It hit me hard.
Like a punch in the brain and the heart at the same time.
My newborn son is going to have a last day on the earth. This 5-pound treasure who has taken over our lives with sweet awe, deep thankfulness, & a fresh perspective of life - he will die.
My husband looked up to find me sobbing. This isn’t unusual, as declines of progesterone and estrogen and surges of oxytocin and New Mom Love have all been working together to create a crazy tornado of feelings which have been busting out of me for the past two weeks.
But this cry was deeper than the others.
Through heavy weeping gasps,
“Boone is going to die some day.”
Husband moved across the couch and held my head against his chest. I stayed there, crying all over his t-shirt, tears for my son’s death. Then my thoughts turned to all the suffering this beautiful innocent baby will face through his life…the heartache, sick days, dark moments. And I’m helpless. I can’t keep his pain away. I can’t fix the hurt that will find him. This incredible tiny human is going to suffer.
Husband’s shirt is getting soaked.
“But that’s not the end of his story. You can’t forget resurrection.” Husband shines the words down on me like a spotlight. Oh yeah. Resurrection.
Husband continues preaching the Gospel to my roller coaster new mom heart. Boone will die. But that’s not his end. Only his beginning.
A family down the road just lost their mom to cancer. A friend from high school is fighting for his life against tumors that have invaded his brain. While I’m holding my baby, other moms are grieving theirs. Every baby post I make on social media causes some women to think about their own baby-less arms as they continue trying to conceive.
Life is tragic, for everyone. There is no way to avoid the brutally hard days. Not for me, not for you, not for Boone.
While husband holds me on the couch, true Heaven words continuing to flow out of his mouth all over me, I look down at the open Bible laying on the couch. My eyes land on the two words I need. The two words Boone needs. The two words all of us heartbroken mourners need.
“Jesus wept.”
The shortest verse in the Book, God only needs two words to lather our broken hearts with hope.
Jesus entered our tragedy.
And He’s still here.
God became a man to join us in our pain. He finds us here, falling apart in our living rooms, and He joins us in our weeping. Like a gentle husband who holds us on the couch.
Jesus wept.
Not because He was hopeless.
Not because He forgot about Heaven for a second.
Not because He stopped believing in miracles.
But because pain is real and that good King feels it with us.
He sees Boone’s hard days, his doubts, his hurts; He has chosen to enter it all. He will be with him, weeping alongside my son.
And when Boone’s days on earth are done, that same Good Weeping King will escort my son into eternal life. Where only love lives. Where family continues. Where death is no more. Where his twin and his Poppa Randy & his Grandma Nita will be thrilled to squeeze him. Resurrection.
Hope. Hope. Hope.
“Before you fall back asleep, you should come see this sunrise.”
It was the next morning. I staggered out of bed again, after a night of little sleep and much baby feeding, and followed husband east through our house.
We stood in the nursery and stared out the window at the hot pink sky, bright orange sunlight splattered across it. We held each other and my thoughts again filled with hope. Resurrection. Sunrise after night. Hope after heartache. Joy after mourning. Peace after storm. Life after death.