Friends & Family,
Every year I’m a complete mess on the 9th and 10th of March. I’d like to think with time comes a sense of growth and distance from pain; but every year I’m reminded that’s not that case. Just like the ocean, the waves might come less, but they remain waves when they do come. Ben would have been 6 years old today, and for the 6th year Pam and I feel a horrid sense of loss you aren’t here with us.
Jami had swim lessons today with her friend Kaden. They both were afraid of the diving board as they watched the older kids try. Jami told me that Kaden is more afraid than she is of the diving board, “he’s 80 scared Dad”. Zach got his haircut today with mom and it’s the first time he didn’t cry. Today was a great day for them. But for you, you could’t be here. Yours is a stolen voice in our family. And I really wanted to hear it today.
Tomorrow, I’ll wake up extra early and go to your grave. I’ll put the cross on that Jami says is to remind you of Jesus. I know the truth. It’s to remind me; not anyone else. I’ll do my best to go into work and pretend it’s a normal day. I know the truth. I’m not normal today. I’m a proud dad of three kids, but I only know two voices.
So here is what I cling to:
But let me tell you something wonderful, a mystery I’ll probably never fully understand. We’re not all going to die—but we are all going to be changed. You hear a blast to end all blasts from a trumpet, and in the time that you look up and blink your eyes—it’s over. On signal from that trumpet from heaven, the dead will be up and out of their graves, beyond the reach of death, never to die again. At the same moment and in the same way, we’ll all be changed. In the resurrection scheme of things, this has to happen: everything perishable taken off the shelves and replaced by the imperishable, this mortal replaced by the immortal. Then the saying will come true:
Death swallowed by triumphant Life!
Who got the last word, oh, Death?
Oh, Death, who’s afraid of you now?It was sin that made death so frightening and law-code guilt that gave sin its leverage, its destructive power. But now in a single victorious stroke of Life, all three—sin, guilt, death—are gone, the gift of our Master, Jesus Christ. Thank God!
– 1 Corinthians 15: 51-57
This year U2 released one of their most personal albums.
The title track is “The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)” and it’s a beautiful song of 4 irish kids fighting out their demons as teenagers by forming a band, finding an outlet and ultimately hope through the music of the Ramones. Here they are 30 something years later, still fighting and still being blessed by the songs that “made some sense out of the world.”
Bono breaks, as usual, to turn a song about 4 kids in band to 4 adults facing life’s biggest questions together.
These last two stanzas I want engraved on my tombstone.
The Miracle (of Salvation)
As Bono says here; the Gospel is a song when you hear it. I woke up when I saw: I’m a sinner loved deeply by God. I’ve lost so much through the years by my own hands and through grace it’s returned. It’s the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard.
I woke up at the moment when the miracle occurred
Heard a song that made some sense out of the world
Everything I ever lost, now has been returned
In the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard.We can hear you
We can hear you
We can hear you
The Miracle (of Jesus’ Return)
And as Bono so often takes me… right into heaven. I get so many things I don’t deserve: Like eternity. With God. With Ben. With everything we lost. All those stolen voices TAKEN from us. Their stolen voices will someday be returned. And it will be the most beautiful sound we’ve ever heard.
I woke up at the moment when the miracle occurred
I get so many things I don’t deserve
All the stolen voices will someday be returned
The most beautiful sound I’d ever heard.Your voices will be heard
Your voices will be heard
Ben, your voice will be heard. I can’t wait to hear it.
I hope you know I love you,
Dad