I think New Year’s Eve is such a letdown. It’s never quite lived up to expectation. When we’re younger, we get all dolled up, put on our best outfits and attitudes, and go out merry-making for the night. We talk of dreams and resolutions, of best-laid plans and hopes for the new dawn. And then the dawn happens, and we’re the same (some maybe a little worse for wear). We sluggishly move about, still grasping for that sense of newness from the prior evening; yet, it has already been diminished at the first sound of something going awry. Little by little, that chipping away occurs. The new year that we’d hoped to chisel into a shining beacon slowly becomes a distorted version of itself—somehow lesser than we had imagined.
It happens most years. At least, it used to, before faith becomes a true presence in our lives.
Fourteen years and four days ago, my family went through unspeakable pain. The new year had dawned and hope was on the horizon. My dad’s transplant had gone well and the doctors were more than optimistic that he’d make it through. Eight days later, he died from something totally unexpected. The crushing sense of defeat was palpable. None of us knew where to turn, where to lay our frustrations and grief. We were lost for a long time, searching for ways to reclaim the lives of joy and love that we’d lived prior to his loss. Finally, with nowhere else to turn, and after a couple of years—yes, years—of heartache, we started seeking God again. None of us were against God, but we were nominal Christians; people who espoused faith but only when things were normal or good. I want to be honest about that. Church was so low a destination on Sundays that it didn’t even eclipse going to the store for Sunday football beers. It just wasn’t in our maps app. Our GPS wasn’t pointed to GOD, it was headed in other directions.
It took time to make that turn, to reroute our lives and face the only source big enough to handle the immensities of our hurt. It took time to look at God, not from afar, but from the vantage point of our knees, begging Him to accept us back home and to help lift the burdens of our troubled spirits.
Fast forward to these past few days. Again, our little family has been torn asunder. Yet, even with the gaping chasm left by Duane’s absence, we are different. We have been refined. Sure, we’re sad—unmistakably and deeply torn—but it’s different. The love is no less and the loss is overwhelming, but we have something we didn’t have before.
We have faith. Real faith. Not the faith that crumbles away at the first sight of misery, but the power of belief that sustains, guides, and gives reassurance. It’s this faith that has been the difference all along this lengthy process of Duane’s battle. He had it, too. I remember multiple conversations from my dad’s death and have been replaying them in my mind and comparing them to the one’s we’re having now. What a change, and what a boon. The realization that God doesn’t ‘do’ anything to us, rather than having already done everything for us is miraculous. None of us are happy right now, but none of us are hopeless, either.
If I were to give any advice to my younger self, it would be to seek God first rather than last. To ground myself in good soil of perfect love rather than seeking the hard paths on the periphery. I have watched my mother turn from an angry soul to an accepting servant. Her remarks and outlook have been wondrous to behold—she understands now, because she has the kind of faith only brought about by living into it every day, not just the ones that are good. I have watched my wife, Nicole, do the same. And I have seen it in myself.
Many of you who are my friends on facebook, and not regulars at the church, are the target of this writing. No matter the hole you find yourself in, seek faith. Seek that reassurance from an immovable source, the eternal God. I promise you that your life will be changed forever. That seeking can come in the form of finding a friend (like me or someone else) who has tread those roads already and can help you find a space to grow. Because we’re still growing, still getting it wrong occasionally, still frustrated and sad and lonely and all the other things. But we also have the grace of God that reroutes us back to the road of love.
I cannot imagine how we made it through without God in those first years, and I cannot fathom His absence now.
Duane has died. We are heartbroken. Yet, the peace that passes all understanding has kept our hearts and minds in the knowledge of God; and His blessings shine upon us. We are not in pieces, rather we are walking back toward peace, albeit slowly, to the Redeemer of our souls.
And what a blessed walk that is, for grief is the price we pay for love. And it’s in that grief that we walk, feeling the love we lost, as well as the love God shines upon us, along the way.
Faithfully,
Fr. Sean+