In the Middle

One of my favorite worship leader's daughter died in her sleep a week ago. She had just released an album with a song called In the Middle of It. Talking about how to find God in the midst of chaos, destruction, despair, loss.

And then her daughter died. She went to sleep and never woke up.

And the world around this worship leader erupted, either with emphatic cries for resurrection, outpouring of grief or skepticism at their response to the death: instead of despair, they faced the situation with praise and the belief that God could bring her back to life.

She never rose.

How do we move in this space now?

When someone who has devoted her life to God and led people to the throne room of God, cried out for a miracle and didn't get it. How does she, how do we, how do I navigate God in this space?

See, this death isn't like some drunk driver hit her and died and so there's some rationale like well God loves the victim and the perpetrator the same, etc. etc.

This death feels FROM God. That He allowed it in a very purposeful way. After all, this young girl was 2, her whole life ahead of her, not ill, not broken. So why take her?

WHY

This why has echoed throughout the world, but it feels deafening in my spirit today. Why God do You allow these types of things to happen and for what purpose?

And more importantly, how do we trust You, believe You are safe, when we see You allow these circumstances?

It's true, you give and take away.

I'm realizing I don't know how to move with you in the "take away" seasons. I don't know how to trust you.

And today, for the first real time, I confessed this to Jesus:

I'M TERRIFIED OF HAVING A CHILD.

It feel a terror, a sense of loss of control, a stepping into an abyss where I'm falling and I don't know where the ground is and if it is there, is it going to catch me or kill me?

I'm realizing that I have a deep fear in my heart that God is out to get me, that He has hard things only for me. That He will use my life to glorify Himself no matter what the impact to me.

Today I heard Him say: I don't glorify Myself at your expense

But don't you God? You allowed this little girl to die, suddenly, tragically, without warning. I'm assuming at some point You will be glorified and good will come from it. But isn't that at the expense of this mother's grief? Won't she carry around a lifelong wound? Won't she often question Your goodness?

And yet you allowed this loss and death.

So are You safe? Are You worthy of our trust when You are seemingly unpredictable?

I'm so scared of having sick child. Or to one day find my child dead.

I'm scared of loss, of heartbreak, of grief.

And yet, God is inviting me into this. He is inviting me into the journey of motherhood where loss, grief and heartbreak are inevitable. Where I won't ever fully know what's in store.

His invitation is to find Him, right in the middle of it. To find Him right in the middle of my every why. To journey with Him in the unknown perhaps to find out this truth:

That He is always good, always worthy of my trust and always working on my behalf, no matter what.

God, I don't know how to get rid of my fear or to trust you, a God who is totally Other.

I grieve my unknowing honestly.

But today, I open my hands reluctantly and say yes to your invitation. A feeble yes, a tentative yes, but a yes, nonetheless.

I have no idea what story you have in store for me and Ash. I have no idea what kind of losses and heartbreak we will have to endure.

But I have to know, deep down, of this:

I will find You always right in the middle of it.

Rest in power O.H.