Sorrow

Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints. - Psalm 116:15 [English Standard Version]

My sister told me about a little boy named Canon. I never met this boy or his mother, Carla. I don't know them. In this life, I'll never get a chance to know Canon - he died three days ago at the age of four from complications in his treatment for heart disease.

This terrible death is not the first time I've seen tragic death. Obviously, if you were alive on September 11th, you saw tragic death on live television. I had a professor who's child died when I was in grad school, and that was pretty terrible. When I was a kid, I met a boy named Chad who died of cancer. One of my few friends in high school was a kid named Mat Morel who also died of cancer. And then there is my Dad. I come up with that list without even really thinking about it.

But this death, this one has touched me very deeply, because I have a little boy and a little girl not much younger than this little Canon. His mother had hoped to see him healed. Now she must say goodbye. How can she be ready to do that? Could I do that? They are so precious - these little ones who share our lives, enrich our lives, make our lives more full. Wouldn't it empty our lives so to loose them? It seems strange that the darkness should be so close and terrifying.

I've cried a bit, thinking about this poor woman. How terrible.

It's enough to make you wonder where God is. Why would he let this go on? Why not heal little Canon? Is he not significant to you, oh God? Does he not matter? Does this woman not matter to you?

I read this Bible verse, and my questions are stilled.

The first thing I note is that little Canon did not die as an oversight. God paid attention to him. Canon was never out of Gods sight. He never took His eyes off of that little boy. Not one moment of his struggle was missed. Carla says that Canon wanted to live and he fought hard to survive. All that suffering was not alone - God was with him. God cares about Canon, and always has and always will. He knew Canon before he was born, and He knows Canon now. He never took his eyes off him.

But also, I see that death is a precious thing to God. Not that it's cute, like Precious Moments figurines, but that it is costly. God sees these deaths as significant. One that was bearing his image well is gone from the world, and will not be back until the resurrection. The pain of this loss is felt by more than Carla - her father in Heaven feels it too. My pain is nothing next to God's pain.

Why pay this cost if he does not have to pay it? If it's costly to him for Canon to die, then why not keep Canon alive? If God can do it, why not do it? Why not answer my prayer and the prayers of so many who asked Him for Canon's life?

Perhaps because God is going to let this world be broken until the time for ultimate fixing comes. It may be that God does not intend to fix things one piece at a time, but all at once, in one great, sweeping, cataclysmic moment when Jesus comes back. It may be that God chooses to leave this world in the mess it is so that people can continue to have the option NOT to believe in Him if that's what they choose. Maybe this sorrow is left in the world so that it can be obvious that things are not the way they are supposed to be, in the hopes that people will feel the discord in their hearts and search for what will resolve all the dissonance.

Who knows for sure? Only God I guess.

But I know this - the death of Canon was a thing that hurt God's heart as much as it hurt anyone's heart. Jesus shows us that people who mourn will encounter him with tears on His holy cheaks. He knows exactly how Carla feels, because He also has had to watch a son die.

Oh God, please, don't let this sad, broken world go on much longer. Please, send your Son to take us home.