I Am Not Alone

I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go.

—Genesis 28:15

I normally describe our family as borderline crazy. (I might be understating it.)

Two parents. Two businesses. Eight children. One really old dog.

But surgery, chemo, and daily radiation treatments for Mama turned our normal version of crazy into crazy on crack. How does a family function when Mama is dog sick? Not well, I can tell you that.

To get through, I knew I needed something outside the realm of cancer to focus on each day. Ideally, I hoped to find a book of the Bible with exactly twenty-eight chapters, one for each of my twenty-eight days of radiation and chemo.

I didn’t find one. I found four. The Gospel of John, plus First, Second, and Third John. A perfect twenty-eight. Thus John became my faithful companion during those dark days.

For those who don’t know, cancer treatment is cumulative, especially treatment on the head and neck. Like adding a single brick to your load each day, I didn’t feel the weight of what was happening until the second week. But by treatment day 11, the impact was undeniable. I grew exponentially sicker with each day. How would I make it to day 28?

That day, I got up at 5:45 a.m., per my new routine, to shower, dress, and dry my hair (something that became less and less necessary). Ready for the day, I headed downstairs and parked myself in my favorite reading chair for thirty minutes before I needed to leave.

That’s when I read John 11. For treatment day 11.

The story of Lazarus. And Jesus’ raising him from the dead.

Ironic, yes? If it hadn’t been for my sleeping family, I would’ve laughed out loud.

I’ve always loved the story of Lazarus. It has a good ending, and I’m all about good endings. That day, though, I wasn’t as intrigued by the ending as I was by Jesus’ emotions. John said Jesus loved Mary, Martha, and Lazarus (v. 5). And yet when He heard Lazarus was deathly ill, He waited (v. 6). Then when He finally arrived at their home much too late, He was “deeply moved in spirit and troubled” (v. 33). Ultimately, He wept (v. 35).

Whoa. Jesus wept?

I used to think Jesus cried because Lazarus had died. They’d been friends, they loved each other. It only makes sense to shed a few tears.

And yet Jesus knew long before He arrived that Lazarus’ “sickness will not end in death” (v. 4). He knew a grand finale would trump the grief.

Still, He cried. Why?

If Jesus knew Lazarus would live in the end, why did God with Us weep? I can’t presume to know the mind of God, but I believe He wept over the wide swath of suffering on that hillside. And perhaps, Jesus wept over our one-day world still riddled with those who weep and keen without relief.

People like you and like me.

That’s when I started to cry.

Do You see my suffering, God? Do You see how I ache for all this to go away? Do You hear my cries, feel my pain? DO YOU WEEP FOR ME? I need to know!

For a minute or two, I waited in my chair for heaven to deliver my answer. Giant teardrops from heaven would’ve sufficed.

A girl can hope.

Instead, silence.

Fifteen minutes later, I parked at the cancer center. With a glance at my phone, I noticed a text message from my friend Kathi: “God and I had a long chat about you this morning. He wants you to know He’s got this. You don’t need to stress or worry this morning. Today, He’s got you.”

Not exactly a sky-splitting memo from heaven, but I walked into treatment day 11 with a little more hope.

Little did I know the greater message that was yet to come.

When I sat down in the waiting room, I again pulled out my phone. It’d been a couple of days since I’d last checked my blog. I needed to see if any new comments had come in. One had:

Two months earlier, I’d set up an automatic reply to messages coming into my inbox, knowing it would be impossible to keep up with emails during the long, crazy months of treatment.

The day before treatment day 11, I’d ordered flowers for my mama from a national company. As a result, the company sent an automatic receipt to my inbox. My server then sent the automatic reply back, which typically is forever lost in the black hole of internet nothingness.

Not this time.

This time, my automatic reply landed in the inbox of a customer service rep named Nina. A girl who, only moments before, had wept and asked God if He sees her suffering. A girl who needed to know she wasn’t alone.

Sweet, sky-splitting teardrops from heaven.

Okay, God. I hear You. And? Thanks.

Does God see our suffering? A thousand times, yes.

If you’re in a place of suffering, please know this: God sees, even when it doesn’t feel like He does. He is deeply troubled by your pain. He counts and carries your tears, even as He sheds His own. He will not leave you alone.

In me there is darkness,

But with You there is light;

I am lonely, but You do not leave me;

I am feeble in heart, but with You there is help;

I am restless, but with You there is peace.

In me there is bitterness, but with You there is patience;

I do not understand Your ways,

But You know the way for me.

—DIETRICH BONHOEFFER, LETTERS AND PATERS FROM PRISON