I danced with my daughter in the kitchen today. We were celebrating an answer to prayer that I’ve been praying since she was born. The California Honeydrops were the perfect soundtrack for our giddy excitement. Jubilation and thankfulness took over and we couldn’t help but dance for pure joy.
It was a far cry from the first two years I spent begging God to just kill me now.
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After God took Tristan home, all I wanted was for God to take me home, too. My children were of an age where they didn’t need me. I knew I’d be better off in heaven, with my boy, not here suffering on earth. It wasn’t lost on me that this was how Tristan must have felt when he took his life, and these were some of the lies he must have told himself. I wasn’t willing to take my life in my hands, but surely, God could make it happen so I begged Him to.
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Today was a reason to stay here. Today was the Truth. My children will continue to need a mom who helps them become as whole a person as Tristan couldn’t be. And today, God gave me joy in that job.
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Parents who have lost children to suicide grip onto life with two hands, with one they forever carry sorrow and loss, and with the other they sift life for the joy and thanksgiving to be found in suffering. We see God more clearly because He has sustained us through unimaginable horror. We cling to Him more closely because if we didn’t we’d tumble into the abyss of lies the enemy wants to feed us. And we crave what He has wanted us to crave all long, the fulfillment of His kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven. His earth, made new, without the curse that took our children.
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Tristan…Tristan… your name doesn’t bring you to dinner anymore. It only runs across the fields and echoes off the canyons as if it were searching for you, too.
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We know where you are, safe and sound and home with God. I wish you were home for dinner. But even if God chose not to heal you on this earth I can trust His reasons for healing you completely in heaven. That’s where you are now, whole and healed and I imagine, dancing in the kitchen for joy at all that God is accomplishing through your story.
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Dear God, You didn’t answer my prayers the way I thought you would. Can I trust You through this slaying of the life I thought we’d have? We are so far from where I thought we’d be. Mary must have thought that, looking up at Jesus as He was tortured on the cross. She had no idea what You were accomplishing with that horrendous sight. Give me the faith it takes to make it through this. Save me from myself. In Jesus name, amen.
