For my 20th birthday I got this devotional from Ryan’s parents called Jesus Calling…it has daily short devotionals and the one for September 5 has a line that says: “I can bring beauty out of the ashes of lost dreams. I can glean joy out of sorrow.”

6 years ago today, September 5, 2006, I was trying to fall asleep next to my mom when I heard the phone ring around 12:45 AM…She answered it and my grandma, who’d been staying with my dad at the hospital, told her that my dad had just died…My mom tried to shake me awake…At first I tried to pretend it was a dream and that I was sleeping…she shook me harder and forced me to face the reality of what had just happened…I started screaming and sobbing…My mom, who was the rock of our family through the time he was sick, held me tight as I cried and finally loosened her grip to tell me to go get dressed so that we could head to the hospital. That’s when all of my senses went numb…Robotically I put some clothes on and got in the car. I called two of my best friends on the way to the hospital to tell them what had happened and to ask them to pray. We pulled up to the hospital and I grabbed my sisters hand as we made our way to his room. We pushed open the door and I felt this agonizing ache in my heart when I saw his lifeless body…I walked up and held his hand, silently pleading that he would open his eyes…I squeezed his hand like I had so many times before…I would’ve given anything to feel him squeeze mine back…to hear him say I love you just one more time. It felt like my world was collapsing and nothing mattered anymore…then I heard this small voice whisper in my head “It’s going to be okay…” and I was overwhelmed with this sense of peace that I couldn’t explain.

[My favorite picture of my dad…I keep it on our dresser:)]

If you had the privilege of knowing my dad, you knew that he cared most about people…He was a friend to everyone he met, and he was constantly finding new ways to serve and help people. If you knew him you know that he loved cars and loved being an automotive professor. The two words that come to mind when I think of him are Servant and Teacher. He was the best dad – the kind that loved spending time with his kids, would do ANYTHING for us and brought us breakfast in bed everyday, not just on special days. There were so many times that I questioned why I had to lose my dad. It felt so unfair that God would take away such a good man and father.

It all started about a year earlier when my dad was diagnosed with stomach cancer and given three months to live. I was devastated and I started praying harder than I ever had in my life. Although I was raised going to a Christian school…the whole faith thing was very legalistic to me..I couldn’t understand what I did to deserve to have something so horrible happen to my family. I felt so depressed and alone, and cried myself to sleep every night.

My dad was a fighter and started treatment soon after his diagnosis. Three months later when he should have been dead, he was HEALTHY again…He went back to work and we resumed life as it had been. His doctors called it a miracle. I was thankful that God healed my dad, but went back to living life selfishly and forgot all about prayer and didn’t spend much time thinking about God anymore…I can now look back and see how He was preparing my heart and beginning to teach me to view life with an eternal mindset.

About 7 months later…shortly after my sixteenth birthday…my dad’s health started to deteriorate again. And again, I was devastated. We had already started to plan a trip to Germany that summer so that we could spend time with my dad’s family there for a few weeks.

So against the doctors orders, my dad, sister, best friend Sara, and cousin Mackenzie, got on a plane to head to Germany a few days before father’s day that June. Since my dad was so sick and wheelchair bound (His six foot frame weighed less than me at this point), I had to be the responsible adult of the trip…I sat next to my dad and rubbed his back and struggled to hide my tears as he threw up over and over again. I wanted to take his pain away so badly…for it to be me instead. I prayed the same silent prayer over and over again during that eight hour plane ride…”God, please take away his pain…”…I was scared to even look over at him in the moments of silence for fear that he would be gone.

We finally arrived and while we were excited to be in my dad’s homeland with his family…mostly we were sad. A few days after we got there, on father’s day, he was admitted to the local hospital. He couldn’t eat and he was severely dehydrated. The doctors gave us little hope and told us his kidney’s were only functioning at 10% at this point. I remember making him a father’s day card at the hospital and taking it to him…I read it to him, then kissed his cheek and told him I loved him so much, I held on tight to his hand…he squeezed my hand and whispered “I love you, sweetheart”.

That night I cried and screamed and couldn’t stop shaking. I was so angry. My aunt called an ambulance for ME because I was in such bad shape. My grandma held me tight and told me it was going to be okay. I didn’t believe her. I can look back now and see how God must’ve known that I still wasn’t ready to lose him…

The next day we went to the hospital and the doctors told us that my dad’s kidneys that were failing the day before, were now fully functioning! Another miracle! I was so excited I jumped into my best friend Sara’s arms and couldn’t stop smiling. We went up to see him and he looked so much better! We spent a long time hanging out with him in his room and then he told us to go out and enjoy his home! He wanted us to fall completely in love with Germany so that we would want to continue coming back even after he was gone…and we did. I’m so thankful that he told me that it made him happy to see me enjoying life. When someone you love is really sick, it’s easy to feel guilty for being happy. But, I know he wouldn’t want me to waste life being sad.

After a wonderful, but emotionally exhausting trip, we returned to the U.S…Over the next few months my dad’s condition continued to decline and he spent most of this time in the hospital. I spent most of my time that summer at the hospital or reading my Bible…I know to some this sounds crazy, but I could feel God holding my heart and sustaining my family in the midst of suffering. I could feel him strengthening me and I started to realize that he could see whole picture, whereas I could only see this little part of it. He could use this hopeless situation for something beautiful.

And he did. I felt this peace that didn’t make sense the night my dad died as I stared at his body. Even though I was devastated, I was confident that this was not the end and I heard that voice in my head saying, “it’s going to be okay…”. Two weeks after his funeral, one of my good friend’s mom came over to tell us something. Two weeks before my dad had died she visited him in the hospital and told us about how she asked him if he knew where he was going when he died. He said he didn’t know and she shared the story of how Jesus died to save us from our sins and all he had to do was accept a free gift of grace and invite Jesus into his life to experience life in heaven and freedom from the pain and suffering that can define life on earth. And he said that he wanted that and accepted it. Two weeks before he died. Had he died the last two times the doctor’s told us he was supposed to, this never would have happened.

To me, freedom and grace define what it means to live life for the Lord. Before all this happened, I knew all about Jesus, but I didn’t actually know him. I can look back on the years since his death and see how God carried me through it..through the painful nights of crying myself to sleep…how he loved me and used it to shape me into a much more loving and grace filled person. I can look back and say I’m thankful for this experience…because even though I miss my dad everyday I never want to go back to being the person that I was before and I really believe with all my heart that everything happens for a reason. To me, life with Jesus is that much better. I’m convinced that my dad is experiencing the best kind of freedom and joy now and I’m so excited to see him again one day.

I wear a locket (in the middle picture above) that he gave me shortly before he died to remind me that he’s proud of me and that his legacy and the things that I learned through his life and death are always with me in my heart. I still get sad sometimes…I wish he could have walked me down the aisle on my wedding day…I still get sad when I see brides dancing the father/daughter dance…I know I’ll have to mourn the fact that my future kids won’t get to have him as their grandpa when that time comes…and I still get sad sometimes because I know that my dad and Ryan would have been good friends…But through this experience I started to realize that I was living my life allowing shortages and worry to makeup my reality. When I choose to be thankful and trust that there is purpose in everything instead, I feel fulfilled…It took a long time for my heart to feel like it was healing, but some people never get to have a good dad, and I had the best one for 16 years. So I could be bitter because of the things that my dad is missing in my life, but instead I’m just thankful. Today, even though I still miss my dad all the time and I still fall into worrying sometimes, I can honestly say that I am thankful for cancer…Although cancer caused my dad and family so much pain and suffering, it provided what so many people don’t get when someone they love dies suddenly..time. Time to say goodbye, time that God used to prepare my heart, time to appreciate what you have before it’s gone.

I’m so thankful for how I can see that God used this in my life already…I don’t think I would love people as much or live life with passion and joy or really know Jesus and his overwhelming Love if I hadn’t walked through this. So even though I had to let go of some of my dreams about what I thought life should look like with my dad here, God has turned my life into something more beautiful than I could’ve even imagined, something that’s bigger and about more than just me. It sounds cliche, but I promise it’s true.

If you still have a dad here, I hope you’ll give him a hug for me today and tell him how much you love him! I would never wish this on anyone, but if you’re facing a recent loss in your life right now, I hope you know that it really is going to be okay and everything happens for a reason.

“There’s a reason why I’m not writing the story and God is. He knows how it all works out. where it all leads, what it all means” -Ann Voskamp