In the quiet moments, when it was just me and Zeke, the whispers of God were like healing balm. Moments that, no matter how many times I share our story, cannot fully be grasped by a listening ear. The comfort as tears fell, the peace when we didn’t know, the understanding when I just wanted him healed on earth, then begged for heavenly healing and mercy from this broken world Zeke was suffering.
Today, those quiet moments of missing Zeke, I feel such a comfort as I let my tears fall. I wonder what life would be like with him still here but healthy, untrained by Batten disease. The nearness of the Father brings me peace.
The calendar on my phone reminds me, “Zekey met Jesus around 3:10 am” tomorrow. As if I needed a reminder. My body and my heart have been telling me since the first hope of spring coming, a changing season.
The year Zekey met Jesus, the snow covered the ground all season long, and it was beautiful. When winter went away, Zekey’s body went away with it, and he got to live more than any day here on earth.
Ezekiel 3:23, March 23rd, the day he met Jesus reads,
“So I arose and went out into the valley, and behold the glory of the Lord stood there, like the glory that I had seen by the Chebar canal, and I fell on my face.” Zekey saw the glory of the Lord and I imagine fell on his face in worship.
Ezekiel 4:44, the amount of years, months and days Zekey lived on this earth reads,
“Then he brought me by the way of the north gate to the front of the temple, and I looked, and behold, the glory of the Lord filled the temple of the Lord. And I fell on my face.”
Only God could have orchestrated such a continual, healing balm to this mama’s heart, and to my other three and husband who grieve, too through these dates and verses.
God continues to redeem, He continues to be faithful, and I cannot proclaim His goodness enough. He is the only steadfast being in all of the universe.
I don’t look at today and say, “Why God? Why did you allow this to happen?!” although there was a time in this journey that I did. As I studied The Fall of man and woman, and how it was never supposed to be this way, I don’t blame God. When I see the way the enemy is still deceiving the hearts of people as he did way back in the Garden of Eden with Eve, and how he desires chaos wherever there is order, it’s so much clearer.
The only thing God did, was come down through Jesus and dwell with us, point us to the way everlasting as He became The Way, laying His *perfect life down completely, on the cross, so that we would have a way out of this fallen world. I don’t deserve anything good I have, nor do I deserve life eternal in heaven. But Jesus. And Jesus is who I claim to be my Lord and Savior, so I do get to receive the inheritance of Heaven.
Jesus literally changes everything.
When Jesus taught us how to pray, “Our Father in heaven, holy be your namel Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven….” I believe it’s a plea for God’s will, which doesn’t always happen on earth, to come down to earth just as God’s will is in heaven. It’s a beautiful, hopeful prayer while we wait for Christ’s return when all will be set right again.
So when this broken world you find yourself in, wreaks havoc on your life, ones you love who are sick, you too can pray this prayer. And if you keep walking with Jesus, drawing nearer to the redeemer of all things, when life gets difficult, he promises to be our comfort, our peace and even our joy, no matter the circumstance.
I cling to this truth: Jesus is coming back, and He will make all wrongs right.
“But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 ESV
We still grieve the loss of our son and brother, Ezekiel Todd. We ache, and long to see him again. But truly, we do not grieve without the Hope of Jesus. We know where Zeke is and we know where we are going, thanks be to God. We may journey in this life with a limp, but we still want to point everyone we encounter to the Hope of Jesus…there is just no better way.
We love you, Zekey Zoo Zoo. I cannot wait to hug you and celebrate together, the Hope of Jesus in heaven. I hope you enjoy these sweet pictures of our boy.
Ezekiel Todd Holt
November 19, 2009 – March. 23 2014
