It's happening, soon.

We have prayed for her for three years, and now it seems she is dying. Has God not heard us? Does he even care? What was the point of all the walking, and fundraising, and praying? How can it be OK if she is leaving her little children behind? 

Oh children, will you remember this struggle, this grief we share with the Wessel family as Kristie is taken by cancer?

Last night I began to prepare you, and you had so many questions.  “Does it hurt to die?” “What will the kids do?” “Why can’t the doctors help her?” “How did she even get sick?”   At bedtime, I held in my arms one child who was overcome with the thought, who could not fall asleep in a world where children loose mothers unless he was in the embrace of his very own mother.   And why does he get to be in my arms, when others… I needed him close to me, too.

Then it was church day, and how we needed it. How is our pastor-daddy still standing under the weight of this?  But he stands-- and he preaches Christ.  He stands because our God lives, and he upholds those who call on Him.

To my surprise, daddy threw out his sermon, and spoke to the church about what is happening. “We need to talk about this,” he said, and suddenly I felt strapped to the pew.  No, I’d rather not talk. I’d rather just keep moving, keep running from the grief and the questions. I’d rather distract myself, sleep, exercise, read a novel- anything else.  I’d rather do anything other than sit, here, still, while he tells us what we all fear. 

Kristie is dying.

I don’t want to hear it, don’t want to sit in it. I don’t want him to tell me how hard it is and I don’t want to see him cry. But he made us sit. And we all cried. And there he was, pastor, daddy, dear husband- standing in front of everyone, not hiding his heart, his grief, his questions. And he spoke to our heart, our grief, our questions.

Christ is risen, and therefore we have hope.

And now, it is time to "be church."
As God's forgiven children, let us walk together through this valley and let us suffer with those who suffer. Soon, very soon, we will be through the valley and on the other side.  

We have sorrow to go through yet, dear children.  

Let us cling to Him who has gone before, the One who even now carries us homeward.

Soon, he will wipe away every tear from our eyes.

Yes, every single one.

No children, I don't know how that can be possible,

but if God can make you, if He can raise Jesus from the dead, than surely He can do this thing.

(Listen to the sermon, all of you who grieve, at this link )

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”

Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?” I said to him, “Sir, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones coming out ofthe great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

“Therefore they are before the throne of God,
    and serve him day and night in his temple;
    and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence.
They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore;
    the sun shall not strike them,
    nor any scorching heat.
For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd,
    and he will guide them to springs of living water,and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

(Revelation 7:9-17)