a common ache

All around the world tonight there is a common ache. Tens upon hundreds of people have a hole, an ache and a deep sadness for a couple who so desperately want to express their union in that of a child. They've been on a long journey to become parents and that journey has been filled with much pain and sadness. They only recently let their hearts give way to hope and that is why tonight the ache becomes ever more profound, deep and beyond description. They again lost another child. They had him for a short 10 days and tonight they held him as he took his last breaths. They have hoped and lost too many times. We have hoped and lost too many times.

It has been 5 years since I've been apart of this church community of which they are long standing members. This was my community, ministry and vocation. I've moved on but it will have a profound place in my heart. I've known this couple for quite some time. I did flowers for their wedding. They attended mine. In the wonders of modern technology, I've stayed abreast of their journey to become parents. It would be amazingly painful enough to lose a child in the circumstances in which they did and yet that is only a part of a larger story of which I know few of the details except this was to be it. THE opportunity to realize their dreams after many setbacks. This wasn't only their child, it was also to be a child of the community. All were pulling in real and tangible ways for this couple to fulfill their dream, their prayer and their journey to become biological parents.

I remember reading the first status update that he was having problems in utero in his surrogate and reading it and reading it. I was in disbelief. I slept little that night attempting to yell, scream and have it out with God in regards to why this had to happen after all they had already been through. I was usually addicted to checking facebook and yet over the last 10 days I've been completely obsessed with only that which told me of updates of Noah. My heart sank and then it lightened. I prayed. I prayed some more. I pleaded, bargained and rationed with God much as I have these past several years as my journey in life has been met with its own difficulty. Yet I wanted more for them than I wanted for myself and these past two years didn't seem too difficult in light of what I imagine to be indescribable pain and suffering they were and will experience.

It is amazing to see the sense of loss everyone is experiencing at the news of the loss of his life. Every two or three updates on my facebook page is in regards to the loss of Noah. He had a fan page of nearly 1,000 members. People he never knew and who would never know him but people who wanted him to be present, living and growing among us. Those same people cry out in sadness, pain, disbelief, anger and a loss of words. The best response possible. Nothing else can be said or done. Moment by moment. That's all that can be handled and that might be much.

Yet these messages of sadness, disbelief and anger are not trite sayings. They will have hands and feet. They will deliver meals, give hugs, be shoulders to cry on and will carry this couple through. This I know even though it has been 5 years since their church community has been my own. It's not buildings, programs, sermons or bulletins that touch the very acute pain they feel. It's people that have been there before this journey and at every sharp turn it has taken them on thus far. This I am confident of and this I am most proud.

Noah would've not only had the unconditional, rich and unbelievable love of his two very amazing parents but would've had that of a large community of people...a church...a real living breathing church. Yet even that is incomparable to what he is experiencing now in Heaven with His God and his siblings who have gone before him. We just wanted him to experience a little Heaven on Earth and we want his parents to be parents because we know he would've loved it and they would've loved it too. This is why we are so sad. We all miss you, Noah. Many of us never knew you yet we feel acutely the hole you've left in this world...in our hearts. We ache for you, Brian & Andrea. We have no words but we are angry and we are sad and that can't even describe it. God, we don't understand and we may never will. We know you can take the tough questions and our difficult days. For that, we are thankful.