The Gift

Last Sunday I had the honor of leading the opening, “bidding” prayer at the traditional service of Festival of Lessons and Carols at my church.  This bidding prayer says:

"Beloved in Christ, we gather this morning to hear the message of Gabriel, to journey with the shepherds, and with the Magi to kneel in awe and adoration before the gift of the Light of the World. In words and in music we seek to understand and to marvel at the wonder of the Incarnation. 

As we meet to offer our praises and our prayers to the Christ child, let us pray first for the needs of the world; for the poor, the hungry, the homeless, for the persecuted and for the bereaved. Let us, too, remember all those whom we have loved, but see no longer, those whose lives have influenced and enriched our own, and who now rejoice with us, but on another shore and with a greater understanding. 

We pray that we may this day be so filled with the love of God that our lives may reflect the light of His glory and of His infinite compassion."

As I read the words - “Let us, too, remember all those whom we have loved, but see no longer, those whose lives have influenced and enriched our own” -  I was overwhelmed with their meaning and the tears came quickly and I struggled to finish.  

Remembering is what we do and though it is natural, I am still sometimes surprised by its power and the depth of pain and longing that it evokes in me.

“Those whose lives have influenced and enriched our own” - of course my thoughts at that moment began with Daniel but as I read this I also was thinking about my dear Aunt Betty as she was struggling that morning in her final hours and indeed died later that day, the seventh anniversary of the death of her son, my cousin Jim.  

Betty has been a person who embodied a graceful and gracious love to me throughout my life.

Recognizing that Daniel and Jim are, and Betty was soon to be, on that distant shore rejoicing with us and yet with greater understanding - these words engulfed me with a deep sense and painful awareness that I was participating in a profound connection and could rejoice along with these dear souls in the wonder and awe of this gift of Jesus to the world.

All of this, and much more that I cannot put into words, swirled rapidly through my heart as I stood there crying and trying to finish that prayer.

Two days later, I sense that during this prayer I had a taste of the glad tidings of great joy that the angels announced to those shepherds on that hillside outside of Bethlehem on that first Christmas morning.  

As Christmas draws near, I realize that as I stood there reading a prayer and crying, I was indeed receiving the best gift and the only one that lasts:  the glad tidings and hope that Jesus gives to us if we choose to believe it.

Daniel, Betty, and Jim believed, and I can to.

Thanks be to God for this indescribable gift!

Daily Desperation

I just came from my weekly early morning men’s group meeting and was poignantly reminded again of how much I need to open my life up to others and through them, to deepen my dependence on God for grace and strength to carry on.

My friends and I shared about our various struggles around relationships, jobs, and more – the recurring theme is that each of us has the opportunity everyday to choose anger and bitterness because of our challenges, struggles, and losses or, for the very same reasons, we can choose to allow our hearts to be broken, resulting in deepening spirits of care and compassion.

Struggles and losses can make us better or they can make us bitter, much worse and a lot meaner – it all depends on how we choose to respond and to whom we choose to turn in our human desperation in managing our responses.

In my struggles, I want to desperately lean on and cling to God’s grace, forgiveness, compassion, and strength so that I don’t choose the anger and bitterness route that is so tempting and so easily available to me.

Lord, in my daily desperation, hear my prayer!

Angry and Bitter, or Compassionate and Caring?

November 23, 2013

On separate occasions this week two friends asked me questions about how we were doing as a family with our grief and how specifically our kids were handling it.

One friend was simply curious and concerned and wanted to know how we were doing; the other also wanted to share some struggles his son is having since he just lost a close teenage friend very suddenly.

As I shared some reflections and answers to their questions it once again struck me that we have some choices in “how we are doing”. 

Anger and bitterness are still very natural feelings that regularly come up for me, and I am often keenly aware that I can “go there” easily and chose to remain there, acting out from a place of extreme anger and bitterness over my loss.  In fact, I can easily extrapolate these feelings and apply them to everything – because Daniel died, all kinds of bad things have happened and are going to happen, and I am going to be “mad as Hell” and on the warpath for a long, long time. 

Or, at least, that seems to be the strange slippery slope that sits before me and beckons me forward much of the time.

On the other hand, I also find that I can have deep feelings of compassion and caring for other people as a result of the intense pain I have felt and that I continue to feel.  Yesterday when my friend shared the story of his 18 year old son learning recently that his close friend had died suddenly, I felt genuine empathy for what this kid and his friends are going through and shared some observations about how my two teenage children have dealt with and are dealing with the loss of their brother. 

Thankfully, right now it seems like our family is primarily on the caring and compassionate side of this scale, though I am sure we all each struggle with the anger and bitterness options more than we let on to each other.

These choices seem very real to me and I pray that we choose to find ways to express the care and compassion that can take hold of our hearts if we lean in that direction. 

God:  help us to choose well!

Faithfulness, aliens, saints and perseverance

November 20, 2013

I was up for awhile the other night in the middle of the night and was drawn back to reading Hebrews 11 and 12.

All the folks described in Hebrews 11 remained faithful – they each heard a promise from God and they pursued it even though all of them never saw the complete fulfillment of any of those promises during their lifetimes.  They knew they were “aliens and sojourners on this earth” (or foreigners and refugees as one translation says) and so they remained faithful as they continued to “look for a country of their own”, a final destination afar off.

What I find equally fascinating are the verses that immediately follow this chapter as chapter 12 opens with, “since we are surrounded by such a great a cloud of witnesses.”  It is implied that these witnesses include all those faithful saints named in Hebrews 11, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and the lot, as well as all the saints who have followed – the famous ones like Paul, John, and Peter.  Further, I chose to believe that this great cloud even includes people like Daniel and others whom I have loved and lost in my lifetime.

All these saints in this great cloud are somehow surrounding us, witnessing our lives and perhaps engaged at some level and cheering us on as we, like them, seek to “run with perseverance the race set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith” as the following verses point out to us.

Thus, I am running the race set before me, hopefully with perseverance before this great cloud of witnesses, recognizing that I too am a sojourner or refugee on this earth just as they were before me.

For this father who can’t stop longing for this son, somehow this gives me great hope and courage to get up and face the new day full of its challenges with my aging parents, my job and its politics, living with my grief, and much, much more.

I hold dearly to this notion that Daniel is somehow mysteriously among those witnesses who are watching me pursue this race – this vision of my own son cheering me on in this life gives me great comfort.

God:  give me that perseverance to run my race as a refugee in this world, knowing that Daniel and many others are watching and cheering me on.  

Thanks be to God!

Redeemer or attorney?

All this week I have been reflecting on a wonderful sermon that my priest, Father Stace Tafoya gave last Sunday.  The text was from Job 19, “I know that my Redeemer lives.”

Stace played with the notion that redeemer has multiple meanings in this context.  The common interpretation led composers to include the text in Handel’s Messiah oratorio as a clear reference to a Redeemer or Messiah who would atone for mankind’s sin.

Stace chose to take the interpretation in another, perhaps more literal and immediate direction from Job’s point of view.

Job was looking for someone to defend him against the accusations that his friends and even his wife were making – Job must have screwed up big time to be receiving such harsh punishment from God, since God seemed so hell-bent on taking everything away from him – his wealth, his children, and even his health.  Stace argued that a more literal translation for the word redeemer here is defender or vindicator, or even to put it into very modern terms, “I know that my defense attorney lives!”

Job wanted a defender to stand up for him before God, his wife, and his friends pleading his case that he was innocent and didn’t deserve to suffer all of these losses. 

Another interpretation could be that Job was demanding that God himself come down and explain it all as well – he wanted to hear some rationale for this bizarre chain of events from God’s own mouth and perspective!

As a father who lost a son, I too yearn for God to explain himself - to come down from heaven and defend me to the Cosmos and explain why Daniel died so young and ultimately, how he did not deserve to die and how we did not deserve to be suffering from this loss.  At other times, I completely relate to the notion that I want a really good attorney who can represent me in some cosmic courtroom and argue my case before God that Daniel never deserved to die and we surely did not deserve to suffer this loss.

Of course these are provocative words from me just like they were from Job. Who am I to demand that God give me an explanation for anything, much less my struggle with why He perhaps allowed my son to suffer from an “unjustifiable” and “premature” death?

Yet like Job I yearn to understand and to somehow be reassured that Daniel's death was merely an accident, or has some other purpose or meaning, but was not punishment for some sin or wrong doing.

And like Job, I don't want to give up and "curse God and die."

I continue this slow and painful wrestling match because I want some answers and I want a relationship with this same God - I want to know that my Redeemer and vindicator lives and that, like my dear son, I will see Him one day.

Then, perhaps I will understand what my suffering - and all suffering - was really all about.

But until then, I wrestle and seek a defender.

We make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!

Several weeks ago I participated in a memorial service for a dear older friend at our church, Boyd.  Boyd was a stalwart member of a men’s small group that I have been a part of for several years.  We bonded even more deeply over our grief after he lost his wife several years ago and we lost Daniel.

The service for Boyd was beautiful as we celebrated his 86 years and his spirit of generosity and faithfulness. 

Though I have heard these words from the burial service in the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer many times before, including at Daniel’s service, they jumped off the page at me as I read them again at Boyd’s service:

You only are immortal, the creator and maker of mankind; and we are mortal, formed of the earth, and to earth shall we return. For so did you ordain when you created me, saying, "You are dust, and to dust you shall return." All of us go down to the dust; yet even at the grave we make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.

“Yet even at the grave, we make our song” –– we are able to sing and we can choose to sing – “alleluia, alleluia, alleluia”!

What amazing words and what an amazing invitation to make our song, even at the grave, a song of hope and a song of praise to God.

On days when I still miss Daniel with an intensity and yearning too deep for words, I cling to the hope that this can be my song, even at his grave, alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!

God:  give me grace to make this my song.

My aching heart: can pain be redeemed?

A young friend who lost her twenty something brother earlier this year posted a comment on Facebook this week about aching to be with him.

I sent her a comment and my thought that our aching and longing to be with those we have lost run as deep as our love for them does, and this phrase has been swirling in my head ever sense.

I still ache for Daniel and long to be with him.  This aching seems to be a permanent reality of life for me now as a father.

In other posts on this blog I have explored the longing I felt to be Daniel as if there is a perpetual magnet pulling me toward this person and my desire to be with him.

I believe that God gives us deep relational needs and when relationships are interrupted or severed by absence, a gaping hole is left in our hearts that in some respects will probably never be filled again.

And so we ache, acutely aware of our hole ridden and broken hearts and the pain we feel over the person we miss.

Can this pain and the aching that it causes also be redeemed?

God:  please continue to redeem my pain.

Living in two time zones: now, and Daniel time‏

Living with loss seems to include living in two time zones coincidently.

One zone is the present - I continue to experience what is happening right now - I get out of bed every morning, go to work, talk to people, do a job, engage in activities with my family and friends, and much, much more.  I really do live a very rich life, filled up with meaningful daily work and a lot of people to care about and who love me very deeply and well.  I am very blessed.

At the same time, I feel like I live in this other time zone that completely stopped moving when Daniel died.  

"Daniel time" is where a part of me simply exists in this space where I seem to sit and wonder what has happened - how has this person left this earth and how is life really going on without him here?

I watch my other children continue to grow and thrive and I watch Daniel's friends finish college, fall in love, get married, and now I have even met the baby child of one of those friends.  My children and all of these other beautiful people are flourishing and it absolutely warms my heart and soul to be in these relationships and get to witness their lives and growth.

But still, I feel stuck in time, sitting somewhere else and wondering about that other unanswerable question - where would Daniel be by now in his earthly life if he were still here?

Sometimes these distracting thoughts feel very selfish and I will myself to come back to the "reality" in the current time zone and pay attention to what is going on right now.  Other times I let my mind wander and stay longer in my other time zone - my other reality where I sit and imagine a life that Daniel might now be leading, fantasizing about where he would be, how he would look, what relationships he might be experiencing by now, including my relationship with him as his father.

Is this healthy or normal for a father who still grieves the loss of his son more than five years later?

I pray to God that is it so.

Amazing grace comes full circle

September 1, 2013

 
We stood in the field house at Whitworth University last night and sang Amazing Grace.  It was the final event capping off the day that we moved Ben into Mac Hall, the same dorm that we moved Daniel into six years ago to the day.
 
Of course the journey to this place this weekend included some bittersweet moments for Carol and me.  This is a great school for Ben, with fantastic and dedicated faculty, staff, and student leaders who will inspire and envelope him in the same learning community that was so rich for Daniel during his time here that was way too brief. 

Ben is very excited and it is great to see him launching into his new adventure so rich with opportunities.  It is thrilling and feels so right for Ben and we can't wait to see him blossom and flourish here.
 
But, carrying his stuff into Mac Hall included many trips walking past Daniel's dorm room right inside a main entrance, and then out to the memorial bench we had erected right across the walkway from the front door.  Coming back here with our second son is complicated in so many ways. 

And, several of the Whitworth faculty and staff who connected with us over Daniel have again reached out and very intentionally welcomed and embraced us as we completed our second journey as parents delivering a son to this wonderful campus.
 
Our quiet longing for Daniel courses through our hearts and souls as those memories are stirred, while we also look on with excitement and anticipation as Ben dives into his new life, with his own memory-making experiences unfolding before him.  
 
So singing this song of Amazing Grace – the very words that came to me as I began this journal the day Daniel died – these words and the reality of amazing grace in this journey all leave me in deep wonder and awe at its “coincidence” at this time, in this place, for this troubled soul!
 
Truly, amazing grace is flowing in seemingly perfect circles around my still broken heart – thanks be to God and to the wonderful people who embraced us in God’s arms this weekend!

Our unfolding story

August 20, 2013

How does this story of loss and pain, and faith and hope continue to unfold?  
 
Recently I went to a neighborhood friend's barbeque for their son who is one of Daniel's high school buddies.  It was a wonderful opportunity to connect with his friends from preschool, elementary and high school, and scouts, and many of their parents.  It was great to see these kids who are now young adults and to hear their stories of new jobs, grad school, getting started in  sandwich franchise businesses that are thriving, and more.  I loved the opportunity to connect and was genuinely thrilled to see the vitality and hope in their young lives - it was a rich and beautiful evening.
 
One set of parents wanted to hear more specifically about our family's journey and we spent some time talking about Daniel and how his life and death continues to impact each of us in our family as well as many others.
 
I am fascinated - perhaps bordering on obsessed at times - with how this story, the story of Daniel's life and death is unfolding and "being told."  At times I also fear that my obsession may interfere with living now and being fully present for my family. 

I pray that I find the balance among these things and yet can fully embrace how our unique story is unfolding. 

Lord, hear my prayer.

Another birthday

August 3, 2013

 

Some reflections on Daniel's 24th birthday, the sixth one we have observed without him since he died five years ago.

 

Loving a child for 18 years does not stop when he dies - we go on loving him and missing him deeply five years later. Watching our kids grow into young adults without their big brother is bittersweet and uniquely painful. It is hard not to get stuck in the "I wonder how this would be different?" cycle of questions that have no answers.

 

Birthdays leave us with these many questions and feelings to ponder. We are still damaged and perhaps we will always be. My heart still feels broken and I wonder what shape this broken heart is taking on - how are God and others reshaping it as time marches on?

 

We had a great time today on a hike in the mountains with Daniel's good friend Matty, and then we went to our traditional dinner at Daniel's favorite restaurant with Matty, Lizzy, Lyle, Beth, Haddon, and the Mulherns. Being surrounded by these incredible friends who continue to love us and to love Daniel is rich and wonderful - we feel literally envoloped in grace and love in these moments.

 

I feel enormous gratitude for the blessing of having had this son for those 18 years.

 

I feel even more gratitude for the hope that Daniel is already enjoying a feast beyond our understanding at a heavenly banquet table and that he is saving a seat for me there as well.

 

Thanks be to God for that hope amidst the dreary pain that I still carry.

 

Happy Birthday buddy!

Easter music and good tears

March 31, 2013

There is something very different about Easter since Daniel died. 

 

Perhaps the fact that his memorial service was a “celebration of the resurrection” left an indelible mark on my soul and I am more sensitized than ever to what we are really celebrating when Easter rolls around – as crazy as it may sound, losing Daniel brought a whole new meaning and yearning for literal resurrection into my life experience. 

 

This is not simply a nice, springtime holiday with candy, bunnies, and sentimental scripture readings about Jesus rising from the grave. 

 

It is a very personal hope and faith that it is all indeed true and that Daniel has already been resurrected and I will be able to join him one day as well.

 

Can I still trust God?

February 19, 2013

Last Sunday was the first Sunday of Lent and the gospel passage spoke of Jesus’ 40 days of temptation in the wilderness.  Once again Father Stace nailed it in his sermon with the simple point that Jesus likely too had to struggle with a basic human question – can I trust God for the long haul or do I succumb to the devil’s temptations and go it alone?  Stace further reflected that Jesus was exposed, again, just as we are, to the risk of somehow losing his companionship with God if he chose the easy path out of his wilderness experience and took the devil up on his offers.

As the sermon wound down I started texting these words to myself as they bubbled up in my heart and mind.

Can I trust God to take care of me and my family, to be my companion, and indeed, to be my salvation?
 
Daniel's death still challenges me to my core – can I still trust this God who did not give me my desire since He did not answer my prayer of desperation by saving this son?

With those words I quietly began to cry as I wrestled with my own wilderness experience of the soul and heart sitting right there in that pew.  I sensed the utter loneliness of this journey vividly in that moment and the fact that I too have a choice – I could take the easy and perhaps more “natural” way out and curse God instead of trusting him, shutting down my still broken heart in some effort to protect what is left of it. 

Or, I can stay on course and keep trusting even though I will never understand and probably will never be able to fully accept the reality of Daniel’s death.
 
As I contemplated those choices in that intense moment, I looked down at the leather bracelet that Carol gave me a few days earlier as a Valentine’s gift.  These bands of leather are woven together, reminding me of a similar bracelet that Daniel was wearing in the closing months of his life.  The little charm on the bracelet says DHB, representing to me both Daniel Hobson Burtness and all three of my children – Daniel, Hannah, and Ben. 

In addition to Daniel and his siblings, I pray that this bracelet also will remind me of the trust I choose to place in God and His ability to weave the fragile strands of our lives into a whole lifeline of hope and companionship.

Lord, hear my prayer.

The grave is part of the journey

February 13, 2013

Father Stace nailed it tonight at Epiphany’s Ash Wednesday service: 

“Take advantage of the perspective that Ash Wednesday has to give us.  In Christ, human destiny is not confined to the grave, but the grave is part of the journey.  For we are dust, and to dust we shall return.”

Daniel’s death continues to ground me – the fact that he has already returned to earthly dust is somehow an important reality and reminder of my status:  I too shall do the same. 

Yet dust is actually only part of the journey – we may start and end our earthly there, and yet our journey somehow continues beyond this dust – the grave is only part of the journey, a mere portal into the next phase of living. 

Funerals are more comfortable

Our friend Darnell who also lost his son the same year we lost Daniel recently asked us how we feel at funerals since Daniel died. 

Without thinking long, Carol and I both commented that funerals are more comfortable for us now than weddings are – funerals feel natural and remind us of Daniel and our future transition back into an experience of a living relationship with him. 

Weddings, on the other hand, happen to bring up more pain – the unfulfilled dreams we had for that son, the love he never lived to experience, a future for him that we will never see come to be.

Since Daniel died, we have been to several funerals but many more weddings.  Funerals are where we seem to find comfort – weddings are where we struggle with the bittersweet pain that we carry in our hearts, even as we marvel at the love between the beautiful young people whose weddings we have witnessed.

Perhaps this makes us odd in this world, but it is seems to be who we have become.

“A Grace Revealed”

December 31, 2012

This year has been very light when it comes to writing much down in this journal.

Since it is the last day of the year and since this morning I finished a great new book by Jerry Sittser, I need to reflect on what is in my heart as we transition into the new year.

This book is called A Grace Revealed and the jacket cover summarizes it this way:

“While A Grace Disguised explored how a soul grows through loss, A Grace Revealed brings the story of Sittser’s family full circle, revealing God’s redeeming work in the midst of circumstances that could easily have destroyed them.  By sharing his own story and those of others, Sittser reminds us that our lives tell a good story after all.  A Grace Revealed will help us excavate the details of our own stories so that we can begin to understand how God is working to tell a good story through our lives too.”

Jerry describes a choice we all have: we can choose to believe (or not to) that our lives are small redemptive stories within God’s large redemptive story for the world.  By choosing to believe this, we begin to see the context of events in our lives in different ways, focusing more on how God can redeem us and our circumstances for a greater good for us individually as well as those whose lives we touch.  In effect, everything that happens can potentially be redeemed – be made new or result in something good coming to bear in our lives.

Jerry’s description of how his family rebuilt their lives after their devastating accident over 20 years ago is full of hope for those of us who struggle with loss and long-term grief.  As usual, he is brutally honest and does not sugarcoat their struggles, but he also shows a path available to us all who seek to find the good that can be found in every struggle and the redemption available for every failure or loss.

Four and a half years into this, it still seems premature to grasp how Daniel’s death has changed our family’s story and our stories as individuals.  Hopefully his death has changed us, and it still can change us for the better.  This experience of loss can “be redeemed”  by serving to help redeem us – to make us more loving, sensitive, gentle, forgiving, and grateful people.

God: grant that this redemption may take hold in each of our lives, that your Grace can be revealed in new and powerful ways, and that our lives will tell a good story after all.  

Lord, hear my prayer.

Speak O Lord: we too are not alone

March 17, 2012

I am up early after last night’s Watoto concert.  Three lovely little girls and their “Auntie” are asleep in our home and the energy of them and the choir has me buzzing.

God is speaking to my heart and I want to listen.

I shared a bit with the congregation about our trip to Uganda and to Watoto in 2010, commenting that holding babies for two weeks was literally an experience of heaven on earth and that Carol and I hoped to return someday and do it some more.

Holding innocent abandoned babies is somehow a taste of heaven – this thought had never really formed in my head until I heard those words coming out of my mouth.  God is present in these precious little ones and you can feel Him when you touch them.  The Sacred and the Holy comes to us in the form of a baby – sounds familiar to those of us who believe in Jesus.

The message of the Watoto choir is simply how God can heal our brokenness through his love and grace.  In the case of these kids, that includes brokenness through harsh poverty, the death of parents and family in many cases, and other calamities related to civil strife and living conditions that are hard to imagine from the comfort of our lives in America.  These kids have already experienced loss in significant ways and they are now experiencing healing through God’s love manifest in Watoto and the people who care for them, and are raising them in family-like groups, teaching them in schools, and investing in each of their lives. 

They are literally healed through the hands and hearts of the Body of Christ at Watoto – the church and community that cares enough to rescue them from their broken circumstances and bring them new life and redemption.

 

We too are not alone
 

Our loss of Daniel continues to weigh on my soul, but I also sense the healing touch of God through the experiences we have had over these last four years. 
 

Like the Watoto children, we too are experiencing God’s love and compassion through the Body of Christ – the church and our family and friends who are loving us and walking with us through these circumstances.  Just yesterday a colleague at my office asked me about Daniel’s upcoming death anniversary – it strikes me now how significant it is for me to hear those words and to know that others are aware of the weight and complexity of these feelings that are still lingering in my heart and likely will always be there.  Just being asked this question opened me up to the care that this person was sharing and the sense that others were present on the journey that so often feels so incredibly lonely and isolating in my heart.

 

At its essence, grief is a very lonely journey since it is such a personal and interior experience.  Each person’s experience of loss is unique in many respects and the emotions, questions, dis-ease that accompany loss all seem to be very personal and intimate.

 

In spite of this reality, it is also true that I am not alone in my pain and that matters more than anything.  God cares for me and that care is delivered to me through the kind and simple words of others. 

Thanks be to God for the friends and family who are present to share in my journey.

Healer of my soul

February 29, 2012

 

The song Healer of My Soul by John Michael Talbot has been a huge inspiration to me lately.  Its lyrics are:

Healer of my soul
Keep me at even'
Keep me at morning
Keep me at noon
Healer of my soul

Keeper of my soul
On rough course faring
Help and safeguard my means this night
Keeper of my soul

I am tired, astray, and stumbling
Shield my soul from the snare of sin

Healer of my soul
Heal me at even'
Heal me at morning
Heal me at noon
Healer of my soul

My Badge: what do others see?

January 4, 2012

During breakfast with a friend this morning we were comparing notes on losses we have experienced in our families.  We both commented on specific photos and other representations we have in our homes related to these losses.  For us, having Daniel’s photos, shots of him with his siblings and others, and the prominent piece of art depicting our three kids dancing on a rock in Moab are all natural and incredibly important elements of our ongoing experience of life as a family.  Somehow having his face visible and even prominent in our home keeps enables him to remain a presence of sorts in our lives and is a constant reminder that he is gone and yet in some very real ways, still ever present in our hearts.

My friend and I agreed that these photos and many other artifacts of loss that we carry are indeed a kind of badge – something that visibly identifies our former lives with intact families and those who are missing.

This also fits with my longer term sense that I am changed permanently and somehow that change should be visible to others.  It often feels to me like my status as a parent who lost a child should be obvious to everyone who meets me since it is such a significant element of how I now perceive and define myself.

When Carol and I decided to get tattoos featuring Daniel I remember her comment that she was simply making permanent and visible the mark that already was made on her.

In some important respect, I too want people to notice my badge – the shift in my reality and the loss behind that shift.  I want people to understand how huge this is in our lives, not so that I evoke their sympathy, but so that they somehow realize something about whom Daniel was and what it means to lose a son.

A lack of balance

December 16, 2011

Hannah arrived home last night from college for the Christmas break.  It is great to see her and to see her blossoming into an even more beautiful, bright, and confident young woman.  She and Ben were cute together as they trotted off to watch their first Christmas movie when Carol and I gave up and headed off to bed.

Yet it is in these very moments that Daniel’s absence is most acutely obvious to me – their big brother should be around to hang out with his siblings – to enjoy the annual viewing of our Christmas video collection – to hear from his younger siblings about their transitions and challenges as they are progressing through high school and college – to share with them his amazing spirit, wisdom, and insights into life.

I miss him terribly and I sense that they must as well, if even in their subconscious wondering about why things seem just a bit out of balance, or “out of kilter” as my mother would say.

Living in this out of balance state must require extra effort.  This might explain why I often feel fatigued even though I can’t come up with a simple explanation as to why I am feeling that way in that particular moment.

I wonder if I will always miss Daniel with this same level of yearning? 

Truth be told, I hope I do.

Sadness and Bitterness

September 10, 2011

Over the past several weeks another birthday for Daniel has come and gone and the busy-ness of life has occupied me to the point that I don’t return to this journal as regularly as I had been doing.

We took Hannah to college three weeks ago and though she is settling in and finding her way, we still wish that she had Daniel around to be her 22 year old, now college graduated brother to share these experiences and help guide her along her path.

Likewise, little brother Ben is off at a Young Life leadership camp this weekend, literally following in Daniel’s footsteps as he begins a school year of helping to lead a Wyld Life club at the neighborhood middle school.  Ben has been asking more questions about what Daniel did when he was in Ben’s shoes at the same point in high school.  Carol and I so wish that Ben also had his big brother around to share these experiences and help encourage and guide him along the way.

The death of this one child leaves us with so many unfulfilled dreams for the rest of our family.  This loss shows up in so many little ways as we go about our lives and continue experiencing transitions into new stages of our lives and new opportunities.

Carol and I are left with a complicated recurring sadness, watching our other two kids as they miss opportunities to continue connecting with their big brother who was such a positive and powerful force in their lives.

I commented earlier today to Carol that I sense that there is a very thin line between this chronic sadness and bitterness.  It is very easy to slip across that line and feel bitter that Hannah, Ben, Carol, and I are not still in a living relationship with Daniel and that we have to carry this burden of grief with us now and perhaps for the remainder of our lives. 

Bitterness seems a natural and easier reaction to this pain, but I pray for strength to not go there.

God:  grant me and my family grace that will keep our sadness from fermenting into bitterness.  Give us extraordinary grace to somehow find some sense of peace and contentment in spite of our constant longing to still have Daniel in our lives.

 

Meandering toward the Light

June 16, 2011

I often find myself late in the evening meandering around in Daniel’s music files on the computer, listening to bits of songs by various artist, or watching YouTube video’s of his favorite band (Dispatch at Madison Square Garden), or picking up books in his room on his bookshelf and leafing through the ideas that were so stimulating to him in his last months on earth.

Then sometimes, like right now, I sit in his reading chair in his bedroom staring at the hockey poster on the wall and letting my heart meander through the depths of my sorrow and grief, wondering what could have possibly happened to this son whom I love so dearly.

In these late night moments, silence rings in my ears as I wonder about my wandering heart.  I have no idea how deep these waters of grief go, but they feel endless and churning tonight.

Then I return to the music but this time to songs that talk about trying to imagine heaven and sitting in the lap of Jesus while He sings over me.  

Songs that draw me toward the Light that shined so brightly in Daniel’s heart and now flickers in my own. 

Light that points a way through the deepest water – Light that warms my heart. 

I listen and meander toward the Light.

Tough and honest questions

June 6, 2011

This weekend was filled with questions and conversation about Daniel.

On Friday evening, some neighborhood friends hosted a party that featured a rock band made of several middle-age male friends of ours (who are actually fairly talented!) and a bunch of us gathering at an art education place run by one of the neighbors.  Our friend Barb says she only agreed to host the event if it would become a fundraiser for Daniel’s scholarship at Whitworth, so it did and it raised almost $2,000 more for that effort which was very gratifying and humbling for us to witness.

We saw some old friends and several folks we don’t see that often including some of Daniel’s high school classmates who have recently graduated from college and are home either for the summer or as they transition into the next activity of their lives.  As always, it was a bittersweet joy to see these beautiful young adults and catch up a bit on their lives, all the while yearning to see our boy among them.  More heartwarming for our broken hearts.

I also had several conversations that evening and another today with adults who asked me “how are you doing”, or, “have you found any peace since Daniel’s death?” 

These questions always trip me up initially since I often start trying to answer them without really knowing what to say or how to describe the complexity of this emotional ride. The common theme that emerged somehow in these conversations was faith and my answers included some rhetorical questions of my own – where would we be without our Christian hope, our belief in God’s ultimate goodness and Daniel’s ultimate home?  How do folks who have no hope cope with this type of loss? 

I often struggle with how to articulate these thoughts very clearly and in my mind don’t do so well.  But eventually I usually blurt something out along these lines – I can’t imagine walking through this valley without my faith in Christ and without the community of people who have loved us every step of the way.  For me that thought is impossible to comprehend.  It is treacherous now and is even more unimaginable to me without this thing called faith and the community that it has brought into our lives.

A graduation that didn’t happen and other mysteries

May 15, 2011

Today is another milestone day as most of Daniel's Whitworth friends went through their graduation ceremony this afternoon.  It is hard to believe that Daniel would be graduating (at least I hope he would have finished in the requisite four years!), but it is even harder to believe that he is not here to graduate.  Seeing Daniel's local friends finishing college and corresponding with his Whitworth friends are bittersweet experiences for us as we struggle with our pain over his absence from this, another momentous occasion we so looked forward to sharing with him on this earth.

And, one of Daniel's Whitworth friends got married several weeks ago in Texas with Daniel serving as an honorary groomsman.  Just last week, another of his Denver friends (one of the Fab Five) told us that Daniel will serve in this capacity at his wedding this fall as well.  Obviously these are loving, kind and heartwarming gestures, though we struggle so much wishing that Daniel was present for these occasions as well as for a wedding of his own one of these days.

But even so, there are so many mysteries along this path . . .

Several weeks ago, the development office at Whitworth contacted us to let us know that the seniors this spring voted to raise money among themselves and their families and add their official Senior Gift to the Daniel Burtness Leadership Award endowment at Whitworth.  We were very touched by this gesture and recently we learned that a Whitworth alum/trustee couple heard about this gift and decided to give $5,000 to the cause as well as trying to stimulate 75% participation among the class by offering to give a second gift if the class achieved that level.  Last we heard, they are nearing 40% so I doubt they will reach the challenge, but we are still humbled and grateful that Daniel's memory is being kept alive and that he is being honored in this way by his classmates.  

We feel like these gestures are truly part of God's grace to us in our pain and they warm our hearts even though those same hearts feel broken so much of the time.

As I was reminded recently, Anglicans and Episcopalians do a great job reminding us of the many mysteries of our lives and in our faith.  In my continuing befuddlement, I find it helpful to worship in a context that allows for and even celebrates mystery.  We don't have it all figured out and indeed we see through a glass dimly.  The experience of grief in particular somehow seems a bit easier when one recognizes that there really are no simple answers to this predicament.

A letter to his graduating class

May 13, 2011

To members of the 2011 Senior Class of Whitworth:

When we learned that you are choosing to designate your Senior Class gift to the Daniel Burtness Leadership Award fund at Whitworth we were very touched and deeply honored by your thoughtfulness and generosity.  Thanks very much for remembering Daniel in this way and for incorporating him into your graduation celebration.  We wish we could be there to express our heartfelt thanks to each of you who contributed, but know that we are there in our hearts!

As a family, we truly wish Daniel was still alive and that he would be graduating with you now.  For those of you who knew Dan, you know that he was a very special guy who had a deep passion for people, for God, and for life, and that he expressed this passion in his own uniquely charming and sometimes quirky ways.  Though short, his time at Whitworth was rich and transformational for him.

For those of you who did not personally know Daniel, here is an email message that he wrote to some friends  just weeks before he died.  These words illustrate Daniel’s faith and passion better than anything we can now write on his behalf.

"Goodness, you are all some awesome crazy people and I love you all more than you know or I can tell you.  And this is life – it smacks you in the face – it blesses you in countless ways – it confuses you to the point where you forget who you are and where you're going.  God hasn't shown me a lot lately – I think He's trying to get it into my head that He is so much in control – anything and everything in my life is in His hands.  And I am struggling.  I am struggling to let go.  I want to stress about where my life is going – who I am, who I become, and how I affect people.  God wants me to care; He doesn't want me to worry.  ‘Beautiful is the moment in which we understand that we are no more than an instrument of God; we live only as long as God wants us to live; we can only do as much as God makes us able to do; we are only as intelligent as God would have us to be.’ Archbishop Oscar Romero's words seem so right in my head, but I am struggling to take them to heart . . . a lot.  I guess my prayer for myself and for all of you lovely people is that of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, ‘not my will but Yours be done.’  I pray that we can live ‘in the deathless Truth of His presence’ because this is life.  This is what God gave us.  Rejoice and be glad.  I love you all, but God loves you more – good thing.  Love and Peace."

Our prayer for you each as you graduate and move on from Whitworth is the same as Daniel’s – may you “live in the deathless Truth of His presence” and may you “rejoice and be glad.”

God bless you each as you move on into your next adventure and congratulations!

Grace and peace,

John, Carol, Hannah, and Ben Burtness

Weary from grief but warmed by grace

April 28, 2011

The anniversary of a death is an enormous milestone.  For weeks we have anticipated this day, watching ourselves move closer and closer and wondering how it would feel when the time came.

Now it is here.

I started the day busy and distracted with a stimulating meeting at work.  When it ended and I went to my car to leave, I opened an email from a dear friend, read the first few lines and burst into tears.  Several more times throughout the day, as I read a text or an email, or heard a phone message, I quietly wept as the pain flowed up from just below the surface.  The wound remains.

Yet as many friends and family reached out to us and reminded us again and again how much we are loved and how much Daniel is remembered and cherished, I once again marvel at the mixture of unspeakable pain and grace that seems somehow heaven sent. 

Grace comes through gentle and kind words that remind us how much people care, how much Daniel impacted the lives of so many, and how much his life and death continue to so profoundly impact his friends and our family.

My heart is still broken and weary from grief and yet is it is also warmed by this grace. God speaks to us through the voices and the touch of so many folks who care so deeply about us.

We have not moved on, but we are moving forward

April 23, 2011

I read an article this weekend about a documentary film just released that tells the stories of the dozen families who lost high school student in the Columbine shootings.  One parent said something that struck me that went something like this:

“As parents, we have not moved on, but we are moving forward ever mindful of what was lost.”

I so agree with this sentiment.

“Moved on” denotes having finished something or brought some activity or experience to some sort of closure – as in moving on from my grief.  I cannot imagine moving on from losing Daniel since I am not finished with him, or with my grief, and I don’t believe I want to bring it to closure or could even if I desired it.

Yet I can imagine that I am moving forward with this loss, carrying the emotional baggage with greater ease as I go and somehow incorporating this loss into my life, who I am as a person, what I believe, how I behave, etc.

I am ever mindful of what, or more specifically, who was lost and is physically gone from my daily life.  I have not left that person or memory behind but rather carry that broken relationship with me wherever I go.  I move forward but feel like I am a different person walking through life differently than I would have otherwise.

I have not moved on from my grief but perhaps I am moving forward, carrying my grief with me as I go, ever mindful of this seemingly permanent new dimension in my life.

Longing for Resurrection

April 11, 2011

Carol and I had a long phone conversation yesterday with Dustin, one of Daniel’s Whitworth friends who is assisting a former professor on a book project.  Dustin asked us some very insightful and challenging questions about how Daniel’s death has impacted us, our family, and our faith.

One question addressed whether we experienced or understood Christ’s resurrection differently as a result of losing Daniel. Though that was a hard question to answer, it is stimulating a lot more thinking in me in the hours since the call. 

I guess the bottom line is, I have thought more about resurrection since Daniel died than in my 51 years of life leading up to that event.  Easter is the yearly reminder of the central tenet of Christianity – Jesus’ resurrection – but losing my son and my hope in our future resurrection and reunion have made me yearn for this experience in ways I never fathomed. 

Longing for resurrection is now a daily occurrence.

Please say hello to Daniel in heaven for me

April 3, 2011

Here I am, writing in the middle of the night again – not sure if it is the hops in the beer I drank too late in the evening last night or if my soul is simply in its usual low level of turmoil – probably a little of each.

I feel unsettled emotionally even though one would think I would be used to it by now.

Yesterday we learned that a long-time casual friend of ours, Linda, had finally been overtaken by the cancer that has ravaged her body on and off again for eight years or so – may this dear woman now rest in God’s eternal grace and peace and may God’s grace surround her husband and family.

As I worked the dirt of a flower garden in our yard later in the day, I found myself deep into a fantasy that Linda could literally be greeting Daniel in heaven right at that moment, giving him a hug and a greeting from us and letting him know how deeply loved and still missed he is on this earth.  As these thoughts were forming and I dove into the emotional side of them, I found myself yearning for it to be true, for there to be this relational transaction occurring, this passing on of a very personal message between a mother who knew us as parents and observed our grief on earth and our son whose death continues to trigger those deep feelings and yearnings.

Of course, I really have no idea what heaven may be like – do people who have known each other on earth or have mutual friends and acquaintances somehow cross paths and reconnect?  Are the crowds so overwhelming that it takes days or longer to find your way around and find all these people?  If so, perhaps it is too soon for Linda and Daniel to have run into each other.

One day, I will find out if this connection took place.  In the meantime, I long for it to be true and I carry that longing, along with so many others, within my unsettled heart and soul.

Dreams

March  2011

Our connections through dreams 

I had another vivid dream two nights ago featuring Daniel briefly.  He showed up in the dream near the end of what I remember, as I was among a lot of people entering a large church to attend a service.  Daniel was in the throng moving through the foyer into the sanctuary, several people ahead of me when I saw his face for the first time in the dream.  I told the person I was with to go sit with Daniel since I had to step out of line to go find Carol.  As I mentioned Daniel’s name, he turned around and grinned at us, looking the same as he did when he died though his glasses seemed to have heavier lens than they did in reality.

Prior to this portion of the dream, I had been walking with our priest, Father Stace, to some event, perhaps this same service.  We were having a sweet conversation, oddly enough, about Daniel and the fact that he had died.

I don’t know what I think about the role of dreams in life – I really have no clear opinion on this and I have done very little reading or research into the various schools of thought about what dreams mean, where they come from, and what function they might serve.  That said, I find it very interesting and in some ways very comforting that when Daniel shows up in my dreams, it seems to often involve him coming into a church service with those of us who are alive. 

From this I can only surmise that this notion of “communion of saints” is somehow very much a reality:  Daniel is still somehow engaged in what we call church – worshiping God and perhaps is even somehow present when we gather here in our literal churches to worship together.   

We are all “in communion” with each other – in a close relationship or an intimate spiritual connection with each other and with God around His table.

Another dream

Last night’s dream included a funeral service for Daniel, though very different from the one that we actually had.  In the dream Daniel was embalmed and the casket was open during some part of the service.  He was situated in the casket in an unusual manner, with him facing the observer having a smile on his face.

In another part of the dream I saw Daniel walking along a street from afar and as I watched, he suddenly disappeared, as if he vaporized while walking along in plain view one moment and gone the next.

I am intrigued with these recurring dreams – the interesting mix of Daniel’s death as a theme and him being somehow alive but not fully accessible in the dream as another. 

Dreams and dust

This morning I awoke with another dream of Daniel fresh in my head.  As is often true, he was fully alive in my dream and looking like he did when he died – I hugged his head and kissed the top of his head through the bushy phase weeks after a buzz cut – yet he did not speak to me or to anyone as is usually the case in these dreams.

This dream occurred hours after we attended our Ash Wednesday service and were given that vital reminder from the prayer book quoting Genesis 3, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Daniel’s earthly body is now literally dust but in some great mystery, his soul and his essence lives on.  Are my dreams somehow a connection across this thin veil that currently separates us, or are they simply a father’s longing heart to be with a son again?  

I would like to think that these dreams are somehow both a spiritual connection and a deeply emotional longing.  Though I will likely never really know what they mean, I am grateful for these connections to my son.

The Grace that Sustains You & Grieving with Hope

January 22, 2011

The Grace that Sustains You 

In an email exchange with Daniel’s Godfather Steve this week he commented, “I remain in awe of the grace that sustains you.”  I am in awe as well since I know that this grace is really the only thing that keeps my head above water, indeed sustaining me when my grief is stirring and creating turmoil in my head and heart.

That said, I struggle to comprehend what grace even means. 

In my current experience, grace is the quiet sense of hope that I find in my broken heart.  Even though I miss Daniel with a palpable desperation and a deep yearning, I also have this calm hope and confidence that he is literally “in good hands” in that realm we call heaven.   Even though at times I become very angry and bitter in my heart over this enormous loss, I also find a real sense of gratitude that Daniel was in our lives for 18 wonderful years and that he made and left such a huge mark on the lives and hearts of so many family members and friends who loved him and enjoyed his presence.

Smart theologians describe grace in loftier terms I am sure, but for me, grace is what God gives me to balance out the pain, anger, and anguish when it rises in my heart.

Grieving with Hope

We received a very sweet note yesterday from Jerry Sittser.  The note was added to Jerry’s post-holiday letter which in itself was rich and wonderful as it described Jerry’s recent marriage to Pat and the activities of their now blended family of five young adult children.

But the handwritten note at the end of the letter took my breath away as Jerry, the wise sage who has lived with enormous grief for almost two decades simply said: 

 

“How strange that Daniel would be graduating this year.  I pray that you are grieving with hope.  I still miss Diana Jane every day.”

Jerry acknowledges that he still misses his departed daughter every day, even after almost 20 years.  I imagine that this happens in small but likely profound ways as he remembers her almost two decades after her death.  And yet, he prays that we are grieving with hope – what a simple and very profound statement and prayer from this remarkable man. 

What does it mean to grieve with hope? 

In Where Is God When It Hurts? Philip Yancey simply defines hope as the belief that “something good lies ahead.”  So grieving with hope might mean to grieve while believing that something good might still lie ahead of us in this life and in the life to come.

In that larger context, I suppose that it also means that even though we deeply miss Daniel, our hope, our confident desire, and our trust is that Daniel is in that heavenly realm and literally living a much better life than we could have ever provided for him or even hoped for him on this earth.  And, since we believe in this same loving and forgiving God who came to us in the incarnation of Jesus, we also have the ultimate hope that we will see Daniel face to face again someday.

All that said, we still miss him ever day and grieve this loss, though thankfully we can grieve with hope. 

Thanks be to God for these indescribable gifts of dreams, grace and hope, and for these sweet reminders from dear friends!