Extremely Close

"Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me.  Your rod and staff, they comfort me."  Psalms 23:4

He was born on a Monday, and he died on a Tuesday, and he only lived 52 years, 2 months and 23 days in between those two days.  The older I get, the shorter his life seems to me.  It has been 11 years, 9 months and 9 days since the Worst Day of My Life, and in some ways it seems like it was yesterday, and in some ways it feels so far away.

My father had his first heart attack when I was just 16 years old.  I was in church.  My mother had stayed home with him that morning because we all thought he had a stomach bug.  I remember I was wearing a green dress with a black bow that was actually my sister's and I had snuck it out of her closet without her knowing it, and I was sitting with my friend Victor during preaching when we heard the church phone ring.  Whenever the church phone rings during Sunday morning service, it is always bad news, and I remember feeling a shiver as I wondered who that dreaded call was about.  When Mr. Threet came and got me from the pew, I was stunned.  He pulled me into the hallway and told me to meet my parents at the hospital.  My brother and sister were both already gone to college, and that morning had been so exciting for me because my mother let me drive to Florence to church by myself, a very big deal to a 16-year-old.  I cried the whole way from church to the hospital, praying Daddy would live and that I wouldn't have a wreck and that my sister wouldn't kill me when she got to the hospital and saw me wearing her green dress.

God gave us 8 more years with him after that first heart attack.  In those 8 years, we spent a lot of time in hospitals.  My brother and I spent one night sleeping together on a waiting room sofa in the UAB ICU waiting area, terrified as the ambulances screamed through the night.  Even though I was 17 and he was 22, we were so scared that it didn't feel at all awkward to be wrapped up in each other's arms on that couch.  We prayed, and we prayed, and we prayed.  And he lived through that open heart surgery.  He lived 7 more years after that.

Even after a heart attack, and even after a quadrouple bypass surgery, our Daddy beat the odds.  He was a living, breathing, walking, talking, laughing, answered prayer.  He lived, oh, how he lived!  He lived each and every day loving all of us, making friends, spreading joy and laughter, leading his community, loving his wife, pulling off hilarious practical jokes on his friends, plowing the ground, loving the Lord.  He got mad, he got sad, he cried, he prayed, he ate, he tried to lose weight, he got new puppies, he hated people who were fake, he got in arguments, he talked on the phone all the time, he drove a truck, he smelled like sunshine and strength and sweat, and he was our hero.  He was larger than life.

Then, shortly after having some extensive dental work, he caught a virus in his heart.  That same heart that had been attacked, that same heart that had been bypassed, that same heart that held so much love and laughter--why did that heart have to get a virus?  Why not the heart of a meaner man?  Why this good, pure, loving heart?  The doctors told us in that hospital waiting room that his heart was now too weak.  There was a high chance he would not survive a year.  They prepared us for the worst, and they talked about the chances of success with a heart transplant, which was still a new procedure back then, and they didn't think it would work.

We prayed, and we prayed, and we prayed, and we prayed.  I quit my job and moved home to spend more time with Daddy and plan my wedding with my Mom.  I was 22 years old, and I was terrified he wouldn't be there to walk me down the aisle.  I prayed every night that he would live.  And he did.

He lived!  He walked me down the aisle.  He beat the odds--once again, his lion heart rallied and kept on beating!  We felt like champions, we prayer warriors, he lived!

And then, one Easter weekend when I was 24 and a newlywed, we all came home to be together.  My brother and his wife, my sister and her husband, my new husband and me, my Mama and Daddy, and two precious nieces who had joined our clan.  We were all together under one roof--a rare and wonderful weekend of the entire family around one table.  But all weekend, he wasn't himself.  He was quiet, he didn't laugh much, he didn't eat much, and late one night, I found him sitting in his chair in the den, tears streaming down his cheeks as he listened to gospel music on TV.  This sight shook me up--a child never gets used to seeing their Daddy cry.  I walked into the room, and he asked me if he died, if my brother and sister and I would speak at his funeral.  Of course we would, but he wasn't going to die--he always lived!  I got mad, as all-knowing 24-year-olds do, and I told him not to even say such things.  On Sunday when I was loading the car to leave, I was still mad at him.  I told him I loved him, but he knew and I knew that I was annoyed. 

My sister, who was expecting her son at the time, stayed with my parents that week with her baby girl.  On Tuesday, Daddy told her to come and jump in the truck with him.  She left her baby daughter with our Mama, and she and Daddy went to a neighbor's house.  As they got out of the truck, Daddy started telling a joke to the neighbor, and then he died.  Just like that.  The ambulance came, but they never revived him.  They took him to the hospital and began to work to try to bring him back, but to no avail

My phone rang just after supper.  I was wearing a grey shirt and black pants.  I had just finished cleaning up our little kitchen in our newlywed house from the supper I had burned, and I was sitting on the couch watching a Biography of Princess Diana.  Stuart was in the driveway changing the oil in our cars and I am sure wishing he had a bride who could cook.  My brother-in-law was the voice on the other end of the line, and he said, "Honey, let me speak to Stuart."  I knew it was something terrible.  I gave the phone to Stuart, who turned away so I wouldn't see his tears.  All I knew was that Daddy was in an ambulance on the way to the hospital, and my poor pregnant sister had been standing beside him when he dropped to the ground at her feet.

We quickly packed our bags and threw them in the car.  Stuart drove so fast, but it was over a 2-hour drive home.  We prayed, and we prayed, and we prayed, but this time it was different.  We both knew it in our hearts.  And then, when we were about 45 minutes from home, a very beautiful star fell right out of the sky right in front of us.  And we knew his bright light was gone from our lives forever.

True to his request, my brother, my pregnant sister, and I all spoke at his funeral.  I know that God got us through that day.  We lived in a town of 1,500 people, and well over 3,000 came to his visitation and funeral.  He was a great man, a man who was loved by all who knew him, a man who lived his life well.

Since then, my brother, sister and I have had 6 more children between us.  We have laughed, we have cried, we have loved, we have fought, we have grown closer together, we have been broken-hearted.  We are so proud of his legacy, and we love seeing him in these magical 8 grandkids, who each have a little piece of him living in their hearts, even though they didn't know him.

He would have loved Mission Athens.  It would be right up his alley.  When he died, several people came by the house to give my mother money.  He had given so many people loans that she had never known about.  One man who none of us knew brought his chainsaw to give my mother.  He said he didn't have the money to repay the loan, but he thought my Mom could maybe use the chainsaw.  We were so touched by all the things people did to comfort us.

Those days following his death are so poignant in my memory.  The horror of going to the funeral home and picking out a casket, the feeling of extreme exhaustion that comes from night after night of tears and no sleep, the huge amounts of food that none of us felt like eating, the sad dogs who missed him so much, the endless line of hugs and stories at the funeral home, the blisters on our feet from uncomfortable shoes, the throbbing headache, the raw, bleeding heartache, the smell of him on his sheets, the tragic discovery that a well-meaning friend had washed his clothes and sheets and his smell was gone, his handkerchief and pocket change I carried in my purse, all his sticky notes with doodles all around the house, sitting in his messy truck and crying huge sobs of pain.  It was a wonderful, beautiful, painful, awful, nightmare, but it was real, and it was true--it was life in its rawest form.

God does not promise us an easy road.  He does not promise us that He will answer every prayer.  God simply tells us to follow Him.  I spent about 2 years following my father's death being really angry with God.  I didn't pray except to tell Him I was mad.  I had crippling anxiety attacks when I was in large crowds because I would see my father's face in the crowd and for a brief moment think he had come back.  My heart grew very cold, and I didn't attend church very often.  My mother had a completely different response--she drew so close to God.  She told me He was the only thing keeping her going.  I was in awe of her faith and still am, but then God sent me an angel to remind me He was always with me.

On a Monday, my baby boy was born.  I kept my Daddy's picture in my hospital room.  I stared into his eyes and introduced him to my son.  I felt his love for me in a whole new way when I held my own child in my arms.  I knew then that I had to live.  I couldn't let resentment and bitterness rob me of my life.  I vowed that day to be grateful for the time I had with him, for the gift of being his child.  I made a promise to myself that I would try to love my babies as much as he had loved me and to teach them to use their lives to spread joy as he had.  I made peace with God.  Shortly after that birth, I found a wonderful new church home, where my husband and I started our family and grew closer to each other and to God together.

For the past two weeks, I have been thinking a lot about death and about how painful it is.  Last week, the Mission Athens team along with a dear friend in our church helped a family with funeral expenses for their teenaged daughter who was tragically killed in an accident.  I can only imagine their aching pain after this terrible loss.  It gives me comfort to know that God hears our prayers for this family--won't you pray for them, too? 

Last weekend, following this painful Mission Athens case, I went with friends to see the movie "Incredibly Loud and Extremely Close," which chronicles a little boy's grief following his father's death in the World Trade Center on 9/11.  It was very hard for me to watch, as it brought back so many painful, raw memories. 

Then, yesterday would have been my father's 64th birthday.  Now that I am 36, I am just 16 years away from being the age my Daddy was when he died.  I don't know if I will die at 52, but I think about it all the time.  Am I using each day to make a difference?  Am I spreading God's love?  Am I loving my husband and children enough to last them a lifetime?  Am I a person of grace and mercy or a person of judgement and bitterness?  Am I using all the gifts God has given me to bring glory to Him?  Am I a good and faithful servant?

The sharp knife of a short life makes me ask these questions.  For those of you who are still reading this blog and who have not experienced a death in your immediate family, thanks be to God!  For those of you who have, you know exactly what I mean.  Death, especially a sudden, tragic death of someone who was too young to be gone so soon, changes all of us who survive it forever.

I have come to see my father's death as a tool that God used to bring me closer to Him.  I still can't make sense of it, and I have stopped asking "why."  Instead, I am so thankful God gave him to me for 8 years past that Sunday when a scared 16-year-old in a green dress drove crying to the hospital.  I don't know why some people have to lose a parent at too young an age.  I don't know why some people have to bury their children.  I don't know why others live for years with horrible diseases.  I don't understand, and it makes my heart ache and my head hurt when I hear about all the tragedy in this world.

I simply know that because He lives, I can face tomorrow.  I know that without Him, life is truly tragic.  He is the fount of every blessing, the well of living water, the beginning and the end.  He gives me hope that I will see my father again.  He gives me the strength to put one foot in front of the other on days when my heart is weary, and I am burdened with a load of cares too big for me to handle.  He is the way, the truth and the light, and He has given us this life with all the joy, all the pain, all the passion, all the laughter, all the heartache and all the craziness.  It is all part of His plan for us. 

He wants us to bear each other's burdens, and we all know that death is coming for all of us.  It is a certainty, it is inescapable.  There is a comfort that comes from surviving death--I know now that I can truly "do all things through Christ who strengthens me," even survive The Worst Day of My Life and bury my father.  I can move on and move up and keep going and keep growing.  It is all part of this beautiful gift of life.

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven;

A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a tiem to pluck up that which has been planted;

A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;

A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;

A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;

A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;

A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;

A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-9