Week Two

November 19^th, 2011

As week two began, our visitors started to go home. My brother and Jay’s brother were the last ones here. Trey spent time playing x-box with his uncles. Apparently Damon kept beating Trey, so Alex became his favorite uncle (Trey has some good sportsmanship issues that we are working on). The next day, Trey went to school, and Jay and Damon went to play golf. Alex and I stayed home and talked. What else do you do with someone getting their PHD from Harvard but pick his brain?

Talking with Alex is awesome. His Masters and PHD are in Hebrew Bible. You can say things like, “Creation story; go,” and he will entertain you for hours. We ended up having a really great conversation.  One of the things we talked about was the idea of suffering. I told him how hard it was to watch Madi suffer. Alex was reminded of a verse from the Bible in Hebrews 2:10 which says, “For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.” It is interesting to think that Christ, who was perfect, was made perfect through His suffering.

Could we also be made perfect through sufferings? When I first learned Madi’s diagnosis, one of my first prayers (besides HEAL HER) was, “If You are going to take her, take her now and save her from all the suffering.” These prayers, like all our prayers, are followed with, “Nevertheless, Thy will be done.” I can’t help but be reminded of the Savior’s similar plea. “O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done.” (Matthew 26:42)

In the following eight months I thought a lot about suffering and its purpose. I thought about the purpose of Madi’s story and how it might end. Maybe the purpose of Madi’s suffering is to change the lives of all those who hear her story. Jay and I had the privilege of meeting with a General Authority of our church to discuss these very topics and others. We talked about how many people had been touched by Madi’s story and how it has changed so many lives. I was definitely focusing on all the people around Madi. Then he asked a very important question, “What do you think Madi will gain from this?”

I thought about this question many times over Madi’s life and since her death. What did she gain? I know what I gained, and it was immense. One thing I have gained is a new level of understanding of the atonement. We know that “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son…” (John 3:16) This idea always confused me. I used to think it strange that (I hope this doesn’t sound blasphemous) we always talk about how amazing it is that God sacrificed His son. It seems to me that God knew (with a perfect knowledge) that when Christ died he would return to Him. I feel like He was never separated from His son. How was this a sacrifice? When Abraham was asked to sacrifice his son, Isaac, he had to have an extreme amount of faith that it would all work out and that they would eventually be reunited. As I watched Madi, a perfectly innocent little three year old, get sick and suffer, I understood God’s sacrifice on a whole new level. Christ dying was not God’s sacrifice. It was watching Him suffer. I understood what it must have felt like to watch His perfectly innocent son be ridiculed, tortured, and spit upon, and to leave Him alone to bleed from every pore so that He could atone for everyone else’s sins (painfully this includes me).

I also gained an understanding that we learn and grow through our earthly trials. Robert D. Hales, an apostle in the LDS church, states, “Suffering is universal; how we react to suffering is individual. Suffering can take us one of two ways. It can be a strengthening and purifying experience combined with faith, or it can be a destructive force in our lives if we do not have the faith in the Lord’s atoning sacrifice. The purpose of suffering, however, is to build and strengthen us.”

So maybe suffering is part of our purpose here, part of the plan. Maybe it is a necessary part of our progression towards being like our Father in Heaven. So what did Madi gain? Maybe, even though Madi was perfect in the sense of being unblemished or unmarked by sin, she was made perfect through her suffering.

I think back to my pleas, all of our pleas, to our Father in Heaven to relieve her of her suffering. Was He torn? Did He long to answers our prayers, but knew He had to do what was best for Madi and all of us? During this time, Jay and I were definitely challenged on our ideas about the power and purpose of prayer. In our discussions on prayer, Jay often quoted from Luke chapter 11, verse 11. In this chapter Jesus teaches the disciples how to pray and then tells them that their prayers will be answered, reasoning that, “If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?”

I know this passage really hits home with Jay. He is such an amazing dad and would do anything for his kids. In fact, it has happened more than once that I have come home and seen something crazy happening, like brownies for dinner. I will ask Jay, “Why is Trey having brownies for dinner?” Jay’s answer (which I have heard so many times) is, “Because he asked for it.” I often go into lecture mode about how Trey is not in charge and that Jay is the parent and has to make the unfavorable decisions as to what is best for our children. Jay will agree with me … and then serve brownies for dinner the next time I go out of town.

So I ask the question in reverse. “If a son shall ask for a serpent, what father would give it to him?” Sometimes what we ask for (beg for) in prayer, is just not good for us. And Heavenly Father shows His love for us by giving us fish even when we, in our naiveté, ask for a serpent.

I actually started to get annoyed with my prayers that were being answered. It seemed that every other prayer was being answered, except the one asking to heal Madi. I stubbornly thought I would stop asking for anything except for Madi to be healed, so if He wanted to answer my prayers He would have only one to choose from.

I know that getting answers to our prayers is a complicated issue for many people. I remember talking about prayer with a friend whose wife passed away several years back. He was annoyed by a recent talk on prayer where the speaker told a story about praying to find lost keys and then finding them. His problem was that it didn’t really matter whether or not the person was divinely inspired to find his keys… he probably would have found them even without such intervention. Why would God answer this insignificant prayer and yet seemingly ignore our prayers when they are really important to us? What about when we pray for things that really matter?

I think that when it comes to the issues that really matter, God has to do what’s best, no matter what we ask for. Since He can’t answer our most important prayers the way we want, He takes every opportunity to answer the little prayers that don’t matter, just to reassure us that He is there and loves us. In our family, I make sure the kids eat their vegetables and Jay takes every opportunity to give them what they want; it is one way he shows them he loves them (keeping them healthy is mine).

I know that God loves us. As odd as it seems, I’ve learned through all the suffering and unanswered prayers that God loves us. I know that Madi gained so much from her trial. About a month before Madi passed away, Quentin L. Cook, an apostle, spoke to the LDS church assuring us that, “There are many kinds of challenges. Some give us necessary experiences. Adverse results in this mortal life are not evidence of lack of faith or of an imperfection in our Father in Heaven’s overall plan. The refiner’s fire is real, and qualities of character and righteousness that are forged in the furnace of affliction perfect and purify us and prepare us to meet God.” God’s plan for us is perfect. Even at the young age of three, Madi was perfected and purified and prepared to meet her God.

All this learning and growth is exhausting! After Alex and Damon left, the exhaustion really sunk in and so did the quiet. The next day it was apparent that Jay felt the same way. He said, “We need to get out of here. I don’t care where we go or how much it costs.” As the family travel agent, I immediately booked a 7 night cruise for two that left four days later.