August 29, 2002

A lot of people ask us how Caleb, Jonah and Graci are doing... so I thought I would give a little "sampler" of their hearts, how they're doing as of now. Basically this is a few conversations we've had in the last couple of days.

Yesterday Graci and I got in the car and were on our way to get the boys at school. All was well and we were having a pretty good day. But then I turned around and noticed Graci crying. I said, "What's wrong, Grace?" Rubbing her eyes, she said, "I miss Levi." So sad, so sweet. I stopped the car, got her out of her carseat and held her. We just hugged and cried together... "What do you miss doing with Levi the most? I asked (hoping I could get her mind off her sadness and on to some of their sweet memories.) "I just miss huggin' and kissin' him." What could I say except, "me too." We cried and hugged some more... later on, as we were getting close to the school she said, "I want to go to heaven." "Wow," I said, "me too but we have to wait our turn and it's not our turn until Jesus says so." "But I really want to go today, let's just drive there, we've been there before, let's go again..." At this point I was really confused..."We've never been to heaven..." It all came together in my mind when she said, "Yes we have, don't you remember when we went to see Levi with his eyes closed?" (..the night of the viewing/wake (whatever you call it), we told Graci that Levi was in heaven...we walked into the room with his casket and she saw him from across the room, looked up at us and said, "Is this heaven, because there's Levi.") Precious girl, there's so much that she doesn't understand, there's so much that I don't understand...

After we picked the boys up we were driving by the cemetery, I drove into the entrance, Caleb said, "Oh no mom, let's don't go in here, everyone starts crying." Jonah came back at him with, "Yeah but that's what family's for, we cry together." That was good enough for Caleb so we had our visit with Levi's sweet little body. (There's something so special about knowing that his body is close.)

I love how all the kids keep Levi in our day. Last night we were praying, focusing on being grateful for God's creation. This was Caleb's prayer: "Dear Father, thank you for your beautiful creation, thank you that you made the sky, the stars, the planets... and thank you that you made heaven for Levi to be in and someday we will be there too and when we get there we won't have to worry about anything else..." Jonah's prayer: "Lord, thank you for the world you made, thank you for the animals to love, thank you for the people to love...thank you that you gave us Levi to love and would you tell him that we love him and miss him right now, would you hug him for us? And of course Graci's prayer was a little simpler: "Dear Father, thank you for the ponies. In Jesus' name, amen."

Is that beautiful or what?

A few days ago I sensed that Caleb was a little down so we sat and chatted for a while. I just asked him how he was doing with Levi being gone. "Well, I miss him."

Then I asked how he feels toward God: "I don't know, what do you mean?"

Well, I said, "You know we prayed for Levi to be healed and he was but only for 3 weeks, and now he's gone..." Caleb, being a man of few words responded with, "Well I still love HIM."

I was reading through the boys journals (with their permission). I read them every once in a while just to check and see the condition of their hearts and to see how I need to pray for them. Here are a few exerpts:

JONAH'S:
"Levi was the bestest brother is the whole world. I love him so much he was so great. I love him so so so so much...I love you Levi.
"Levi was like a very best friend."
"Levi was so precious to me. I just love him so much."
"Dear Levi, I miss you so so so much, I am sorry if I was ever mean to you, I love you."

On each of these pages he has drawn pictures for Levi, sunshine, dogs, flowers, fish, birds, hearts....the things that Levi loved...

CALEB'S:
"I miss Levi, I wish I can be with him in heaven. I love Levi. I miss him. I want to be with him and hug him. I want to come home from school and see him and hug him, Why did Levi have to die?"
"Levi, I love you so much. So much that you cannot believe it. I love to hear you laugh. I love to watch cartoons with you. Football is fun to play with you too. You are good at football. We are a good team at baseball. We love sports don't we Levi? I love you Levi..."

Every time I read these I am blessed and I am broken. I am amazed at thier new capacity to love. It is deeper, wider and more selfless than most adults I know... I have learned more about the person of Christ through my children in the last year and a half than in the prior 10 years of seeking Him. God is profoundly brilliant through them. He whispers to me through thier words, He speaks to me through their prayers and He shouts to me through their painful tears. Teaching me, showing me that just when I think I know all the dimensions of my Savior's personality there is still more to be known and loved of Him. Tim Hansel wrote: "While one great tragedy of the world is that many people are unfamiliar with Jesus, it is equally tragic that some of us are too familiar with Him, in the sense that 'we think we know, we think we really understand' the full significance of His life within us and among us." With that in mind I think HE is saving me from the "tragedy" of familiarity by way of the tragedy of Levi's death. Does that make sense?

I guess what I'm saying can be summed up in and through this story: It was the middle of World War 2. Men were giving their best on the front lines. Somehow one of them scrounged up an old beaten-up phonograph and a record. the record was of none other than Enrico Caruso, considered at that time the greatest singer in the world.

That evening as they sat around the tent listening to the scratchy, rather worn record on a weathered phonograph, there were two distinct groups of listeners. Some heard only the scratches on the record. Others, who listened more deeply, heard the "master's" voice...

Our lives have been very confusing, scratchy and unclear. But we are starting to hear the message of THE MASTER that is coming through loud and clear but only if we have ears to hear it.

jami

August 24, 2002

On August 17th Graci turned 4 years old.  She is officially a "big girl" now.  We were crossing the street to go into the store and I put my hand down to hold hers.  She looked up at me and said, "It's okay mom I'm 4 now, I'n (she gets her m's and n's mixed up) a big girl, I can cross the street all by myself."  I am constantly amazed with her – well, with all my children. It's one of life's great mysteries to me that I am their mother and am supposed to be teaching them about life but there's no way that I could teach them more about life than they teach me every day...  I took Graci to my mom's and then went to pick the boys up at school.  As soon as they got in the car they said, "Where's Grace?"  I said, "I took her to MaMa so that we could go get her a birthday present."  You would have thought we were going to Disney World.  They were totally psyched.  But they were  upset that they didn't know ahead of time so that they could have gotten their own money.  I told them that I would pay for the gifts..."but mom, I want to buy her something from me.  I know exactly what I'm gonna get her...I can't wait to see her face when she opens it..."  My heart swelled with pride and joy as I listened to my 10 and 8 year old boys swim in excitement at the thought of giving.  Little did they know they had given me a priceless gift before we ever made it to the store...Isn't that the way Abba (Daddy God) is?  He gives us a wealth of knowledge and blessing in the children we step over every day.  Sometimes when I see parents ignoring thier children I want to say to them, "...Better listen up, you're missing the key to a treasure that you only have a certain window of time to open...if you're not careful you'll miss it,  soon they'll be gone and the treasure will be forever lost."

Totally off the subject:  I was talking to my Daddy the other day just remembering regrets I have in Levi's last days.  But in talking about it I thought maybe it wasn't as bad as I thought... while Levi was in ICU there was an "incident" that I was ashamed of.  Levi had just been extibated (breathing tube taken out) he was really struggling to breathe, turning a little blue even, there was fear in his eyes... there seemed to be no concern on the part of the doctors and nurses.  Jeff, Lori and I kept going out to the nurses and saying, "there's a problem here, he's really struggling, could we get some help? (trying to be nice but wanting terribly to punch someone) every time, they would say, "we'll be in there in a minute."  Well this happened about 4 times.  It went on for about 20 minutes... I wanted to remain calm for Levi's sake.  If he saw me panic then he would know something was really wrong.  But it was too much for me.  I lost it.  I won't go into detail but it was not pretty,  I went head long into panic mode, went out of the room talking VERY loudly to anyone who would listen...it was just a few seconds before every nurse and doctor within shouting distance was in our room...  Levi was laying in bed with tubes running out of him, wide eyed watching the whole incident.  I felt like a failure, I had lost control and made Levi feel even more afraid at the sight of me pointing and screaming at anyone who had ears...I wondered if he was ashamed of me. I have regreted that day for the better part of 9 months.  But then the other day Caleb, Jonah, Graci and I were watching a show about a man fighting (literally) for his son to get treatment at a hospital that was denying him care for insurance reasons.  Caleb looked up at me and said, "Would you do that for us?"  I said, "Caleb there is no limit to what I would be willing to do for y'all... his face showed full satisfaction in that answer.  It's like it gave him a deeper security in my love and devotion to him, a pride if you will.   All of a sudden my mind went back to that day at the hospital.  I thought for the first time.  Maybe Levi was not ashamed of me for losing it.  Maybe he saw something good.  Maybe he saw me loving him the best way I could.  Maybe he wasn't ashamed of me after all,  maybe he was proud.  Wow, that thought gave me relief.  Oh Lord,  May it be true that in that day that I saw as a failure he saw a mom that was willing to fight for him.  I hope, I hope, I hope....

    Lately, my heart has been packed full with thoughts and memories that are less than comfortable.  Which has brought me to this place of  "ponder".  Lord, why is life so hard?  Why is it that every person that has ever totally sold out to you has had a life packed with trials, failures, tragedy, pain????  Why does that happen? Why is it that the more answers I find about you the more questions I find as well?  Why is it that the more You mold me into Your image and will, the more I see how far away from that goal I am?

When will I get to that place of comfort that I long for?????  NEVER.  My latest "lesson" is that comfort has nothing to do with walking with Christ.  As a matter of fact if comfort is what I want I'd better "back out" now. 

There was a letter found in the rubble of a Jewish ghetto in Poland after it was bombed by the Nazis.  It was written by a child and it echos my heart... "Lord, I do not ask you to make my life easy, I do ask you to make me strong."   

And Jesus said, " I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the Kingdom of heaven."  Matthew 18:3

jami

August 8, 2002

I can't believe that Summer is almost over. We went to Caleb and Jonah's orientation for school and I walked by the kindergarten class that would be Levi's. What a stab of pain went through my heart as I looked at all the children in their little desks, wide eyed at their new, grown up status. "Little man" couldn't wait until school. He would walk past that same classroom and say, "that'll be my room when I'm a big boy." I wanted to walk in that classroom and tell them all how sorry I was that they were missing a treasure and they didn't even know it. I wanted to tell the teacher that I was sorry that she would never get the chance to meet her very favorite student... that if she had known him for even one minute she would be overwhelmed at the magnitude of her loss... surely that class would be better if they only knew him for a little while... I know that I am better because I knew him for a little while...

Sometimes I am "used to" having three children here. But then other times I am slapped in the face with the shock of missing one. Every night I go up to check on them one last time before I go to sleep. They're usually in their own beds and I go from room to room kissing, staring, praying... but this night they had all congregated in Caleb's room (Levi's old room) they were all crowded in the double bed... 1,2,3...all of a sudden the lack of one hit me. I gasped out loud at the pain of it. I just kept saying in my heart, "there should be 4, but there's only 3." In my mind I pictured him there right in the middle just like they used to "line up" when they all laid in bed together. I pictured him with his arms over his head and his mouth opened, his chest going up and down with heavy breath, even with an occasional snore. So peaceful, they all were, unscathed by the harsh realities of the pain and tragedy life gives. It seems like just last night when I had the privilege of seeing them all together, when I would look at their little shoes and clothes laying on the floor, knowing they would ALL be worn again. But now all of Levi's clothes are in a box, never to be "warm" again. I hate that!! I hate that!! I hate that!!!

Obviously, I'm not feeling to great today. The courage thing is not enticing to me today. I'd rather curl up in a ball and cry for what used to be mine, have pity on myself for what might have been but will never be ,now... I feel sad for my other children that they have to be familiar with such loss. Just for now...when I get up from this computer I will choose to be grateful for what I have today.

Yesterday we were driving down the road... out of the blue Caleb asked if I dressed Levi before he went into the casket. At first I couldn't remember exactly what transpired in those blurry days...then I told him that "no, the 'funeral guy' did it." He was shocked and said, "Why? you're his mom, you should have done it." All of a sudden I felt angry that I wasn't allowed to. Then I felt shame that I didn't demand to be the one to dress him for the last time. Why didn't I? What was I thinking? Then my anger turned into sadness... All of a sudden I remembered the day before he died. I was getting ready to leave the house. My mom was staying with him. Every time I walked past him he would put out his arms for a hug and his eyes would well up in tears. I would say, " Oh Levi, I'll be right back..." Then he said, "but what if I don't get to say good-bye?" I had forgotten about that comment until now. Did he know that he was going soon? Why would he say that? My mind is desperately trying to remember more... then Jonah says, "I wish Levi could have died on my birthday, then your birthday wouldn't be the worst day of your life." I said, "but then your birthday would be the worst ever." Sweet, sweet Jonah... "I know mom but I'd rather it be my worst day than your worst day...." Caleb chimed in, "I wish he could have lived long enough to open his Christmas presents. You know how he loved to open presents." Graci: "I wished he could have stayed for my birthday (next week) because I love him... she is really struggling in her mind with the "overness" of seeing Levi again (here). The other day she said, "Mom, I have tears because I want Levi" I said, "Me too Grace, I miss him sooo bad." Graci: "I want to go see him." Me: "Okay, maybe we'll go to the grave site tomorrow." Graci: "No, I want to see him when his eyes were closed." Sadness flooded my heart when it hit me that she was talking about him in the casket. I guess she knows that she can't see him alive but she'll settle with seeing him in the casket...sooo sad... as you can see, our conversations jump from bad to worse some days...

I am grateful for all we have learned through our tragedy. I still believe that Jesus is doing something way bigger than I can see. I still believe that His ways are better than ours which means Levi's death was best (which is really hard to say) . But my heart is still bleeding. I can step back and see a bit of the big picture but for the most part my daily life collides with that big picture and blows it out of the water. I miss him. I miss the simpler days. I even miss my naiveté, believing that I was completely safe from such a tragedy because my God would not allow that to happen to me. I was, in my mind, protected because surely the Lord knew that I could never survive such loss... I still choose to serve a God that I can't explain..."To Him who is able to keep me from falling and to present me before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy." (Jude 24).

jami

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