“Don’t ask about that, please don’t ask.”

We got your autopsy report and an in-depth accident report
the other day.
I surprise myself by reading them thoroughly
multiple times,
examining the details carefully.
I didn’t think I’d do that, Noah,
I didn’t think I wanted to know.
For some reason,
I have found the topic of the accident and the details of the crash
to be off-limits in conversation
outside our family;
my heart grimaces at others’ curiosity
and silently pleads as they look into my eyes,
“Don’t ask about that,
please don’t ask.”
I do not want the questions
and the speculations do not comfort
me in the realities of your death.

But still I read about
the moments and the injuries that took your life;
the accident report pulled deep, gulping sobs
from my chest,
while the autopsy report made me
praise the Lord for His mercy to you.

You did not fear and
you did not suffer.
You did not feel the pain of your broken bones
or the agony of crushing injuries.
You did not have to wonder
what was happening
or what would happen to you.
You only had to die
instantly.

It is your mercy
that instead of surviving the severity of
your injuries
and the immense physical, mental and emotional
anguish and loss that would have followed for you,
you got to instantly enter the
glories of heaven
and the presence of our Lord.
It is the gift of mercy
given to you.

And this mercy I see you have received
strengthens my heart
as I look at the numbers on the pages:
The lengths of blood splatters 1, 2, 3 and 4,
the position of your glasses, 43' from where you were hit,
the position of your body, 58' from where you were hit,
the position of your bike, 76' from where you were hit,
and between your body and your bike
your dislodged safety reflector at 71'
flashing red
flashing red
flashing red...

I would have been there, Noah
I would have taken the hit for you,
or at very least,
I would have held your hand in the place where you landed...
but the fact that I could not
is the mercy I’ve received.

I saw the visual aftermath
in a lesser measure:
The blood was gone
but the spray paint remained,
and they had picked up your glasses;
your body was gone
but the matted grass remained,
and they had picked up your bike;
the flashing lights and investigators were gone
but the illustration and measurements remained
and they had picked up your beckoning red reflector.
While I would have held your hand
and offered you every ounce of strength I could muster
as your heart beat its last,
even as I let your brothers go before you,
God knew it would have been
more than my human heart could have withstood
and so He covered my eyes with mercy.

To know you did not fear
and you did not suffer;
you did not feel
and you did not wonder
is my comfort in the center of description
of things my eyes never have to see.

I know that to live is Christ,
and to die is gain;
and to know you’re whole in Heaven
is healing balm for my searing pain.

You have promised me a fountain.

Isaiah 41:18a “I will open rivers on the bare heights, and fountains in the midst of the valleys.”

a fountain in this valley
©9-21-12 hannah mclean

i am not alone here
in this valley so low
i do not grieve as one
who has no hope

i am not afraid here
in this valley so low
for there is a time to laugh
and a time to weep

but i am unhinged here
and i am broken
i am without words though
there’s much to be spoken
there are rivers of tears here
that flow from my eyes
and the cracks in my heart show
the force of my sighs

You promise fountains in these valleys
Living Water that will flow
without measure in these moments
fountains I now long to know

You promise fountains in these valleys
when deep cries out to deep
so I wait here in my sorrow
longing for the One who keeps

i am filled with the honest sorrow
of sincere love
and the pain of lost joy

my aching soul wonders
as it calls for the healing flow
of the fountain You have promised
in this valley so low

Questions

What am I to do?
©9-7-12 Hannah McLean
For my Noah Boa

There is a place beside me
that you are suppose to fill
but these days
when I reach my hand out
to grab hold of you
I feel only air rush past my fingers
and an aching emptiness.

Without you
I’ve a gaping hole
within arms reach
the constant reminder 
of what is lost.

What I am to do?
Do I rattle around in this space that is now
too large for me?
Can I wedge myself in
by filling the gap?

If I gather all my memories of you,
will they shelter me from the
razor sharp edges of your empty space?
If I pour out all my affection for you
will it cushion my feet from the
spitting stones on the ground where you no longer stand?
If I pull together all the photographs of you
will they distract from the
heart breaking reality that I can no longer look into your face?

...Or if I collect all the things that remind me of you
will it only prove to magnify the gap between us
and the broadness of the expanse you’ve left behind?

What am I to do
when the air rushes through
my reaching fingers
and the gnawing ache of emptiness
overflows me?
What am I to do?

Proven.

Today the pastor preached on these verses:
Luke 14:25–33 “Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?  Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.”

To clarify what this means, here is what is written of this place in the book of Matthew:
Matthew 10:37–39 “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

These verses always strikes me. I find it to be a hard passage, but not in the ways that I typically hear it explained.

To me, this is a passage that the Lord uses to encourage me and to lift me up. It is a place that brings to mind James 4:10 where it says, “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you.” What strikes me about this place in scripture is that every time I come to it, I know my failures and where I simply fall short; I come expecting to hear conviction or even condemnation...but instead, I hear, as I did in this morning's sermon, the gentle voice of God say to me,
“I asked for this, and you gave it to Me.
I took this from you, and still you praise Me.
I said 'No,' and you submitted to Me.
I told you to trust Me, and you endure pain as you wait on Me.
You are My disciple.
You are not perfect, but you are proven.”

And the hard emotional pains of the cost I have counted and found “worth it” wash over me, and they are always accompanied by a comfort that the God I live to glorify has been shown as worthy in my grittiest details of my heart and life.