She Worships

Christmas can be a wonderful time for many people, a time of joy, excitement, laughter, and gift giving. Christmas can also be a difficult time for many people, a time of depression, loneliness, aching hearts, tears cried in quiet places. At Christmas time, when we are supposed to be happy, sometimes we remember more strongly the family members who are not with us, and miss them. Sometimes we remember the gifts we should have been given–a present father, a loving mother, warm children in our arms–and miss them. Sometimes we try hard to meet expectations, to make the Christmas for our children we wanted for ourselves, and find ourselves coming up short. It is for these Christmases, for these moments within our Christmases, that I share the following post from my friend Laura Sporre.

She didn’t write it specifically for Christmas; she wrote it to commemorate a woman who worshipped in her pain. I think of Laura, missing her mom this Christmas, and for those others of you missing a person, a dream, or a wholeness in your soul. I honor you. I know where you are because I have been there too. I hope this post encourages and inspires you to look to Jesus before all and above all, as it inspired me.

You can read more from Laura Sporre on her blog, Loose Leaf Anthology, at laurasporre.wordpress.com.

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She lifts her hands in worship from her hospital bed, reaching out to Jesus in her need, perhaps to distract herself from worry or fear.

“Raise your arms in the air,” the surgeon says during her initial exam.

“Praise Jesus!” She says as she raises them.

“Yes!” He agrees. “This is one place where we can speak the name of Jesus because there is a cross in every room.” The hospital is founded on Catholic beliefs, and a statue of Jesus himself welcomes me off of the elevator.

But the patient, my beautiful mother, doesn’t need a cross in the room to remind herself of Him. She worships in her pain and anxiety because she has ingrained it within herself as her response to life with all of its complexity, sorrow, joy. She worships out of faith rooted deep by years of habitually pursuing dependence on Jesus and His Word. She worships out of desperation.

I hear my brother pray in a voice familiar with his Savior, confident that he is heard. I hear my own voice reading Scripture. It’s surreal to be at the bedside of the woman who taught us to pray, taught us to read, taught us to always trust in God, even when we don’t understand. Now in her physical and emotional frailty, we pray over her in the same way she prayed over us in our neediness. We worship in the way it was modeled to us.

“I asked your mom once how she copes,” someone says, “and she said she turns up the worship music nice and loud.” Now her favorite music by Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir plays from the tinny speakers of her laptop, and once again we turn it up and sing along.

“Worthy is the Lamb
Seated on the throne
Crown You now with many crowns
You reign victorious
High and lifted up . . .” ¹

“My help, my help, my help . . .
All of my help cometh from the Lord.” ²

Back at home as her disease progresses faster and more furiously than any of us would have imagined, we do the only things we know to do. We gather, we eat, we laugh, we cry, we sing, and we worship.

“Yes I will lift you high in the lowest valley
Yes I will, bless your name
Yes I will sing for joy when my heart is heavy
For all my days. . . Yes I will.” ³

My aunt tells me that after my dad died, Mom saw how much her grief and sorrow were affecting her children, and she made a choice. She decided to save her weeping and grieving for night after we went to sleep. She would stay on her knees – for hours sometimes – until she felt that she had the strength to get up the next morning and face the day. This explains why I remember her as unwavering, trustful, and hopeful, even during those dark days. In her depression, loss, and despair, she worshipped.

“Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in His wonderful face
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of His glory and grace.”⁴

“Jesus, Jesus, Jesus
There’s just something about that name
Master, Savior, Jesus
Like the fragrance after the rain
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus
Let all heaven and earth proclaim
Kings and kingdoms will all pass away
But there’s something about that name.” ⁵

She whispers the name of Jesus on her bed. We cry out His name in our songs. His presence is so strong that we feel strange peace. We worship in our brokenness. We worship in our pain. We worship because death has been swallowed up in victory. We worship because what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

One afternoon when I arrive, her eyes are closed and she is lying in her bed. My sister tells me that the nurse said her face is flushed because of how hard her body is working and compared it to running a race.

“I have fought the good fight. . . ” I begin, but I’m overcome with emotion and unable to finish the quotation.

Then I hear her weak reply. “. . . I have kept the faith.”

“All my life You have been faithful
And all my life You have been so, so good
With every breath that I am able
I will sing of the goodness of God.” ⁶

I have kept the faith. I’m not sure anyone could encapsulate her life in a single sentence. But if we were to try, perhaps this would be it.

At her funeral, a mere 12 days after this exchange, we carry on her legacy. We gather. We remember. We worship with tears in our grief.

She worships with joy in eternity.