Till We Are Home

We walked along the pavement of the parking lot to our car, heat radiating from the baked-in warmth of the day as the overhead lights shined through the remaining gloom of the day. The clock revealed we were well into the evening when I turned the engine on. All four of us piled into our large SUV, the third-row seat empty for the very first time as we headed home. 

Tears streaked our worn faces and somehow we had not reached the end of our tear duct reservoirs. We pulled away from the hospital, turning left onto the main road in silence save for some sobbing. I sat at the stoplight in a daze, barely comprehending the illuminated red of the light that haloed in my vision. My thoughts swirled over the past few hours, constantly coming back to one acutely painful realization: 

She wasn’t coming home with us…ever again.

Turning left at the light, approaching the courthouse in the middle of our town, we followed the flow of traffic around it, heading west along the country highway to our home. Once we rounded the courthouse, the setting sun’s soft, orange glow lit up the interior of our car as wispy clouds streaked toward the sun as if they were pulled down with it over the horizon.

We chased the sun toward our home, but as we sped further and further along, it descended further and further into the horizon. As it did so, my thoughts crumpled into mounds of despair thinking that I’ll never see my daughter again this side of heaven. The sun finally set on her life, but at an oh-so-painfully young age. 

How I had wished that reality to not be true! I didn’t want to turn into our neighborhood, to settle into a life without my little girl and admit she was truly gone. I wanted to keep heading west, chase the sun and maybe catch it before it could set on this new reality.

I think back to that day and those hours more often than I’d like to. These are not happy memories like the day I married my darling bride or those days when the Lord blessed me to see my children born. Those memories don’t fill my heart with joy like memories of our first home all together or the wonderful family vacations we took. No, that day and those hours after losing my youngest daughter bring so much pain and sadness.

Sometimes there are days when the sorrow I carry over my daughter is more manageable than others. Then there are other days or seasons when the waves of sorrow crash over me, deepening the weight of my loss more and more.  

In these days or seasons, I can often find myself yearning for her return or drawing further inward into my grief. Of course, I miss my little girl. And what father wouldn’t wish for days filled with a full house again – to have his lost little one back home with him again? I can get lost in these moments and question loads of things: why us? Why Isabel? Why now? Why are we the family who constantly carries this sort of pain when others around us don’t feel the same sting around certain dates, familiar roads, or even certain triggers from that day?

My trust is completely in the Lord, and I know what He’s done is according to His loving and wise plan. Yet, I’m starting to think some of these downward spiral questions may be coming from a heart that still has some growing to do out of seeming unbelief. 

In seasons like this, it’s good for us as Christians to read often, read widely, and hear from older saints who have gone before us. 

J.C. Ryle in his book, Holiness, speaks wonderfully and convictingly (I’m not sure that’s even a word) of our great need to live a Christ-like life. Ryle shares the following about losing loved ones:

“The very moment that believers die, they are in paradise. Their battle is fought; their strife is over. They have passed through that gloomy valley we must one day tread; they have gone over that dark river we must one day cross. They have drunk that last bitter cup which sin has mingled for man; they have reached that place where sorrow and sighing are no more. Surely we should not wish them back again. We should not weep for them – but for ourselves!

We are warring still – but they are at peace. 

We are labouring – but they are at rest. 

We are watching – but they are sleeping. 

We are wearing our spiritual armour – but they have forever put it off. 

We are still at sea – but they are safe in harbour. 

We have tears – but they have joy. 

We are strangers and pilgrims – but as for them, they are at home.

Surely, better are the dead in Christ than the living! Surely the very hour the poor saint dies, he is at once higher and happier than the highest upon the earth.” (J.C. Ryle, Holiness, p206)

When we drove home that fateful day, I began a journey of chasing the sun. In the forefront of my view was a wish that none of this new reality was true. If I could just reach the sun, the day would not set and further cement the truth that my little girl was gone. There would be no days ahead without her greeting me ‘good morning’ in the kitchen. If I could just reach the sun, then my sorrow would not be real.

There are still days I find myself chasing the sun with my questions of ‘why’ and wishes that all this were not true. Yet, as Ryle poignantly states, if that were true then my little girl would not be at peace…would not be at rest…would not have laid down her spiritual armour…would not be safe in harbour…would not be fully joyful and at home. She is higher and happier than anyone alive today, and more than she ever was in my home and more than I could make her happy.

May the Lord forgive me my evidences of unbelief in my questions and help me (and so many of you who have lost loved ones that feel that same bitter sting of loss) to see that my Isabel is not the one to be pitied, not the one to be wept over, but indeed I am. 

But, one day, I won’t.

One day my time will come to cross that great divide and walk the streets of gold. One day I will be before the throne of God and behold my Savior face-to-face. One day, I’ll be home and safe in harbour. So, in the hours and numbered breaths that remain, may I…may we turn our chasings of the sun heavenward and, like Paul, say, “to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” (Php 1:21)…

Till we are home…