My Walk with God this Last Month

 

Dear Prayer Warriors.

I wanted to share with you this testimony because I know I asked for prayer writing it. With God's strength, I spoke at the Men's breakfast this past weekend to shed light on how God helped me in the last 5 weeks. Sharing this with close to 150 men from my church was so hard, I started off pretty wobbly. It's all so fresh. This was harder than speaking at the funeral because it shows how the Lord met me and the choices He helped me make, rather than focusing on Simon.

Thanks for reading and praying.

 Nic

A month ago, yesterday I cried out to God on a bike trail after my 6-year-old son collapsed in front of me from a snake bite. I got his sister out of her bike seat and picked up my son's limp body. I ran through the brush to the houses I saw off in the distance. As my three-year-old daughter tried keeping up. I carried Simon about a 1/4 mile in my arms not knowing this would be the last time I held him alive. I was talking to him while yelling for help "Simon Breath! son keep your eyes open and breathe. HELP, I NEED HELP Lord Jesus help." Simon was losing all consciousness; his face was white with his lips and eyelids turning purple. Next, I turned to make sure my daughter was still running behind me trying her best. I repeated my instructions to my son, and cried for more help. My Son Simon was alive and biking on Tuesday and dead by Sunday.  

 

I am here today to testify about my month-long journey out of trauma and into Mourning. It has been the most humbling experience of my life. But a Shepherd has carried me. Jesus wept with me, spoke to me, and equipped me in song.

 

I arrived at the hospital where they took Simon by ambulance with nothing but a Bible. I wasn't licking my wounds about the event, or replaying in my head the incident because I was clinging to the Author of life and asking Him for mercy. I spent 5 days hoping that it would please Yahweh to heal my son Simon. As the venom spread and the helicopters were transporting him to more necessary machinery, 3 hospitals altogether, my hope remained on the glory of God in this situation. In each hospital room, I was at his side praying, singing and reading the Scriptures in his ear as the medical helpers were working around us.  I also sang the two versions of Psalm 23 that I knew over and over.

 

 I had faith that God was perfectly capable and able to make my comatose Simon arise in an instant. 24 hours after the snake bite we ended up at the Aurora Children’s Hospital. I hadn’t slept in 36 hours and as I settled in for sleep. I got a call from Children’s hospital Colorado Springs telling me my daughter Anna arrived by ambulance and had multiple seizures. She hadn't had seizures since her birth. This clearly was not a battle of flesh and blood. So, at 2 in the morning, I left Simon in Aurora to go be with my daughter Anna in Colorado Springs. By now I asked people to pray that we would stand our ground amidst Satan’s schemes. When I got to Anna, I prayed in the authority that Jesus gives to cast out all demonic influence and claim the blood of the Lamb over my family. I was praying with hope about all these things because at the cross the Lamb of God has overcome all darkness and death.

 

Early the next day the hospitals agreed to take Anna to Aurora and admit her there for monitoring rather than keep her in the springs. Once we were reunited in Aurora, the diagnosis for Simon arrived. I frantically wrote prayer requests as I could understand them to everyone that prays in the name of Jesus. I told the doctors that we are people of faith depending on the Almighty. And by His grace, my daughter Anna remained in stable condition from that point on. 

 

For Simon, the brain swelling persisted and the science of man concluded death, I began to feel desperate. I called upon the counsel of many to bring wisdom for direction. Every spiritual leader of mine for the last 5 years was invited to my son's hospital room. Lindsey and I had not ceased calling upon the name of Jesus. We sang, read, and prayed. We were exhausted, totally spent from days of asking, seeking and knocking for healing and now we started to pray for resurrection. This was around the time that we asked for praise help from those praying for us. We asked them to send us songs to listen to and believe God for. We received close to 50 songs and it ministered to our hearts and minds as we listened and played them in Simon’s room. Yahweh is the author of life, we know how to pray in life, but what will my worship of Him look like in this allowance of death?   

 

I was humbled by the unthinkable, the death of my 6-year-old boy. The only rest for my soul was in copycatting the words of Jesus in prayer. "Lord let thy will be done." My prayer was for the miraculous, but nevertheless "Thy will be done." This transition to acceptance of death came not from a lack of faith that Jesus could raise my son, but more exactly from a step of faith that God was telling me that my job as Simon's father is over and that I did a good job.

 

During these hours of my son's death my bride asked me in full sorrow: "why can God supply seemingly endless amounts of peace and prayer warriors but He can't raise the dead or heal?" after listening carefully to her question of woe. I waited a second and the Lord gave me this response for Lindsey "It’s because He is showing us what His will is for this context. He desires us to take His peace." Simon Emmanuel's life ended in the arms of his parents much like how it began 2530 days before. 

 

I remember cleaning out our hospital room with the help of a Radioflyer wagon that they supply. My dead son remained on his hospital bed unhooked from everything while my bride was in an exhausted sleep right next to him. It was 4 in the morning of the next day. I knew I didn't have the keys to my car but still went outside just to wander around the hospital with my overloaded wagon. I could hear the very early signs of morning like the birds singing and see a faint glow on the horizon. This was not a time to rely on feelings, rather it was time to drain my feelings and rely on the Holy Spirit. There in the darkness, with the promise of morning, in between the hospital and the hospital parking garage I wandered singing "In the morning when I rise, in the morning when I rise, in the morning when I rise give me Jesus."  My voice trembled as I sang out loud knowing my Shepherd hears my voice from this valley of death. 

 

I wish I could say that my bride and I took the same path in faith, loss and grief. We are what Jesus would call "equally yoked", but Satan wanted our son's death to be a wedge in our marriage. So in leaving the hospital we found ourselves wrestling with different questions, surrendering to the Lord at different times, and seeing the future quite differently. Although we equally wept, equally missed Simon, and equally sought the Lord. Death changed things, there was a temptation to let our love for each other grow cold. But God reminded me that I made a vow, He also reminded me that I married up and I am not going to be the husband I was before. My focus needed to be on my living relationships with Jesus and with my bride more than it needed to be about my son. I did all I could to promote unity with Jesus. Singing praise in my loss to the Man of Sorrows. I did all I could to promote unity with my wife too, I listened, hugged, and I even ate at Panera.    

 

The weeks following required me to set up and take on all phone calls to carry Simon to his resting place while staying in step with my bride's wishes. Since my daughter Anna was hospitalized at the same time, she had new medications and significant follow ups needed. everything was pressing in on us from medical bills, news channels, crowdfunding pages, organizing helpers, family flying in, and applying for assistance. So, I would work on all those outer things till about noon and no matter where I was, I would stop to eat lunch and take a nap. I felt I needed to protect my family and our time, to make space for lamenting. This was the time I focused on shepherding my 3-year-old daughter Renee's heart through the death of her roommate, best friend and brother in a manner that she could comprehend. It was a grace from God to be patient with her no matter how many times she repeated "when are we going to see Simon." 

 

One of the hidden blessings of being a special needs dad is that I learned early and often how to ask for help. So, through all of this I wrote prayer emails regularly asking for prayer and keeping the prayer warriors updated. I know God used what little I shared in humility to fan the flames of my faith in Jesus as well as the faith of those who were praying. Part of being a Christian is asking for help because we all are different parts of the same body.  I needed prayer, I needed people at our side practically, I needed to be shepherded by our pastors and God met every one of those needs. There were people around the world praying for us. God's grace was evident throughout. My aim as spiritual leader of my family was to place us in the pathway of blessing while enduring the burial of our son. The most personal and meaningful answer to prayer I received in those days was for God to give me a faith greater than my sorrows. Which He did.  

 

I needed Jesus most of all and I wasn't going anywhere without Him. He met me often, I concealed nothing and hoped in Him. I never blamed God. I never prayed with anger yelling about "why", rather I showed Jesus my broken heart in prayer and told Him I hoped in His plans for us. I have been so humbled. I am still taking many walks, driving with the radio off so I can talk to Jesus.  I counted on the Church to pray for us and they did. I counted on my wife's friends to minister to her because I felt I couldn't and they did. Humbly I prayed for her time with the people she picked. Hopefully as the grief continues she'll look to me too. It is sweet to see life and hope grow back into my family even though the calendar on our fridge is filled with white-out. The road through mourning has just begun and filling the space Simon took in our lives will be slow to fill; but we are asking God to fill it. Please pray for us.