When you called her Hope

Six years ago I walked alongside some of my dearest friends (and providentially nearest neighbors) as they navigated the unique path of delivering their baby only to bury her.  When my friend went in for her 20 week sonogram to find out their baby's gender she heard the surprising and painful words "incompatible with life." As they grieved the imminent loss of their daughter, and for my friend what felt like the loss of her future family, we were doing our best to encourage them, comfort them, speak truth in love to them, and yet give them space to hurt.  We knew we couldn’t understand their pain. To feel the beautiful torture of butterflies, kicks, hiccups, knowing they were fleeting... 

I still don’t ever know what to say.

It has been six years, but every year at this time I fumble through my options. Send a card? Text “Thinking of you today”? Maybe you just don’t want me to say anything. What if you just want everyone to leave you alone?

But the truth is I am thinking of you.  I’m thinking of her.  Every November 13 I pray extra that God will comfort your family and multiply your joy.

I remember seeing your name come up on my text, and I ignored it because I was having coffee with a friend.  As soon as she left I checked to see what witty way you'd reveal the gender. But my heart stopped.  My hands were cold. Why did I ignore this text? How long have you been over there in your apartment crying by yourself? That was one of the saddest hugs I’ve ever given a friend.  I remember weeping to my husband that night and, for the first time in my life, sincerely pleading for Jesus to come back.  It hurt to know how, just down the hall, your world was so shaken— so broken.

But I also remember the day you both walked into our apartment and told us you had settled on a name. “We’re naming her Hope.”

Leave it to you two to take this utterly hopeless situation (the sonographer and doctor made that painfully clear) and to label it “Hope.” But it wasn’t denial.  It wasn’t wishful thinking.  It wasn’t just a pretty name.  It was a declaration – in this utterly hopeless situation there is Hope.

And here I am, six years later, thinking through how to say I still care and still love you and still wish I could be her “Aunt Abby” and fumbling back through my options…and it hits me.  What I really want to tell you is thank you.  Thank you for naming her Hope. Thank you for staring down the darkest, loneliest, most terrifying path that was laid before you and walking into it under the light of hope. I’m in awe that you looked at that seemingly hopeless situation and said “I know this is redeemable. If not now, then in eternity.” But that’s what you saw.  You saw beyond the pain of the now.  You saw that beauty and reality of the future that is promised to us. That one day all of this – all of us – will be made new. 

1 Corinthians 15:19 says “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.” I’ll bet some people heard your story and then heard her name and thought it didn’t make sense. Or maybe that you were a Christian nut praying for a miracle. Or possibly even that you knew one day she’d be one of you guardian angels.  “Sweet, but pitiful.”

But we knew what you were saying – that you believe what has been promised. You were clinging to the assurance that “the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.” It was your testimony that even death had lost its sting because of what Christ had done.  In no way am I saying that losing Hope wasn’t or shouldn’t have been one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. But when a Christian hopes, it’s because we believe that the deepest, heaviest, most painful burdens we carry in life will seem like “light and momentary troubles” when we cross to eternity. We are sure of what we hope for, certain of what we do not see, and confident that God is making all things new.   And by naming her Hope, you handed that to the world.  With tear-stained faces and an enormous belly, you called her Hope.

And friends, this world needs that hope. 

Honestly, I needed that hope. The next six years laid a number of painfully dark, lonely, terrifying paths in front of me.  And as I stared into the blackness ahead of me, your family stood at the far end of the tunnel holding up your light of Hope, encouraging me forward. On my darkest days, in my loneliest moments, I repeated often “Even if this lasts until the day I die, this won’t last forever.” I clung to it. Why? Because of hope.  Because I know there’s more coming.  There’s purpose, there’s redemption, and this broken beaten world and my broken beaten self are going to be made new.

I’m so thankful for the testimony of your family.  I’m blessed to witness her short and precious life that has reminded me of deep truths on dark days. It is such a privilege to walk the road with the broken faithful, and to call you our friends.   

I love you guys.  I’m thinking of you.  Thank you for sharing your life and your Hope with me.

Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope.  For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.  According to the Lord's word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.  For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.  After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.  Therefore encourage one another with these words.
                                                                                            ~1 Thessalonians 4:13-18

"He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" Then he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true."

                                                                                            ~Revelation 21:4-5