Problems are for Solving

Those who read my blog have likely noticed that there hasn’t been anything there. I planned (and still will) to put some more of the writings I’ve done after previous miscarriage out on the web, but just haven’t done so.

For those who came in late, 15 days ago during a routine OB visit we found out that our baby is dead. Since then, there has been no change, and Theresa has not yet finished miscarrying.

The waiting is hard on both of us, but especially so on Theresa. Her body still is acting like a normal pregnancy and is a nearly constant reminder of the death of our little one.

Please continue to remember us in prayer. This continues to be hard, and we are steadfastly trying to trust God’s timing and care in all of it.

As I’ve written, we found out Tuesday that we’ve lost another child. This is the eighth miscarriage for us. For most of them, the first warning sign we had was the beginning of bleeding. On this one we found out during an ultrasound. That happened once before, in our second miscarriage, the first of six in a row between Peter and Margary. Below is something I wrote as I grieved over that child.

(written June/July, 2002)

Bon Voyage T.o.D.

My wife began bleeding today. There are many times in our marriage that this has happened for many different reasons-but this is only the second of this one. In contrast from the first time-we knew this was coming.

Something wasn’t right-that’s what she told me over the phone only weeks ago. She was having cramping and had passed some mucus-either one of which wouldn’t have alarmed her-but together they came and she had a feeling something was wrong.

It had been about eight weeks since she was late and we took a test. There’s the line! Another baby! What joy we had at knowing that God had chosen to bless this unlikely pair with another child.

We went to the wrong doctor’s office. We didn’t mean to-there was an OB/Midwife group in the same building, with the same address, one upstairs, one downstairs. We didn’t know any better and waited downstairs for over an hour before the mistake was realized.

A midwife came back to work on a sunny day. It was after 3:30 and it was perfect outside for enjoying God’s world. Not too hot-not too humid. And she came back to work. The upstairs nurse was a gem-a real kindred spirit. She laughed and joked with us-this was our seventh pregnancy in as many years.

Out came the Doppler. No heartbeat could be found. No worries, they told us-it’s not rare at twelve weeks to not be able to locate the baby with the Doppler. We’ll sneak back and give you a free ultrasound.

My wife’s uterus measured just right for a 12 week pregnancy. But the sack was empty-no heartbeat, no baby. Something was wrong-my wife’s intuition was correct. What could it be? Is the baby gone? Did we do something wrong?

We had to come back tomorrow. The trained ultrasound technician would be necessary to have an internal sonogram. That would show for sure what was going on inside my wife. Not to worry-the midwife who performed the ultrasound wasn’t a trained expert and might have missed something. Go, have some blood taken at the lab and then come back tomorrow afternoon.

Friday. Nothing. A blighted ovum, the doctor said. No embryo from the conception. No baby. We were happy to know that there was no baby-no miscarriage. But the doctor was wrong. A blighted ovum is a conception-it is a child.

We found out that some blighted ovums, or those diagnosed as such, eventually grow into a long-term pregnancy. We held out hope that our child would be spared and that God would let us meet him.

Today my wife started bleeding. We knew it would happen soon-but we had hoped it wouldn’t. In the back of our minds we knew that our baby was dead-but we hoped yet that God would spare him. God can bring back a child from the dead-we know that-and God can show mercy as He wishes.

Theodore-that means a gift from God. That is the boy’s name my wife had selected. Danielle if he were a she. Theodore or Danielle. T.o.D. We’ve named all of our children before they were born-from our first (MoZ-for Moriah or Zechariah).

Funny how life works sometimes. Certainly our God is good and knows beyond our greatest wisdom. As I was typing the above more than two weeks ago my wife called to me from the bathroom. The bleeding had increased. She then proceeded to pass out. We called the midwife who said to head to the hospital.

We were sad, of course. We still are. We’ve lost a child before-and though it is somewhat easier to adjust this time having gone through it once already, it still hurts a whole bunch to lose a child.

Simeon. Simeon or Anna. Those were the names we’d picked out for the child we lost in 1999. That one was much harder. We’d just moved from South Carolina to Illinois where we knew no one. My grandmother had just died causing me to leave my wife and children for a funeral in Colorado. That was the first time we’d spent two nights in a row apart since we’d been married almost four years before. And then came the call from work-that she’d had spotting.

We barely knew anyone from church-only having been here a couple of months. People pitched in to watch the kids while we went to the doctor-and then to the hospital. It was a bad experience checking in that time-my wife was bleeding out a miscarriage and they seemed to be most concerned about getting our billing information down. So much for the only pro-life hospital in town. Theresa spent the night in the hospital and I came home to a baby-sitter I’d barely met and my children. I got back to the hospital early the next day and she was discharged. The hospital was so-so and the doctors were nothing to write home about-and so we chose not to use either again.

This time the hospital experience started out great and went downhill quickly. The ER nurses were fantastic. No wasting time with paperwork-and I was never asked to leave my wife’s side. The downhill part is mostly due to primadonna doctors. They tried to get us to sign a release form without talking to us first. The anesthesiologist was visibly perturbed at having to come all the way to the 7th floor on a Saturday for a consultation before the surgery. Our latest doctor (his last service) was incommunicative and elitist as he pretended to care for us. So much for the health-don’t-care-industry.

The neatest part about this miscarriage is the way God took care of us through it. When Theresa passed out we had ‘houseguests.’ I put that word in quotes because as of the next day we were moving out and they were renting our home. Because they were there in God’s providence, I didn’t have to call an ambulance and I was able to be with my wife during this difficult time. The next morning we had one friend who showed up early (she answered her phone at 10:30 the night before) to watch the children, and another friend who answered the call at 6:30 AM to oversee our move.

It’s a strange Saturday when people show up to help someone move and the people who are moving don’t. It’s truly amazing to me when I think of how well God took care of us that weekend. We closed on our new house on Friday morning, planted the beans and tomatoes in the new yard that afternoon, and went to the emergency room that night. On Saturday while I was attending to my wife men and women who we didn’t see got most of our stuff loaded into a truck (after unloading the new renters’ things into the house) and over to our new house. When we got home in the evening that day sure most of our stuff was in the garage, but Theresa’s mattress was made up and ready to sleep on and I had no problem finding what I needed to get the kids to bed.

The next day three men (on Father’s Day mind you!) showed up after church and helped me move all of the big items into the house from the garage, into the proper rooms, and put together all of the beds. As of 48 hours after the beginning of the final stages of the miscarriage there was nothing in our garage that I couldn’t lift myself other than what we’d planned on storing there already.

I think it’s easier this time for another reason. Since we’ve lost another covenant child before we have some confidence that ToD is enjoying playing with Simeon or Anna. In the presence of Jesus Himself. We miss both of these children that so many will meet before we do-and we long for the day when we too will be with the Lord and finally fellowship with them. God, for His wise eternal purposes, has spared these children of my poor fathering and the hardships of this sinful world and has chosen to keep them to Himself. Though I miss my children-I’ve long since learned that arguing with God never works.

It’s 5:00 now. I couldn’t sleep tonight for whatever reason-between asthma and allergies and other things. So I finished this. I’m glad it got saved before we left for the hospital. I would never have remembered to finish it otherwise.

I hope that you can see a bit of my life in this struggle and know me better. I know that I have been able to know God more through what He has brought us through. Please join with me in wishing T.o.D. a hearty bon voyage. I know he’s already at his destination and probably has been there for some time (can you say that someone’s been in eternity for some time?) but I never finished saying good-bye.

Good bye ToD. Rest well with Jesus. The tears in my eyes right now won’t be there when you meet me-that will be after Jesus has wiped away all my tears like He’s already done for you. I don’t have to wish that God will be with you until we meet again-He’s with you in a way I can’t fully understand yet. Good bye my child. I loved you imperfectly during the short time you were here and I will love you still forever, one day perfectly with His love. We will miss having known you but we know that you are better off and that our loving God has planned this for our good. Enjoy playing with your brother or sister-we’ll be there soon to enjoy you both.

You know, it’s funny. Not ha ha funny, but weird funny. I don’t think I ever grieved until now over to. Something about my ‘inspector gadget’ personality I guess that I didn’t grieve until I did it at a computer. It was just Monday morning when I finally set it up. Life changes quickly. Peter is now one and soon he’ll be walking and talking. As close together as our children are we’ve never really had a time without a baby. We had actually prayed before conceiving to that God would give Theresa a short respite between number 5 and 6. There was a time when we might have been tempted to be resentful at the conception-and that ended right before we found out TC was pregnant. We were able to rejoice whole-heartedly in the news of the new child coming.

Now we’ll have that space we prayed for before between children. Sure it’ll still likely be small compared to most people we know. All right all the people we know. But we were rejoicing in the new face we’d be seeing later this year. And we’re still sad that we won’t be able to look into that face until after we see Jesus’ face-but we know that it won’t hurt at all then. It’s just kind of weird to think about the house without a baby.

Toby is finally getting potty-trained, and Elsie is close on his heels. For the first time since 1997 we may have only one child in diapers. I got married in 1995. If you had told me then that we’d have five plus years with two or more children in diapers, with most of the time being three-I’d have said you were crazy or walked away from the marriage, I’m not sure which. In hindsight I so often am glad that God doesn’t tell us in advance what our decisions are bringing in His providence. There are so many things I would have done differently if I’d known then what I know now. But I wouldn’t know Christ the way I do had I not gone through all of those difficulties I so wanted to avoid.

I’m sure this is another time like that. A time I wish I didn’t have to go through-the loss of a child and the adjustment to that reality. But a time in which God is cultivating His Spirit’s fruit in my life. A time aimed as all times are-at making us more like Christ.

Bon voyage, ToD. We’ll not forget you. We’ll see you soon.

Marquette Heights, IL
July 2002

As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival. Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. My soul is cast down within me; therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon, from Mount Mizar. Deep calls to deep at the roar of your waterfalls; all your breakers and your waves have gone over me. By day the LORD commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life. I say to God, my rock: “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” As with a deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. (Psalms 42:1-11)

Years ago a friend wrote a song based on this Psalm:

Where is my joy, when all around is sorrow?

Where is my light when night is all I see?

Why is my soul in agony despairing, where is my hope, my song of victory?

I shall again praise my God. There may be those who wonder where He is when sorry strikes like it has to my family this week. I know where He is. He is holding me together. He is keeping me from falling. And He keeps despair and death at the door. I mourn in hope because of His grace, and today I will get out of bed because I know He lives, He loves, and He sustains my soul. Lucy Anne followed those words with:

My joy is in the God of my salvation

His Word will light the shadows of my heart.

So I will hope in God who is my comfort,

Who gives a song of joy when sorrows start.

May God give all who grieve that song of joy today–and may every one of us pant for His love and grace as the dear for water.

Canadian doctor warns Sarah Palin’s decision to have Down baby could reduce abortions | Top of the Ticket | Los Angeles Times
Published reports in Canada say about 9 out of 10 women given a diagnosis of Down syndrome choose to terminate the pregnancy through abortion.

I had planned to write a post today, starting a different track on abortion: that of what we can do to stop it while it’s legal.

But this article crossed my screen and it made me mad enough that I wanted you to see it. A woman choosing (yep, Sarah Palin chose to have that baby knowing its frailties) to have the baby is an inadequate choice. Because other people might see her and realize that it’s not the boogeyman the NARAL pundits make it out to be. Because other women might not abort so many children. Wow. That’s horrible. [/sarcasm]

The issue is the lives of these babies, and whether they get to have one or not. I can’t choose to end your life, and neither of us should be allowed to choose to end the life of another. Especially a defenseless child in the womb.

HT: TJ

…on 9/11/01?

On September 10, 2001, my parents had been visiting and we left the Peoria area, following their RV, for St. Louis. Just outside of St. Louis, only a few miles from the campground where we’d be staying that night, Clifford’s (the big red van, yes) fuel pump died. Dead. Six lane road, at the stop light, van full of children (including Peter who at the time was just shy of 3 months old).

We managed to get everyone loaded into the RV and I waited (somebody helped me tow the van out of traffic) for the AAA tow guy to come and take it to a mechanic. They were able to get it in and told us they could finish it in the morning.

The next morning (before we’d gone to pick up the van) dad and I were working on clearing a drain in the RV and somebody came up and told us that we should turn on a TV because somebody had just flown a plane into the World Trade Center. We missed the second plane, but we saw the people jumping and the buildings drop to the ground even as firefighters were running in.

Moriah, who was just five then, was asking questions and we were explaining, some of us through tears, what was going on. After a bit of watching we decided we needed to go on with our day.

When dad and I went to pick up the van, there were lines around the block at many gas stations. People were acting erratically.

We had planned to go up in the arch, but it was closed (or we knew it would be). But still we went to the zoo. I remember vividly finding a dollar bill in the parking lot and not letting the kids touch it because of the anthrax scare going on, and I remember there being a feeling of haze over our visit. I have more memories of the previous trip to the zoo when Elsie was a few months old than I do of this one.

Since that day, things have changed. But on that day, and every day, I am thankful that I know, would I have been in that building or someplace nearby, or in any dangerous place, that God is watching over me and that death takes me Home.

Many families still mourn the losses of that day, as do I. But one thing that was true before 9/11 and is true since: God is merciful and slow to anger and wishes to bestow His grace on all who will repent and turn to Jesus.

So in that crisis, and every crisis, an opportunity exists to turn to Jesus for forgiveness and life. He is the only one in whom it is found, and He gives it freely to all who ask in faith.

Sunday I posted that we are expecting another child. We are joyously fearful in that news. We are joyous because this child is a life, being knit together inside Theresa, and is an amazing and wonderful creature in God’s image. And we are fearful because between Peter and Margary we lost six children to miscarriages and at one point in 2006 we thought we were losing Margary too. And God allowed her to be with us and she is a deep joy in our lives. One that we wouldn’t trade for anything.

Death is ever present in this world. Death surrounds us every day, and we ignore it or embrace it, but it is there whether we remember or not. And Jesus comes to bring freedom from death and it’s power, and He will destroy death in the last day.

9/11 was the last day on earth for thousands of people. Today may be mine, and I pray that I will live it in the same way that I would if I knew that. And one day will be yours. Don’t hesitate to come to Jesus and be freed from the sting of death. Consider where you were, and where you should be. Come, repent, and live.

I received a comment from someone on this post from the Coalition for Secular Government. They called the amendment I was touting in Colorado, “a monstrous evil.”

I found the contradiction ironic. Secular government coalition using the term “monstrous evil.” How do they know? What constitutes a monstrous evil? How do they know that this is evil?

I believe that the killing of defenseless people is murder, and therefore it is evil. Murder is a violation of God’s law (6th commandment, 5th for my Lutheran readers), and God says it’s wrong. Throughout God’s Word he elaborates on why and when killing is murder, and when it is not. And killing Jews because you don’t like them is murder (Hitler). Killing citizens because they might rise up against tyranny is wrong (Stalin). And killing your baby because he might change your life in a way you don’t like is murder (3,500 babies today, tomorrow and the next day).

And I can say this beyond doubt because I’m relying on a standard outside myself. This is evil. Life is good. End of argument.

For the Coalition for Secular government, defining good and evil is somewhat more complicated. Who gets to decide what is good and evil? Majority vote? Nine men and women in black robes? The Coalition for Secular Government?

You see, neither Hitler nor Stalin believed what they were doing was wrong. And they religiously attacked those who they hated, and used their power to kill.

People who do not love babies viciously attack the unborn and kill them. And other women are either fooled into believing their babies are not human or are lead to think they have no other options when in fact those options exist. To the tune of 1 baby murdered for every 3 babies born.

God created us to be worshiping beings. It’s written into our makeup as creatures created in His image. We were created to worship Him. homo adoranis. homo sapien is inadequate.

And that natural proclivity to worship is undeniable and inescapeable. Even the rebellious who turn their backs on God worship something. It may be a baseball team. It may be an ideal, even an ideal that is a good ideal like personal liberty. It may be personal peace and affluence. For everyone, there is something in your life that is worth more than anything else. Even if that something is yourself.

The Coalition for Secular Government worships secularism. They want to be freed from all reminders that they were created by a sovereign, loving, just, holy God. And they want to make laws with no foundation. And their false worship will drive them further from God as they try to bury His image into something unrecognizable. And Jesus Himself, in David’s Psalm 2 tells us that this will happen, even among the kings of the earth:

Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying, “Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.”
(Psalms 2:1-3)

But they can’t. Because it’s inescapable. God exists. The next verse in Psalm 2 says He laughs at these efforts. His image in man exists. And so even they will use the term “monstrous evil,” even though they don’t have any way to define what is evil and what is good.

True religion involves turning to the creator and submitting to Him.

Sad thing is that you can’t. Not on your own at least. And that is why the loving, holy, sovereign God sent His own Son to become a man and to pay for the rebellion of people like you (and me!), and to bring into the world the power to turn from death and darkness and evil to a loving Son who takes us to the Father in forgiveness.

I know what is good and evil because Jesus came to divide the waters and to give evil people like me life for death and a heart of flesh for a heart of stone. May those at the Coalition for Secular Government turn to and honor King Jesus, and may each of us do this today and every day.

Matthew 25 Network
mission statement
The Matthew 25 Network is a community of Christians – Catholic, Protestant, Pentecostal, and Evangelical – inspired by the Gospel mandate to put our faith into action to care for our neighbor, especially the most vulnerable.

The election of our public officials, and the politics they stand for, are a reflection of our core values. We believe that those elected to public office carry an important trust, as their decisions have a profound impact on our nation and our world.

We believe that people of faith should actively participate in the political process as an important avenue for social change. We are called by our faith to engage in the world as it is, while we seek after and hope for God’s Kingdom.

Therefore, while no elected official will be without flaw, we come together as individuals to support candidates for public office who share the values of the Matthew 25 Network: promoting life with dignity, caring for the least of these, strengthening and supporting families, stewardship of God’s Creation, working for peace and justice at home and abroad, and promoting the common good. (emphasis mine)

Sounds like something we can all get behind, right?

I want to call upon all Christians to actually vote in ways that will protect those who are most vulnerable: those children who our nation allows their own parents (with the help of licensed physicians, I might add) to murder while in the womb.

If you are a part of a church whose pastor is in the Matthew 25 Network, false shepherds who want to steal money from the rich in order to pay for, among other things, the murder of the unborn children of the poor, then you need to call on these leaders to repent.

May God have mercy on those who would lead so many astray.

I started to leave a comment on this post from Gabrielle, and then it turned into something long enough that I wanted it here.
———–

And because of this, even when our lives are pathetic and cranky, Jesus intercedes and redeems those things that are pathetic and cranky.

He gives us:
Beauty for ashes
An oil of joy for mourning
A garment of praise for a spirit of heaviness.

And He sometimes gives us hope for despair as well. Praise the Lord He is risen in power.

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to grant to those who mourn in Zion– to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified.
(Isaiah 61:1-3)

My friend Seth is working on a role playing game (RPG) that is akin to an improv play called A Flower for Mara. He discusses the “why” of the game here. His post, and Adiel’s, and the discussion that is the context for the “quote from me” in that post, caused me to think about grief and stories.

Grieving is something that for a long time I never really did. Not much, anyway. Some of it is related to how I handle crisis situations. I move forward, the greater the stress the calmer I am. So in a situation where others are sad and grieving, I step up and let them lean on me. And when the crisis is over I collapse, never really taking the time to grieve on my own.

Another part of it is pride. “I can handle it,” I tell myself. “Death is a part of life.” While it is true that death, and someone you know dying, is inevitable: so is grief.

Grief looks different for all of us. Some grieve quietly, some wail and moan as in deep, powerful, physical pain. Some cry, some become quiet. But grief, and some expression of it, is inherently human. It is bound up in the image of God that is in man alone—it is not exclusively human because God grieves. He grieves over our sin. He wept at the tomb of His friend. He groans with His creation is it waits for complete redemption. He speaks in sadness to Saul of Tarsus on the Damascus road.

Like all other aspects of the image of God in mankind, grief is marred by sin. Without Jesus, we grieve without hope. Without Jesus, grief can be consuming and become an idol in itself. Grief is among those emotions that is inherently good (God grieves), but which only exists because of sin. One day there will be no more grief. While these truths are important to remember—they are not the purpose of this post.

What makes me say that A Flower for Mara (AFM) sounds worthwhile is the power of story to help us grieve. Role playing games, at least as Seth designs them, are a group activity of collaborative story telling. We have a family tradition involving story telling in our Night of the Burning Plum celebration that happens each fall on Orange Street. And in those stories that are told are glimpses of the people who tell them. Just as God is reflected in His creation, so are our personalities and quirks and desires and thoughts and feelings reflected when we create. When we create stories, and tell stories, we reflect who we are to those who share the story with us. And (saying this not having “played” AFM) the Mara storyline is a time of reflecting the grief of the participants to one another and for us to see the grieving process in others in the absence of crisis. It is this grief in the absence of crisis that is intriguing to me, because that can only happen in the process of story. When grief hits in “real life” it is because of something devastating—either death or illness or accident intersecting with a life absent of that death or illness or accident immediately prior.

The possibilities are seemingly endless for community in the role playing of AFM. We are able to know one another better. We are able to encourage one another in our “following after God” creativity. We are able to enter into the past and present grief of our brothers and sisters through a “safer” mechanism than the actual crisis. We are able to see (and therefore recognize in the future) how one another grieve. This will make “weeping with those who weep” easier—because we will recognize grief and weeping our friends even when it looks decidedly different than our own grief.

I may have some more to say about this in the future, but these are some initial thoughts to keep the conversation going.

A few weeks ago we had to make a quick trip to northeastern Pennsylvania for a funeral. A man I admire had died.

This man fathered my wife’s mother–he is the first Christian in that side of my children’s line. And he was a godly great-grandfather to seventeen little ones, grandfather to sixteen and father of five.

He loved Jesus.

And so we were sad. And because we were sad we celebrated.

We celebrated his life.

Grandpa Rhodes now sits with Jesus. He has no pain and no sorrow and he will serve Christ forever with redeemed arms and legs and energy like he never dreamed of in his final days. And Jesus has shown him his inheritance and said “well done.”

My wife has been greatly influenced by her grandfather. She spent many summer days working beside him in the strawberry fields. She often talks of the hard summer and the hard work of the man who never quit. Retired three times he was always busy until close to the end when his 80+ year-old body failed him. And sin, and the death that comes through sin, became more real to him in that decaying body that lies silent in the grave now.

And so we celebrated. His sister told stories of when they were young, and his brother (who no-one expected to speak) pointed everyone there to the Scriptures that Alan Rhodes loved. This was a funeral he planned himself years ago after his stroke and it was a beautiful reminder of his life and his true life in Christ even as we grieved his death.

So long, Grandpa Rhodes. We will miss you here–but I would not wish upon you one more day in this dark, sinful place. May you enjoy glory forever. We will be there soon and then the celebration will never end. Because in that eternal celebration we will celebrate one death that conquered death forever–and we will rejoice in the life that he bought us. Forever.