door in the morning and seeing your bright cheery smile. You were so much more of a morning person than I am. Your smile made my mornings much easier.

Being your daddy meant just hanging around the house with you, playing your favorite music, reading books, playing in the sprinkler, and taking walks down Willow Lane.

Being your daddy meant basking in your excitement when would we press play on that music CD you had chosen on your Dynavox. Your smile was because you knew the next 30 minutes will be filled with familiar melodies. You loved a familiar song.

Being your daddy meant laboring hard with Mommy and your teachers and therapists to try to understand what you wanted and needed and were feeling inside, because you couldn’t express these things with words. I would like to think that we scratched the surface of understanding these things. But I have a feeling that when I see you in heaven some day, you will be taking me aside to have a word with me and you will say something like, “Daddy. Seriously. I meant this, not this. You were way off!”

Being your daddy meant serenading you as I gave you a shower and cutting loose with songs I would probably never sing in public. You loved cheesy 80s songs by Chicago. You loved Karen Carpenter (wait, I did sing a Karen Carpenter song in public). You loved for daddy to spin you round and round after your shower, still wrapped up in your bath towel. It seemed like the highest point of your day, and I will never forget those belly laughs as we spun round and round with wet hair and the smell of soap in the air.

You couldn’t speak, but oh, you knew how to laugh.

Being your daddy meant seeing so clearly what matters most in life. You rescued daddy from putting too much stock in his career and the empty promises of earthly success to rush home and help mommy take care of you. You kept mommy and daddy loving Jesus and clinging to Jesus for our hope and our strength and our encouragement, more than anything else.

Being your daddy meant brushing your hair and brushing your teeth, dressing you and feeding you, lifting you up and setting you down, pushing you from place to place and experiencing the world with you from just above your head.

Being your daddy meant playing lots of word games with you. One of your favorite things to do was have fun with words, swapping out vowel sounds and adding extra syllables. Changing the lyrics to a song was the one sure way to get your funny bone. You were definitely born into the right house for that. I invented a new word this week in your honor. It’s the word “cryle” – which means crying with a smile. I’ve been doing a lot of that.

Being your daddy meant having a front row seat to watch God do very big things through very small things. You heart was the size of a walnut when they first operated on you at 3 weeks old. For more than 12 hours they worked to reconstruct your heart, and came out of the operating room smiling in disbelief. It was the first of many times you would overcome the odds. They had given you a 20% chance of surviving that day.

The ripple effect of that surgery sent shock waves of repentance and reconciliation through our family, our friends and countless strangers looking on. And the 3 surgeries after that had the same effect.

It is a gross understatement when I say that God did something very big with something very small. He took five loaves and two fishes and fed untold thousands.

Being your daddy was a precious gift that I will cherish forever.

In his biography on the legacy of Jonathan Edwards, John Piper writes these few words spoken by Edwards’ wife after his death, which echo my heart as I reflect on Elli’s life. Piper says:

“Upon hearing the news that Jonathan had died, his wife Sarah wrote in a letter to their daughter Lucy: ‘O what a legacy my husband, and your father, has left us! We are all given to God; and there I am, and love to be.’ His legacy is that when he left this earth, he left God with his family—and with us.”

Elli, when you left this earth, you left God with us. There we are, and there we love to be.

We will see you soon, princess.

Remembering My Elli-Girl

Tonight we celebrated Elli's life at a memorial service in her honor. We have been carried along by the love and prayers of so many friends, family members, and total strangers who have heard our daughter's story and been touched by her. I don't know for sure how many came, but our best guess is that between the visitation last night and the service tonight, we've hugged over 500 people. I was amazed by the number of people who traveled from out of town, and by the number of people who came who had met Elli once, or not at all. What a blessing and an encouragement to us.

I thought I would share here what I said tonight. My prayer was that both of us would be able to speak clearly and completely, and thanks be to God, He got us through. I decided to keep my memories light, as I knew if I started crying, I wouldn't be able to collect myself again.

Elli was always accompanied by stuff. She was severely limited by her body, needing total support just to sit upright. Equipment and medications and feeding supplies were an essential part of her gear every day.

As her mother, all of those things seemed to fade into shades of gray, while the little girl in the middle shone out in brilliant color. Tonight I’d like to introduce you to the rambunctious and irrepressible girl I knew.

The first several months of Elli’s life were really tough for her. She was living with a poorly functioning heart and couldn’t digest lactose. One of her vocal chords had been paralyzed by the breathing tube, so she had no voice. We used to say that her default mood was irritated and it took tremendous effort to make her happy. After her second heart surgery and new formula, she was finally able to get past the pain and let her personality emerge. We took great delight in those moments when she would reveal a little spark of the person hiding inside her uncooperative body.

The first time we ever heard her laugh, she was in a baby swing at our apartment. I was singing a Bible song with hand motions and trying to tickle her. She didn’t really know how to laugh – it just rolled out of her in this low chuckle that would turn out to be her trademark laugh.

I’ll never forget the morning I was getting her ready for school and preparing to take the younger kids to the zoo with some friends. I was very careful to avoid the use of the word “zoo” that morning, as I didn’t want Elli to feel like she was missing out on anything. I told the other kids to put shoes on and that we were going to put sunscreen on once Elli got on the bus. The next thing I knew, she had gone to her zoo page on her Dynavox and was talking about going to see the manatees (her favorite animal there).

She has been working hard to learn to drive a power wheelchair. Last summer she spent time every week practicing. One day when I picked her up, her therapist, Missy, told me that Elli had accidentally driven herself into the boys’ bathroom. Missy had backed her out, telling her that it was the boys’ bathroom and girls weren’t allowed. The next thing Missy knew, Elli had driven straight back into the boys’ room with a great big mischievous grin on her face!

Every time her brother and sister would start campaigning for me to take them to McDonalds, Elli would head straight to her McDonalds page and chime in with “McDonalds French fries” or “yogurt parfait.” Their teamwork was nearly irresistible.

Elli loved to mess with people, too. She learned to roll over at a pretty young age – probably around age 2. She would roll onto her belly constantly at home, then growse and complain about being stuck there until I or someone else would roll her back. Then she’d do it again. After 6 1/2 years of working at it and working it, she was almost able to do it. But… she never once rolled over for anyone at the hospital or in private therapy! She rolled over last year at school, but refused to roll this year, even after I blew her cover and told them she was pulling their leg.

She wasn’t above messing with me either. While she would walk across the gym and the resource room at school and down the hall for her physical therapist at Children’s, she refused to walk one foot in our home.

Elli was quick to size people up. Last year, in second grade, school got a little less fun for her – she was expected to actually listen in subjects like science and math and reading. She complained loudly, disrupting class, and earning herself a ride back to the resource room… which was exactly what she wanted. Fortunately, her aides realized pretty quickly that she was working the system to her advantage. They changed things around and Elli got much better about listening quietly. But still, as recently as last week, I got notes home from school saying she had needed three time outs and had lost her video privileges at lunch. Of course, last night I learned that the resource room staff were pretty much putty in her hands. She came in for time-out giggling, and got the whole room giggling with her. Her laugh and her impishness were infectious that way.

Elli also loved her family dearly. Her favorite people outside of our family were her grandparents, aunts, uncles, and her in-home helpers, Julie and Patrice. She nearly threw herself out of her chair every time we told her relatives were coming to visit or we were going to visit them. She loved bouncing around in the waves or the sprinkler on the beach buggy Grampa made, riding around the yard with Papaw on his 4-wheeler, having tea parties with Mamaw, and dipping strawberries in chocolate and making cookies with Gramma. She talked about those visits for months. She greeted Patrice and Julie with her beautiful smile every day when they arrived to help me with her.

All of this showed me that in so many ways, Elli’s mind worked just fine. And as patient as I tried to be with her, I know that she had to be 10 times more patient with me. We constantly underestimated her. My greatest desire for her was for her to learn to read and write so that she could finally say exactly what she wanted to say the way she wanted to say it. I know that one day, when I leave this life, we will finally be able to go for a walk and have a long long long talk. I look forward to that very very much.

Sadness

I had all sorts of chipper little things to share today, like how I planted 100 iris bulbs yesterday afternoon. Or how the kids actually had a pretty good day in spite of the diarrhea thing. Or how Elli ate a really good dinner last night. Or how excited the kids are getting about the birthday party tomorrow (this is mostly about Gramma, Grampa, Mamaw, and Papaw coming over!). Or how I finished Elli's birthday socks last night (That felt good. Very good.)

And then the bad news started pouring in.

A friend's 10-month old baby just got diagnosed last week with SMA. They will find out next week, probably Tuesday, if he is Type I or Type II, but suspicions are that he is Type I, the most severe and devastating kind. I couldn't sleep last night, trying to figure out how to pray and just grieving for them, for the baby.

Another friend's mother just got diagnosed with lung cancer, in addition to the bone cancer she's been battling for the past few years. She's young - in her 50s - and a non-smoker.

We have a number of siblings between us who are looking for work and trying to make ends meet in very difficult financial situations. They are in various stages of discouragement and frustration.

It's all so very sad, especially since I feel powerless to help in any tangible way (to my eyes). I know that prayer is a powerful thing, but sometimes it doesn't seem like much to my human, finite mind. And that same human, finite mind only wants to see the hopelessness, pain, and futility of life.

My minor little frustrations, like Big Boy still being sick this morning and the house being in total disarray, seem more discouraging. Yet, I'm not the one in the difficult situation. Well, we've certainly had our challenges lately, but you know what I mean. We're not facing that level of difficulty right now. All in all, things are looking fairly positive for our little family at this moment.

I think my problem is that with the kids being sick... with sickness in our house for so many weeks in a row... I am worn out. I haven't had time for a lot of the things I normally do, and I haven't made time for some of the things I need to do, like read my Bible and pray every day. That has been sapping my spiritual strength. And that starts the slide down into gloom and doom.

With three demanding children (demanding because of their illnesses - they aren't normally high-maintenance kids), it's incredibly difficult to read or take time for myself during the day. I'm having a tough time even finding time to eat (or inspiration to fix something for just myself). And with all the additional demands, I've been too tired by the end of the day to make myself read and pray in the evening. The kids have been waking up too early and beating me to it in the morning. And I apparently lack the self-discipline and motivation to figure something out when my original plans don't work out.

What I need to do when I start looking at things through human eyes is rely on the Word of God to find hope and joy and comfort to give others. But I have to preach His truth to my own heart first before I can really reach out in ways that aren't trite and pithy. The Psalms are especially dear, as David was such an honest and open poet. He got discouraged and sad and angry, just like everyone. But he always brought himself back to the goodness of God and the hope that we all have in the future righting of all the wrongs when Christ returns.

I also remember the words of a song that has always moved me. I can't listen to it without tearing up. It's such an important reminder that although I am filled with, as the Bible says, "only evil continually" and deserve only eternal punishment, God, in His infinite mercy, has chosen to spare me from that judgement that I fully deserve. This is far more blessing than I could dare to ask for. So even if this life is filled with hardship and heartache and I never know any earthly joy, if I am His child, I am infinitely blessed and can proclaim that God is good!

If I never get to see another rainbow
Or share another laugh with a friend
If I never stand barefoot by the ocean
Or get to kiss my child goodnight again

If I never have another prayer that's answered
Or have another blessing come my way
If this is all I know of heaven's kindness
Father I would still have to say...

You have been good
You have been good
I am in wonder how could it be
You have been good
You've been so good
In so many ways
You've been good to me

You have shown me mercy upon mercy
Grace upon grace
Time after time
And I know all too well what I'm deserving
Yet You are still so patient and kind

You have been good
You have been good
I am in wonder how could it be
You have been good
You've been so good
In so many ways
You've been good to me

If suddenly it all were ended
And your blessings disappear
Looking back over a lifetime
The evidence is clear

You have been good
You have been good
I am in wonder how could it be
You have been good
You've been so good
In so many ways
You've been good to me
In so many ways
You've been good to me

- by Scott Krippayne, from the album Bright Star, Blue Sky

So, on that note, I need to get it together, do that long-overdue reading, spend some time in prayer, send some notes in the mail, and try to get this house in better, more germ-free order. Oh yeah, and give lots of hugs to the kiddos.

The question "Why"

My husband found the text of this sermon and asked me to read it. It has particular meaning to us right now because we are struggling with why God has allowed an unspeakable tragedy to occur to someone we love dearly. The following is the first two paragraphs from the sermon by John Piper, preached on September 11, 2005.

The Supremacy of Christ in an Age of Terror

This weekend is the first anniversary of 9/11 that has occurred on the Lord’s day, Sunday. Therefore it seemed good to us to step back and pose the question again about the meaning of the supremacy of Christ in an age of terror.

The Supremacy of God in All Things—No Exceptions
One of the truths of the Bible that we embrace with trembling joy is the truth of God’s supremacy in all things. The mission of our church is that we exist to spread a passion of the supremacy of God in all things for the joy of all peoples through Jesus Christ. When we say that, we do not mean: “except in calamities,” “except in war,” “except when Al Qaeda blows up a building or a train,” “except when cancer takes a mom or a child is born with profound disabilities.” There are no “except” clauses in our mission statement.

To read the entire sermon, click here.

This message really took me aback. I've read lots of people's attempts to answer "why do bad things happen to good people." Many fall woefully flat in the face of real pain, and other seem to minimize or gloss over it. A few good ones, in the abstract, do make sense. But now, up close and personal with tragedy, I have been struggling with why again.

I thought God was supposed to protect His own. If I believe that God is truly sovereign over everything, that means that He chose for this to happen to this person. But how could He?

This sermon does not minimize the pain experienced every day by so many, nor does it avoid the hard questions above. It is clear to me that Mr. Piper has faced and wrestled with these questions head on. And God has blessed him with some amazing insights.

Not that I'm in perfect peace, not that the pain or the tragedy is any less great, not that I'm not still struggling with a wide range of emotions and sinful responses to this. I am and I will for awhile. I know in my head where I'm supposed to be, but getting my heart to follow is much more difficult. It's an ongoing, minute-by-minute battle. Please pray for us. We need God's grace to reach a point where we can truly say we are "sorrowful yet rejoicing."

A dear friend directed me to this psalm a couple days ago.

Psalm 6
O LORD, rebuke me not in your anger,
nor discipline me in your wrath.
Be gracious to me, O LORD, for I am languishing;
heal me, O LORD, for my bones are troubled.
My soul also is greatly troubled.
But you, O LORD--how long?

Turn, O LORD, deliver my life;
save me for the sake of your steadfast love.
For in death there is no remembrance of you;
in Sheol who will give you praise?

I am weary with my moaning;
every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with my weeping.
My eye wastes away because of grief;
it grows weak because of all my foes.

Depart from me, all you workers of evil,
for the LORD has heard the sound of my weeping.
The LORD has heard my plea;
the LORD accepts my prayer.
All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled;
they shall turn back and be put to shame in a moment.


I noticed immediately that the Psalmist did not end his pleading to the LORD in despair. He expressed his pain and his questions quite openly, but in the process of bringing this to God, he came to realize the God did hear him, was still there, accepted his prayer, and would eventually bring justice and punishment to his enemies.

I can find some comfort in that.