Today I watched two brothers, ages 12 & 15, serve as pallbearers, carrying the small, ivory-white casket of their little sister to her grave site.
No photos for this post. None are necessary.
It is a sobering reminder of the junk that I feel is important and the meaningless stuff I worry about fade into nothing. I listened to her father and mother tell stories of their daughter’s life, her joy, her battle with bone cancer, her courage, and most of all, her faith and unswerving love for God.
Little Faith Lautzenheiser was a giant in faith, and a true testimony to her name.
I’m just pausing to honor Faith and her family.
It’s a painful world we live in… a fallen world. But some of Faith’s last words, while the doctor was putting a line into her heart, singing through an oxygen mask, were these words:
Bless the Lord, O my soul
O my soul
Worship His holy name
Sing like never before
O my soul
I’ll worship Your holy name
Part of that song, “Bless The Lord” by Matt Redman, also sings:
And on that day when my strength is failing
The end draws near and my time has come
Still my soul will sing Your praise unending
Ten thousand years and then forevermore
Faith was not afraid to sing those words. I pray that I may sing those words as well until my last breath.
C.S. Lewis said, “Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret? There are better things ahead than any we leave behind.”
Hebrews 11:38 says, “the world was not worthy of them.”
Faith had no regrets or fears of what lay ahead. Four or five days before she passed, she told her family that she was ready to go to Heaven. She is healed as she prayed. She is singing not just to Him, but with Him. She has gone on ahead. This world was not worthy of Faith.
Cancer and tragedy may not be explainable, at least not in logical, human terms. C.S. Lewis also says, “The problem of reconciling human suffering with the existence of God, who loves, is only insoluble so long as we attach a trivial meaning to the word ‘love’ and look on things as if man were the center of them.”
Faith understood this better than those of us who are 3, 4, 5, or 6 times her age. Though there is pain in this life, “we must anticipate that it will never cease till God sees the world to be either redeemed or no further redeemable.”
I told my daughter several years ago, when a teacher sent home a question regarding the right to have an abortion, which they were to think about, and then prepare for a debate in class about, that the question was foolish. The question was ignorant from the start and could only lead to further ignorance. You will never get the right answer when you’re asking the wrong question.
Proverbs 26:4 – “When arguing with fools, don’t answer their foolish arguments, or you will become as foolish as they are.”
I believe we ask the wrong question when we ask “Why pain? Why suffering? Why tragedy?” At least we ask wrongly because we only ask from a base of what we know.
Faith Lautzenheiser strengthened my faith today. I see Heaven better than I ever have. I believe in a loving, caring, compassionate God more than I ever have.
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” Matthew 5:8
“It is safe to tell the pure in heart that they shall see God, for only the pure in heart want to.” C.S. Lewis
Faith was and is, pure in heart.
It has been a long battle for everyone, not least of which is a mother, a father, and two devoted brothers. I’m just reflecting on what is important, what is honorable, and simply want to tell Faith that I will see you soon.