Don't Waste This

It is such a beautiful spring morning, but the weather is completely hidden by the dim lights inside the church.  The rows of chairs are filled with friends and family, so many well-wishers who are gathered to surround this family with support and solidarity during their time of unspeakable loss. 

When the father, a foster parent friend of mine, steps up to the microphone and describes the moment last week when he placed his baby daughter into the doctor’s arms for the last time, and then used the pen to sign her death certificate, and then realized that he would never get to hold her again, there is not one dry eye in the room.  Heartbreak beyond explanation.

He is transparent in his grief.  He speaks of sobbing in the night, crying out to God, Please don’t waste this!  Meaning, please don’t let my baby girl have died in vain.  Please use her death for a greater purpose.  Please give meaning to our devastation.

It’s not fair!  Why would such a terrible thing happen to such a nice family?  A family who has stepped into this hard calling of foster care and has committed their life to serving the most weak and vulnerable?  After all they have done and given and served and sacrificed, shouldn’t good people like them be somehow exempt from tragedies like this?  Shouldn’t God be protecting them from suffering like this?

We expect foster care to be hard.  We know that welcoming a hurting child into our homes is messy and that the relationships of everyone involved can be complicated.  We see it again and again, foster parents giving sacrificially, so much more than they ever thought would be humanly possible to give.

What we don’t expect, the stories we don’t often talk about, is the non-foster-care related areas of our lives.  Our families.  Our health.  Our jobs.  Our finances.  We forget that just because we are devoting our lives to one of the hardest ministries imaginable, it doesn’t mean that we get a free pass to a trouble-free life.  It doesn’t mean that we are exempt from experiencing the same struggles that other families face. 

Even as we focus on caring for the weakest and most vulnerable members of our society, even as we love and nurture and bind up their broken bodies and give our all to heal their wounded hearts . . . even then life goes on.  And sometimes it doesn’t.

Our marriages get strained and can sometimes break apart.  Our biological children may become resentful and distant.  Our struggling teenagers might end up in a psychiatric hospital after attempting suicide.  We could be sitting in a doctor’s office holding someone else’s child in our arms as we hear the words, The test results show that you have cancer.  Some of us struggle with depression.  Sometimes our precious babies die. 

No, even as we walk in obedience to this life that God has called us to live, even then we are not immune to pain.

And in our grief, in the middle of the night when no one sees, we cry out to God, just as this heart-broken father did, Please don’t waste this!  Please don’t let our labor, our many sacrifices, this life of obedience be in vain.  Please use this pain for a greater purpose.  Please give meaning to all of this.

Occasionally foster parents get front-row seats to the miraculous.  We see lives transformed.  We see broken families find hope.  We see unwanted children become beloved sons and daughters.  And when that happens, it makes sense!  We know then that all the efforts, all the sacrifices have been worth it.  All the pain has served a greater purpose.

But seeing the miracle is not faith.  Faith is what grows in the darkness.  It is invisible.

Faith is like a tiny seed buried deep in the darkness, hidden and maybe even forgotten.  In the secret places of the heart where only God can see, something beautiful is happening.  Faith is growing.

Faith grows when, despite our most earnest, our most fervent prayers, God remains silent.  When the hoped-for miracle never happens.  When it seems as if we have devoted our entire lives to something meaningless and empty.  When wounded children never heal.  When our very best parenting strategies and nurturing and attempts to connect don’t seem to be making any impact at all.  If, when God seems distant and absent, we learn to trust His unending goodness, this is not wasted.

In the darkness is when we learn to stand by faith.  Sometimes we fight by faith, and sometimes we walk by faith.  But sometimes, there is nothing we can do.  We see no way forward.  But that doesn’t mean we give up or give in.  It means we stand.  By faith, we stand firm with confidence, waiting expectantly for the Lord to make a way.  If, in the struggle, we learn what it means to stand by faith, this is not wasted.

When our children struggle.  When the diagnosis is confirmed.  When a baby dies.  When nothing makes sense, when the tears don’t seem as if they will ever stop, we learn, perhaps for the first time, what it means to have a Comforter.  To be able to hide under the shadow of His wings.  If, in the midst of our deepest grief, we learn that His grace is sufficient, that He is enough for everything we need, this is not wasted.

As this father, the one who lost his baby, shares his thoughts with those of us who are grieving with him, we see a tiny peak into the faith that is growing in his heart.  He says, I look forward to the day when I enter heaven, see my daughter’s face again, and hold her, finally, in my outstretched arms.  I now know what it means to long for heaven in a way I never would have known had I still been holding her in my arms today.

The end of this child’s young life is tragic and bitter.  Heartbreaking in every way.  We can never minimize this dear family’s terrible grief.  However, already we can see, in this father’s heart, that there is a purpose.  There is meaning in this devastating loss.

Seeing a little seed of faith become just a little bit stronger.

Learning that God is indeed enough and that His grace is sufficient.

Finding sweet comfort in His loving arms.

Standing with confidence, waiting for Him to work.

Gaining a new perspective, a new longing for heaven.

Something beautiful is indeed growing!  In our weaknesses and struggles and pain, in the midst of unspeakable loss, we can be sure of one thing . . . even in this there is a purpose.  This has meaning.  God is using all of it for our good.  He is using the ugly – the dark and messy and invisible - to create something of infinite beauty in our hearts and in our lives.

Yes, even in this we can absolutely trust His promise . . .

This will not be wasted.