To be human is to suffer. This is hardly self-evident in middle class America. It certainly wasn’t clear to me for the first 28 years of my life. For sure, by historical standards, I have only suffered a little. But to me, I have felt real pain, sorrow, and heartache.

On September 11, 2018 I was at work. I got a phone call from Kayla, my wife. The reception was spotty. I moved to the window, struggling to make out what she was saying. Eventually I gathered, “no heartbeat.” I thought perhaps it was a mistake. Maybe an equipment malfunction. As I drove down Coburg Road, in denial, I still held out hope. The ultrasound confirmed.

I remember sitting outside the operating room, waiting for them to cut open my wife and remove my dead son. We named him Asher, which means “blessed.” The irony laughs at me. I held him in my arms, kissed his lifeless cheek, and ran my finger over his cold, purple lips. Such perfect little hands, such perfect little feet. My dear Kayla, her body wrecked with surgery, and her mother’s heart wrecked with sorrow, despair, and guilt. How does a mother recover from that?

I went to the courthouse. I needed a permit to bury my son.

Then I dug his grave. Shovel after shovel, trying to make it perfect for my son.

Friends and family gathered to lay his body to rest under a big oak tree, Asher’s tree. I read from Job. I felt every word and wondered where God was.

And through this, people were kind to us. People showed us love.

In the years since, I have tried to sort out what it all means. I’ve asked the questions humans have always asked. Why? Where is God? Couldn’t he have done something? In the wrestling, I’m learning.  

Wrestling with God

There’s an old hymn I grew up singing in church, Trust and Obey. The chorus goes “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way, to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.” I tell you what. In the days and weeks and even years after losing Asher that seemed like such bull****. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t just trust. I had to scrap and claw and wrestle and wonder where the hell God even was.

I was reading Job in the hospital. He taught me it was okay to question God, to be angry with God, to wonder where he is why he doesn’t show up. The things Job said to God were outrageous and bold. He wants to argue with God (13:3). He wishes he could just die (7:15). He asks God why he contends against him and oppresses him (10:1-3). He longs to have been “carried from womb to tomb” (10:19).

And yet, the narrator of Job says “In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong.”

But wresting with God is dangerous. Job found that out, as did Jacob (that’s a long, weird story). At the end of the book God finally shows up to talk to Job. He tells Job to “gird up his loins like a man” and goes on to say:

“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell Me, if you have understanding,
Who set its measurements? Since you know.”

God continues line after line hammering home the point that the Creator’s wisdom and power make Job’s miniscule in comparison. Job’s response:

“Behold, I am insignificant; what can I reply to You? I lay my hand on my mouth.

Wrestling with God will humble you.

The old hymn writer wasn’t crazy. There’s a lot of wisdom in the idea of trusting and obeying. But it ain’t that simple. You can’t trust until you’ve wrestled.

The Cross

Asher would have been five this last September. In my wrestling there have been two big ideas that have changed everything about suffering. They seem obvious in hindsight, but they are so powerful.

Christians believe that “God became flesh and dwelt among us.” And then we tortured and killed him. He suffered in excruciating, unimaginable ways. Peter says that when we suffer, we share the suffering of Jesus. We follow a God who isn’t distant but knows what it’s like to suffer. He feels our pain.

Further, the death of the creator at the hands of the created is a tragedy. The idea that the created would turn on their creator and murder him is the pinnacle of pride and evil in the heart of man. It is then surprising that the worst thing humanity has done, to murder their maker, results in our salvation, the best thing that could happen to humanity. This is the way the Creator can work.

The late, great, Timothy Keller says it so well in “The Prodigal Prophet”.

“Jonah could not see that deep within the terror of the storm God’s mercy was at work, drawing him back to change his heart. It’s not surprising that Jonah missed this initially. He did not know how God would come into the world to save us. We, however, living on this side of the cross, know that God can save through weakness, suffering, and apparent defeat. Those who watched Jesus dying saw nothing but loss and tragedy. Yet at the heart of that darkness the divine mercy was powerfully at work, bringing about pardon and forgiveness for us. God’s salvation came into the world through suffering, so his saving grace and power can work in our lives more and more as we go through difficulty and sorrow. There’s mercy deep inside our storms.”

I’ve learned that sorrow and pain can be beautiful. Tears and heartache are the only way I know to love Asher. If God can turn his own murder into the greatest blessing known to man, then perhaps Asher somehow can mean ‘blessed.’

The Resurrection

In the days after Asher died, my brother Byran called from Ohio. He talked about the Christian hope of resurrection. He gave me a song, “Graverobber” by Petra. The greatest song ever written on the resurrection. Youtube it, you won’t be disappointed (at least if you like 80s Christian rock). 

Many still mourn
And many still weep
For those that they love
Who have fallen asleep
But we have this hope
Though our hearts may still ache
Just one shout from above
And they all will awake

And in the reunion of joy
We will see
Death will be swallowed
In sweet victory

Where is the sting
Tell me, where is the bite
When the grave robber comes
Like a thief in the night
Where is the victory
Where is the prize
When the grave robber comes
And death finally dies

This is the Christian hope of resurrection. When Jesus returns and robs the grave of its victory. Death, the ultimate enemy of humanity since the garden of Eden will finally be vanquished for good. That’s hope.

When Christians die, we usually focus on them going to heaven. But that’s just the downpayment. The real deal, the real hope is when heaven comes to earth.

Revelation 21:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. ² And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband. ³ And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, ⁴ and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.” ⁵ And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.”

This is heaven and earth reuniting as it was in Eden. Heaven coming down to earth. This is all the good we now enjoy and more without the trash. This is life as it was meant to be. And so while it is comforting to know that Asher is with Jesus and that I will join him there someday, it is much more exciting for me to envision that day when we are both resurrected to new and perfect bodies to live, work, and play alongside my other sons in a new world.

Revelation 21 shows a picture of when heaven and earth are fully united, but Jesus taught that the Kingdom of Heaven IS AT HAND. Heaven can mean the physical space above the earth, or it can just mean God’s Space. Revelation 21 is the complete overlap of God’s Space and Human Space. We don’t live in that yet. But we kinda do. When Jesus left he sent the Spirit to live in us. Everywhere that Christians are can be heaven on earth. It’ll just be a taste, as sin and death still reigns in this world, but the taste is sweet.

In the days after Asher died, people were so loving and good to us. The cascade of texts, meals, flowers, gifts, and help we received were lifegiving. The love we were shown was a glimmer of heaven on earth. It will always mean the world to me that Kayla’s uncle Kevin built the most beautiful, heartbreakingly little casket you could possibly imagine. It is a work of art, a tribute to my son. I will never forget that as long as I live.  

That is the kind of love humanity needs, especially in moments of tragedy and loss. It’s not about what you say but showing you care. In the darkest moments the love of Jesus can shine through and be a foreshadowing of heaven on earth.