God is Near To Those With Broken Hearts

Sunday, last week, was a difficult day as we buried Nicholas and came to grips with his death. I wanted nothing more than to curl up and sleep for days….but life goes on. I taught my regular Bible class that afternoon and felt God’s blessing on my spirit.

Monday morning we held our church service since we had missed out on that the previous morning. The pastor on the video we watched was speaking about ‘establishing your heart’. He spoke about meditating on Gods’ Word, and one of the verses he read was Psalm 112:7-8: (She) is not afraid of bad news; (her) heart is firm, trusting in the Lord. (Her) heart is steady, (she) will not be afraid...."

It was exactly what I needed to hear. My heart was refreshed. I had peace. Even though I was still sad, I was comforted. I had no idea this was only a temporary reprieve.

Tuesday morning I woke up with the Bible verse running through my mind: “We do not grieve as those without hope” from 1Thessalonians 4:13. I thought this had to do with Nicholas’ death. Little did I know.....

All through my morning workout and my regular routine of starting work for the day, the verse just wouldn’t leave my mind: We do not grieve as those without hope.

Around 10 AM that morning I received a call from the American Embassy. This is not unusual. As area wardens we help with issues regarding Americans in Zambia.

This phone call, however, would change my life forever.

I knew my world was about to be forever different when the voice on the phone said, “Do you know a Brant C.?” As I answered that, yes, he was my brother, my heart fell to the tips of my toes and I held on to these words: She is not afraid of bad news....her heart is firm....we do not grieve as those without hope.

Even so, I was not prepared for the next words spoken by the embassy staff member. He told me that my brother had been hiking near Victoria Falls in Livingstone, Zambia and when some baboons got aggressive, something went wrong and he fell to his death in the gorge!

My brother had been backpacking around the world--traveling through South America, India and Nepal before flying to South Africa and heading north through Zimbabwe and into Zambia. His next stop would have been to come and see me and spend a month with us.

Now, instead of traveling down to Lusaka to meet up with both my brother (who I’ve hardly seen in the last ten years) and my husband coming home from the U.S, I was now traveling to take charge of my brother’s body and sort out all the details that come with a tragic accident like this.

Because the embassy could not get ahold of either of my parents, it fell to me to call them both and break the news that their 34 year old son had died. I don’t know that anything else I do in my life will compare in difficulty.

As I write this, five days after being notified, I still haven’t come to grips with it all. 

I will say that I have seen God’s hand moving so completely. We do not grieve as those without hope. This does not mean we do not grieve, because believe you me, I am grieving!! But, I have hope. I know that God has a plan. I know that He loves me. I know that He is caring for each of my family members and will never ever leave us alone. 

I’ll write more about this in the next few days. I would have shared with you the adventure of my brother spending a month with me. Now I’ll share with you the adventure that was his life. Look for that soon. My brother was an amazing human being and I can’t wait for you all to meet him.

Please keep my entire family in your prayers. We are scattered around the world and it will take us time to gather together for a memorial service. Please pray especially for my mom and dad, my three sisters and youngest brother, and Brant’s girlfriend.

I am linking this post up with both UnknownMami and FreshMommy. I hope they both forgive me. I've made friends on both blogs and want to make sure everyone hears the news. Thank you.