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.
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