Through The Darkness

Through the Darkness

He pours disgrace upon princes and disarms the strong.

Job 12:21

Nancy knew her baby had problems almost immediately, but she and her husband named the baby girl Hope. Born with clubfeet and extreme lethargy, among other problems, Hope was officially diagnosed with Zellweger Syndrome. There is no treatment or cure for this rare metabolic disorder. Most babies with the disease live less than six months.

As Nancy looked at Hope, she thought, Here’s my chance to respond to the worst thing I can imagine in a way that is pleasing to God. It wasn’t easy. Nancy had to make that decision over and over again during the next few months. The grieving didn’t get easier. Hope wasn’t healed. On her 199th day of life, Hope took her last breath. But that was not the end of hope. Each day, Nancy trusted God to do something meaningful despite her loneliness and grief.

Both parents must be carriers of the recessive gene in order for Zellweger Syndrome to occur, so the Guthries decided David would have a vasectomy to prevent another pregnancy. Only one in two thousand vasectomies fail, so the couple felt secure. But one year after Hope died, Nancy was pregnant again. Prenatal testing revealed this child would also have Zellweger Syndrome. Named after the angel, Gabriel was born on July 16, 2001. They knew what to expect. Their son’s first day would be his best. Gabriel died 183 days later.

Nancy says that answering how or why begins with another question: what? What do we believe about God? “Do I trust God enough to believe he’s in control and whatever he allows in my life will be for my ultimate good—not that whatever he allows in my life is good?”^a

It’s been said that faith isn’t faith until it’s all you’re holding on to. Nancy’s hope had left her clinging to nothing more than a conviction that God would carry her though her dark and deep abyss of grief. Her expectant faith was not about to let her waste her pain on perpetual anger and forever asking “Why?” Her faith resuscitated her hope when it seemed that all was hopeless. Her faith and trust in God’s heavenly perspective pulled her through the darkness. It was her expectant faith that gave her strength she didn’t know she had.

In your marriage, you may know very well a situation requiring the kind of faith Nancy displayed. Or you may not yet. The Guthries have survived their personal tragedy by holding on to this faith in God together and watching him bring them through. What about you? How can you allow hope to permeate any corners of your marriage darkened by grief and doubt today?

The person who is plunged into doubt is not the unbeliever, but the person who has no other hope but hope.

—Jacques Ellul

^a 73