Once Upon a Time: Discovering Our Forever After Story Read online

  We know about worst-case-scenario thinking. That’s when we imagine things all out of proportion. It’s the high school senior facing finals who imagines failure on the test leading to not receiving enough credits to graduate, leading to having to earn a GED instead of getting a diploma, leading to giving up his seat at the college that already accepted him, leading to . . . well, you can see how far imagination can take us if directed toward the negative. We can be so creative when imagining imminent doom. And you know what? It paralyzes us. It becomes self-fulfilling prophecy.

  Second Corinthians 10:5 holds the answer for us. “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” We take captive every thought.

  In other words, we need to keep from what many call “stinkin’ thinkin’.”

  My friend’s grandmother wanted to learn to drive in the early days of automobiles. Not many women drove at that time, but she was determined. Her husband took her out to a smooth field, flat and open for as far as the eye could see. The only obstacle in the whole acreage was a lone tree. Her husband settled her behind the wheel of that shiny black Model T Ford, showed her how everything worked, and, as he climbed into the passenger seat, joked, “Now just don’t hit the tree, Ruth.”

  Well, you can guess what happened, right? Acres and acres of open space and she headed right for that tree. She focused on the tree—on the one obstacle—and she hit it smack dab in the middle of the bumper. She never did learn to drive, though she tried it several times through the years. She used to say, “Give me a tree, no matter how distant, and I’ll manage to hit it.” Self-fulfilling prophecy. If we can imagine it, we can attain it. Unfortunately that works both for us and against us.

  In his book Soulprint, Mark Batterson talks about Leonardo da Vinci and the two distinct kinds of imagining he wrote about: preimagining and postimagining. We know all about preimagining. That’s the imagination we usually refer to. It’s imagining what something will be like before it even happens. Postimagining is reimagining the past—those things that have already come to pass.

  Batterson says that our ability to postimagine—to put things into perspective once some time has passed—will determine how well we live life. I agree. I often write about characters who have allowed the troubles of their pasts to embitter them. They are not free to love again, to live fully, or to see people through God’s eyes.

  So while it’s important for us to imagine creatively in order to reach for God’s best, we also need to postimagine—to see God’s hand in our lives.

  One of my friends struggled with infertility and, after years of trying, found herself pregnant. She and her husband were overjoyed and savored every moment of the pregnancy. When the time came for her to give birth, one complication after another arose, and their baby boy died a few hours later. It’s hard to imagine more of a worst-case scenario, but through a series of miracles my friend was able to adopt a baby just a few months later. As she postimagines the events, she says that she can’t imagine it any other way. Though she still mourns the little boy, she sees that had it not been for his passing, she would never have the daughter who was always meant to be theirs. No bitterness, just seeing God’s hand in unimaginable circumstances.

  When it comes to trouble—and we know trouble will always find us—we need to minimize worst-case-scenario thinking and put our energy into postimagining in order to see how the trouble was instrumental in shaping us.

  Fourteen

  AND THE CHALLENGE OF HIS LIFE LOOMED . . .

  God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.

  —PSALM 46:1–3

  In my books I often create that moment when it looks like all will be lost. When we talk about the classic hero’s journey, this is the ordeal stage. It’s when the hero faces his greatest fear, often called the deepest, darkest cave. In the last chapter we talked about troubles. We all have them and they come at us with great frequency. This is different. This is the event that marks a change in our lives forever.

  The year 2011 was that time for me. I woke early on Easter Sunday, as I did most mornings. I was the only one awake as I reached for my Bible. The scent of spring was in the air even before the sun rose. I savored this time I spend each day with the Lord. Wayne and I would be joining our children and grandchildren later for church services, followed by a big family breakfast.

  I had already wrapped a gift for each of my children. It was a book I’d recently read about heaven. The story involved the near-death experience of a four-year-old and his incredible telling of what life was like in the great beyond. The book had fascinated and encouraged me, and I felt it was the perfect Easter gift for them.

  FACING THE ABYSS

  Opening my Bible, I smiled at the rising sun and thought about the brokenhearted Mary Magdalene and the other women walking to Christ’s tomb that early morn. As I read the familiar verses I realized anew the terrible price Jesus had paid for my passage into heaven. I bowed my head and closed my eyes, and as I did I had a vision. The image was that of a tunnel, dark and bleak, with a bright light shining at the end. It was like the one I’d read about so often in writings by those who have stood on the precipice of death. In that moment I realized that it was Jesus who carved that tunnel. He died; He descended and was there for three days. I often wondered what had happened during that time. All the Bible says is that He descended. In that moment I understood. Jesus had freed the multitude of souls who had been awaiting His arrival. The saints who had passed: Moses, Samuel, David, Daniel, and literally thousands of others who had been His faithful servants. They needed to wait for Jesus to carve that tunnel. I don’t often have such visions, and this one excited and encouraged me. I woke my husband and later told my children about this beautiful vision God had given me of the saints walking joyously toward the light, following their Redeemer.

  Little did I know that just four months later, Wayne and I would stand brokenhearted over our son’s grave. My solace was the knowledge that this was the very tunnel Jesus had carved out by His death and resurrection. Jesus was there to greet our son on the other side.

  THE DARKNESS GATHERS

  Our son Dale suffered from depression, and recently his life had been beset with difficulties. He was on medication, but a recent DUI ticket and what that would mean to his teaching career further complicated his perspective on life. I realized that for our son this was as much a spiritual battle as a physical one. Every morning, I faithfully brought Dale before the Lord. I’d told Satan he couldn’t have my son and I was prepared to do battle—and I meant it.

  I couldn’t forget that three years earlier, Dale had gone to the Holy Land with a pastor friend of ours and was baptized in the Sea of Galilee. He joked with me and said, “Gee, Mom, all you had to do was send the other kids to Bible camp. Me, you had to send all the way to Israel.” For a long time afterward, he was on the right path, and then all of a sudden everything seemed to go awry.

  One week before Dale went missing, I sat praying for him, as I did every morning, when a dark, oppressive spirit came over me. Words fail as I try to describe this heavy darkness that descended on me. For a moment I could barely breathe, and then I broke into sobs. When my husband asked me what had happened, I said, “Something’s wrong with Dale. I can feel it. We’re losing our son.”

  I called and talked to Dale later that day, and he assured me all was well. It wasn’t. I believe now that was the day our son decided to take his own life.

  WHEN ALL SEEMS LOST

  A week later, Dale turned up missing. He’d sent vague text messages telling each of his family members of his love. I was busy with a business meeting and perturbed that he would pull one of his stunts when it was inconvenient and embarrassing. His wife was in
a panic and so were his siblings. I, on the other hand, was convinced Dale had either entered rehab or had run away, something he’d done before. It would be just like him to think he could escape his troubles.

  I didn’t take the fact he’d been missing for twenty-four hours seriously until his wife contacted Search and Rescue. Dale’s car was found, and the family gathered together and prayed as bloodhounds searched the area. They found nothing. I was the optimist, reassuring the others. Dale would be found alive and well. He just needed to get away and think things through.

  Our elder son, Ted, spent the night with Wayne and me. The next morning I rose and reached for my Bible. The verse for that day was John 6:39. It read, “And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day.” In that moment I knew, as only a mother can, that our son was dead. Ted found me sobbing and reminded me I was the one who gave everyone confidence. “Don’t lose faith now, Mom,” he urged. But in my heart I knew Dale was gone. As Ted left I reached for the phone and called our two daughters, asking them to come to the house right away.

  Instead of heading directly home, as he had intended, Ted stopped off at the area where the bloodhounds had searched only a short while before. In the woods he found evidence that his brother was close by. He contacted the sheriff’s department and together they located Dale’s body.

  The leader of the Search and Rescue group told us that in thirty-one years of experience he’s never had his dogs be that close to a body and not find it. In retrospect, I understand that God didn’t want a dog to find our son, and so he sent Dale’s best friend—his older brother. Nor did God wish for a stranger to come to relay the news to our family that our son had committed suicide. My daughters and husband were with me when Ted contacted us with the devastating news. God had placed His loving arms around us and given us the gracious cushion of His love.

  The Lord was so very present on the worst day of my life.

  A VERY PRESENT HELP

  Dale’s funeral was packed with family, friends, and his former students. The church was filled to overflowing. We placed his high school letterman’s jacket in the front of the church, along with his favorite pair of running shoes. His brother gave his eulogy and his two sisters worked on the photo display in the church vestibule, along with a video set to his favorite karaoke song, “You’re So Vain.” Ted set up a Facebook page titled “Remembering Dale Macomber” and literally hundreds of entries were posted within a few days. A sense of unreality settled over me as we celebrated the life of our son.

  Following the reception, just the family went to the cemetery. I’d been emotionally strong through the funeral and the reception, but when we reached the graveyard and I viewed my son’s casket being lowered into the ground, it felt as if someone had thrust a knife into my heart. Grief overwhelmed me and I broke into sobs. How could this have happened? Why would our son, who was always so loving and tender, bring such horrific pain into our lives? None of this made sense. None of this felt real.

  As we got ready to leave, my husband came to me and Dale’s wife, Laurie. He placed his arms around each of us and steered us toward Jody, our elder daughter. “I want you to take your mother and Laurie home,” he said.

  I looked up at him in disbelief. I couldn’t understand why Wayne wouldn’t want to return home with us. If ever there was a time I needed my husband, it was then. How could he even think of leaving me at such a time?

  “What are you going to do?” I asked.

  My husband looked at me, and with tears in his eyes, he said, “I’m not going to let a stranger with a backhoe bury our son. I’m going to do it myself.”

  Ted stayed with his father, and together the two of them buried Dale. Wayne and I have been married more than forty years, and in all those years, I have never loved my husband more than at that moment.

  As you tell your story, you’ll recognize your own deepest, darkest cave. It’s only in telling the story that we begin to see God’s hand. I’ve learned that it isn’t until you are facing your own black tunnel—the biggest challenge of your life—that God reveals how He’s been preparing you for this.

  Storytelling Prompt

  Have you had a deepest, darkest cave experience in your life? Try to recapture your emotions during the ordeal. Tell about it without the benefit of hindsight, without the redemption that may have come since.

  Dark Night of the Soul

  As you live your story you may find times when it feels as if God is nowhere to be found. John of the Cross, a Carmelite monk who lived in sixteenth-century Castile, wrote about this in his poem “The Dark Night of the Soul” and later writings. He suffered that dark night and realized that it was part of the spiritual journey. He sensed that God wanted to take him deeper, and in order to do that he needed to be weaned off the emotional and taken deeper into obedience and an understanding of his failings.

  There have been times in my own spiritual story when the Lord seemed especially quiet. There were times when I prayed fervently and could not sense an answer, times when I wondered, “Where is God in all this?”

  Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, born in Albania, is better known to us as Mother Teresa of Calcutta—winner of a Nobel Prize, selfless servant to the poor and dying in India, and an example of obedient service to God over a lifetime. She said, “We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature—trees, flowers, grass—grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence . . . . We need silence to be able to touch souls.”1

  It’s interesting that she speaks of finding God in silence. After her death, her correspondence to her spiritual directors became public, though she had asked that it be destroyed. The letters revealed that from 1946 until just before her death, Mother Teresa suffered a dark night of the soul. In one of her letters she described “just that terrible pain of loss, of God not wanting me, of God not being God, of God not really existing.”2

  That is half a century of God’s seeming silence. And yet Mother Teresa continued to love and care for the least ones in India. She didn’t let feelings alter her path. She clung to the written word of God. She wasn’t the mystic, spiritual giant many perceived her to be, but a struggling pilgrim working to be faithful to her Lord. It’s something we don’t often talk about, fidelity—a faithfulness to God despite how we feel. Mother Teresa underwent what she considered to be a purification process during this dark night of the soul.

  You’ve often heard that feelings—emotions—are notoriously untrustworthy. And yet so much of our faith is described in emotional terms. “I feel so close to God.” Feelings are part of it, but faith is so much more than feelings. If part of your story involves your own dark nights—perhaps depression, addiction, or deep emotional wounds—you understand that sometimes our faith blossoms while God seems silent. We’ve come to realize that even if we don’t sense Him, He’s been there all the time.

  Fifteen

  AND HE WAS NEVER THE SAME AGAIN . . .

  Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

  —ROMANS 12:2

  Transformation. It’s our favorite part of the story. When we see a character slowly changing, we know there is hope for the ending we’re pulling for. We are drawn to character growth and change. For example, there’s the crotchety old man whose heart softens once a child comes into his life. Remember the story Heidi, by Johanna Spyri? Or what about the young woman who sees nothing but arrogance and disdain in the eyes of an aristocratic suitor, only to discover that her own pride and prejudice are far greater? (Think Jane Austen.)

  I was seated with a group of friends around a table when Carole Lewis, director of First Place 4 Health, a weight loss and total health program, told a story that had us all in stitches. She began, in her Texas draw
l, by asking whether she had ever told us how her cat got saved. Of course we were all ears. Yellow Cat (yes, that’s his name) was the meanest cat Carole had ever seen. He would jump up on her bed, purring and stretching just like a kitty that wanted to be petted. As soon as he had suckered Carole into petting him, he’d turn and bite her hand or reach out and scratch her. Then he’d jump off the bed and hide before she could call him on his behavior. Yellow Cat was a nightmare.

  Carole lives on the water in Houston, and when her family evacuated for Hurricane Ike, she brought out her two cat carriers, one for the docile Archie, the other for Yellow Cat. Well, Yellow Cat, ever stubborn and disagreeable, saw the cat carriers and refused to come. He hid somewhere, and no matter how hard they searched they couldn’t find him. The winds were blowing harder and harder, and finally they knew they had to leave Yellow Cat.

  After Ike, Carole was convinced Yellow Cat couldn’t possibly have survived, but when they went back to the bay on Monday, there he was in the rafters of the garage—one of the few structures that survived. He was still scared and refused to come down. However, the next day, when they returned once more, Carole placed a can of albacore tuna inside his cat carrier. Yellow Cat was so hungry he left his shelter. When he went into his carrier to eat the tuna, Carole was able to shut the door.

  She told us that when she opened the carrier door in their temporary living quarters, he was a different cat. “He got saved.” She was convinced Yellow Cat must have had a spiritual experience during the battering of the storm, because he emerged as the sweetest, most docile cat they’d ever seen. He’s never attempted to bite or scratch Carole again.