When you believe that your God allows the people you love dearly to die much too early, what does that say about your God, and who you are becoming?

Who would you be and how would you feel and how would you live life if you decided to believe that God, whatever you believe God to be, only allows each of us to die right on time? Regardless of the circumstances of our death.

What if you decided to believe that it could be no other way? That everyone dies at the right time. Even if you don’t understand it. And never will. When you’re in your physical body. Who would you be if you decided to believe that everyone dies at the perfect time? Everyone. — Tom Zuba

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I read that quote by Tom Zuba (look him up…what an incredible story of loss and life) a few weeks ago and it has bounced around in my head ever since. Deacon is gone, and what I choose to believe about God because of it is life-changing. While I do (did?) believe that no one dies by accident, guilt plagues me. Guilt has made a home on my shoulder. Guilt walks beside me around the block on a sunny day. It sits beside me driving the kids to school. It stares back at me in the mirror. I can even find it in the eyes of friends and family looking back at me (although I’m certain it couldn’t be found in their heart or mind, it’s only me placing it there). Cause the thing I was supposed to do….the only thing, really…I didn’t do. Protect my child.

In a variety of scenarios it follows me. I didn’t get him to the right doctors. I didn’t push hard enough to get him to that program in Denver to be a part of that asthma study. I didn’t take him to the hospital soon enough. I didn’t find the right combination of drugs. I didn’t see that this time something was different. I didn’t. I didn’t. I didn’t. It’s in my head on repeat.

What I would have said I believe about God, before losing Deacon, was that He knows the number of each of our days on this earth. That nothing I did or didn’t do killed Deacon. That “all the days ordained for Deacon were written in your book before one of them came to be.” Psalm 139:16 I would have said all that. But I find myself saying it now and then adding a *but maybe* to it. Maybe if I’d tried… Maybe if I’d seen…. Maybe if I’d called…

I’m on shaky ground. But I think that’s ok. God’s ground isn’t shaky. He’s firm. And he’s letting me fling my wonky theology and wounded heart at him. This time is creating who I am becoming and what it says about the God I believe in.

I’m out of words to comfort myself and put a bandaid over the guilt. I only have God. He’s there while I try to be gentle with myself but fail. He’s there when I know I’m supposed to have hope but just don’t have the oomph for it. He’s there when I practice telling Him that I’m not fine. That this is NOT fine. He’s there.

In the school drop off line when I say, “You feel so far.”

When I’m making beds and say, “I’m not sure how to see You here.”

In the grocery store when I think, “I can’t find You but I really want to.”

Washing the dishes whispering the uncomfortable truth, “I don’t know if I want to find You, but I want to say that this hurts.”

These honest, messy, prayers, brought to Him before cleaning them up. The guilt. The questions about my God. Is He good? Is He there? What do I truly believe the Bible says about life and death? The ache of who I am becoming through this. I’m counting on what’s being created in my darkness and chaos.

And so I ponder again, “Who would you be if you decided to believe that everyone dies at the perfect time? Everyone.” Working on finding out.