I know it’s a bit early for Mother’s Day and parental musings but this blog is spurred on by two recent thought-moments. One of them echo-ing our upcoming Easter season. One was a blog I recently read and the other was upon realizing it is only 2 weeks until my son’s 8th birthday. The two thoughts, it seems, are linked with small similarities.
I was touched recently by reading a blog linked to my sister-in-law’s. From what I can tell it is by a woman who recently lost her son and this blog is partly in memorial to him. She writes beautifully and touchingly.
I can not fathom the grief that must come upon losing a child. Whenever my mind starts to wander to thinking what that must be like, I have to sharply pull it out of those thoughts as I am immediately brought to tears. This blog shows the pain and yet amazing strength and courage shown by a woman who has gone through the worst type of loss. I was brought to tears upon reading it. Whenever I hear of someone who has gone through this I feel the most painful twinge in the pit of my stomach. No, actually in the pit of my heart. The death of a child in human terms seems to be the worst tragedy that one could have to endure.
I lost a child through miscarriage a few years ago. It is not the same thing; that child was not born, although it was loved. I spent months agonizing over what would have been had the child been born, and felt that its conception was a miracle of God which made its loss so much more painful and harder to comprehend. But I did not get to see him/her crawl, walk, run, laugh, cry, hug. This woman’s writings show me what I have always believed. That is must be nearly impossible to go through that kind of experience without Jesus at your side. Jehovah Rophe, our healer, is the ultimate source of comfort in times like this. What a friend to be able to turn to, cry upon, and wail our most despairing thoughts to. God, the Father, knew the ultimate pain that comes from the loss of a child.
This brings me to my last and final thought. As I pondered Zachary’s upcoming birthday I was thinking about the day he was born. It was the best day of my life (I’m tear-ing up now just writing about it….). He was the best present I had ever received and opened up a whole gap in my heart I never knew existed. I said something to my Mum and Darrell that day to explain how I felt. I felt like I finally understood the crucifixion. Don’t misunderstand, I never claimed to understand God, but the crucifixion suddenly made so much more sense to me. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son”. HIS ONLY BEGOTTEN SON. In a million years I could never give up my only begotten son. Even after he had only been born 5 minutes. The love for him was that instant. God gave up His ONLY SON. For you. And for me. And for my children. How can you reject such a gift as that?
