Tuesdays will generally be a more difficult day for me as they contain most of my arranged weekly counseling appointments. I hear stories that are heartbreaking. Instead of shirking away, by God's grace, I dive right in--carefully understanding issues and separating one issue from another, working to understand the thoughts and feelings behind these issues, fitting them within the larger pattern of one's life, and ultimately, working to hold these thoughts, feelings, events, and relationships before the light of the Gospel.
All that to say, as I'm working through my next sermon on Philippians (1:3-6), I have been convicted anew about the need for gratitude. I need not resolve every point of suffering or conquer every sin in order to be grateful. I simply need remember Christ's mercy (Rom. 12:1). I often think of attacking sin and suffering in order to attain gratitude. The reality is, gratitude is a mighty weapon in itself.
And on a tough day like this, I go back to gratitude. There is one worldly episode that, for me, will probably give me gratitude until the day I die. And the episode, unsurprisingly, was a very hard one.
I got a call from my wife one day this past November, and she was crying. A radiologist had X-rayed what appeared to be a meaningless cyst in her ovaries, but now looked to be cancerous and life-threatening. I encouraged her as best I could and told her to get home as soon as she could. As soon as she hung up, I broke down.
This was the worst possible news. There were no two people in this world I cared about more than my wife and my unborn baby. My wife is my best friend--my "meta-partner"--the one with whom I stand over the world. No matter what happens any given day, I can lie down next to her at the end of the night and sort it all out (and she can do the same with me). My baby was the object of my dreams--the one I had envisioned caring for from my childhood days. Now, both lives seemed threatened.
In addition, I am the man. I am the first line of defense and whatever threatens either my wife or my child must pass through me. And I will always be ready to give my life to protect them. Except, this time, I was helpless. I could only offer up my wife and child to the Lord and profess in practice what I have long professed in word.
My wife and I talked late into the night for much of the next couple of weeks. We reflected on God's grace to us--from life in Christ to the ways in which He blessed our dating, our engagement, and our marriage. We reflected on God's grace in the previous couple of months--our trip to Malawi, His care for our brother in a time of crisis, and the blessed gift of this pregnancy in the wake of all of that.
In considering God's grace, we grew in gratitude. And so, when we learned of our baby's sex during this time, we named him Seth, which means literally, "God has appointed." We would pray for mother and baby by name. And on the day of my wife's surgery, our gratitude gave way to hope in a future secured by God and we decided on the house that we would move into.
And as my precious wife was wheeled into the operating room, her prayers were transformed by God from desperate pleas into expressions of gratitude. Again, gratitude is a mighty weapon in itself.
Two heartbeats. That was the first thing my wife heard when she awoke from her surgery.
And now, as I do what I feel called to do and serve the Lord amidst so much brokenness and at times feel emptied by it, I think of my wife--my best friend--and my baby boy--the object of my dreams, and my heart is filled with gratitude. At least for the present season, God has granted my wife and boy more days in this vale of tears, along this pathway of hope. And I have been taught, through hardship, that my hope is not found in providing security to them, but in knowing that they belong body and soul, in life and death, to Jesus Christ our Lord.
