Selah

I slept fairly well last night, except for those few occurrences when Don -- who had gone out with the guys, ate rich food late at night, and consequently could not sleep -- jolted me awake with his own tossings and turnings. That's all right. Knowing that my parents were leaving at 7:30 a.m. for the hospital, I hopped out of bed -- my mind instantly switched on (a rare occurrence) with the knowledge of what "today" is -- and took a quick shower before heading upstairs to talk a bit and say good-bye.

I walked in on my parents praying in their bedroom, my dad sitting on the side of the bed and my mom in her chair. Oops. My mom was crying, responding "I'm a little bit OK" to my question of how she was doing. I asked her to tell me what she was worried about. "Are you afraid?" I asked. No, not really -- it wasn't that. "I'm just so, so sad," she said. She was sad about losing a part of her body, she was very humanly struggling with this fact of her life, and this journey she does not want to take. "I just don't want this," she said. "I don't want to do this again, I just don't. I know I have to, and I know I'll get through it, but I just don't want this."

As I heard her searing honesty, I knew I was not going to spew forth the usual platitudes: "It's going to be OK" or "God is in control." Sometimes I really think there is a time not to say those things. Of course she knows it, but she also needs to address her true feelings and emotions. Interestingly, when I listened to my mom this morning, I immediately recalled my own state two years ago, when I was almost ready to give birth to Grace. I knew she was going to be born with a clubfoot; those last four months of pregnancy were heart-breaking for me, feeling so dejected, all that anticipatory joy of having a newborn somewhat sapped with the knowledge that my newborn was going to face pain, surgery, difficulty. I prayed constantly for healing; I read books about praying for your unborn child and the miracles that could happen; I asked a friend/priest and his wife to come to our home to use their spiritual gifts of healing as we prayed together. And still my baby was born with a deformity.

I remember when Grace was about two weeks old and my parents were staying with us for a short time to help us out. I cried the entire day before we left for her first visit with her pediatric orthopedic surgeon -- a visit that would result in the first of many, many casts on her tiny twisted foot and leg. I remember saying over and over to my mom, "I don't want to do this. I just don't want to do this!" I wanted a healthy, complete baby; I wanted to hold my sweet newborn without a cumbersome cast getting in the way; I wanted to cradle her in my arms without a heavy chunk of plaster sticking in my ribs. We had been going through so many excruciatingly difficult things with the church and our ministry; why is God making us go through this on top of it all? Why couldn't He give us a beautiful gift without strings attached? "I just don't want to do this!"

But of course, we all know how it went. We went to that first appointment; she screamed as he manipulated her foot in the opposite direction, stretching that shortened tendon as he plastered her little leg; I cried as I sat next to her helplessly stroking her head. And then it was over. We learned to live with it. We had no choice but to accept her deformity. We had no choice but to visit that surgeon every week for a new cast. We had no choice but to hand our daughter over to him, watching her look at us over the nurse's shoulder as this stranger carried our precious gift down the long hallway to the operating room of the hospital. "I just don't want to do this!" But we did. Not on our own strength, since we had none. Talk about grace-snacks ... we had a heavenly feast.

Now two years later my mom is -- understandably -- crying out those same words. She just got over her first bout with cancer. She was just getting her life back on track. Now once again her life is interrupted with tremendous force. In about one hour she will go into surgery. Nothing will stop that hour. If all goes well, she will be out in 5 hours. We were given the great gift of a day off (paid!) for Don, so he could be with us. He's out now with the kids, running errands and leaving me in a peaceful house. In just a minute I will put on some music -- probably the group Selah, one of my mom's favorites, with the opening hymn "When Peace Like a River" -- and start cleaning the house, a good way to keep busy and distracted. And before we know it, it will be next week already. Then next month. Healing will continue with each passing minute. No, we don't want to go through this ... but we are. Fasten your seat belts ... there's no stopping this ride.