Promises for 2022

“What are your dreams for 2022?” My husband asked as we drifted off to sleep. The clock struck midnight ushering in the new year…

“Mama, what if I die?” Sitting on the corner of his bed, I rub his back while he cries and coughs into his pillow. Memories of nights sitting in a hot steamy shower with his gasping toddler body wrapped around mine threaten to steal my breath away. My throat closes over with a lump so thick I can’t swallow as I try to hold back my worries and fears. I remember the way he’d wake up in the night clutching his chest, eyes wild in desperation, ribs turned inward frantically running in his little footed pyjamas for the front door, for the icy winter night that might open his airways. I remember my husband wrapping quilts around us as we sat huddled together on the front step surrounded by snow and ice, counting stars and gasping for air for what seemed like hours. Please Lord, no, not that.

“Will I ever get to see my friends again?” I glance across his room, pinned to the bulletin board over his desk are pictures and colourfully depicted drawings and notes from his school friends. “Student of the Week”. “To my best friend…” “Happy Birthday”. How long has it been since our house has been bursting with children’s squeals of laughter, doors swinging open as they run in and out, their play and reality merging in one exuberant burst of childhood?

“Why doesn’t God answer my prayers? I pray and pray, but I don’t think he hears me.” His Bible lays open beside him. I know it’s true. I’ve stood with the angels outside his bedroom doorway and heard his passionate pleas and prayers. I’ve woken to his sweet kiss on my cheek as he leans over me praying.

I long to promise him things that aren’t mine to promise.

Instead, I sit beside him, quietly praying, thanking God for him, asking for God to protect him and make himself known to him, until he falls asleep.

“Will it be like this forever?” His words ring in my ears as I prepare myself for bed. I know what he can’t in his ten years of living; this won’t be like this forever, but I don’t know how long.

I didn’t have many words for my son this night. We passed head colds and sore throats around the house for weeks; he is the last to catch it. We tested negative for COVID time and time again. We remained in partial house arrest, I mean isolation, for three or four or was it six weeks running; isolation laced with fear and worry of the “what ifs” associated with a two-year pandemic we can’t understand. My words would be cheap and empty; my presence would have to be enough.

 If I’m honest, I’m feeling pretty empty myself, wrapping up 2021. The pendulum swings back and forth while some prophesy doom and gloom and others blissful optimism. I’m somewhere else, somewhere in the middle between two sides. As I sit in my chair stealing a moment of quiet, the house sleepy, candlelight flickers. My aching throat gives way to the cry it suppressed. Hot tears let go, tracing a path of healing down my tense cheeks and I pour out all my words, worries and fears to the only one I know who knows already.

And I hear Him calling. He sits with me; His presence is enough.

God Almighty, the creator of the universe, story maker, ultimate redeemer, reminds me that it’s not up to me, I need not deny the circumstances, solve the problems, pretend optimism, tie 2021 up with a bow. My job is merely to turn my focus to Him and choose to trust the godman who hung in the balance, arms reaching to bridge human reality and the divine.

I need Jesus. His promise in the book is mine. His promise in the book is my son’s. 

He is love. He is hope, peace and life. He is laughter and joy. We know him all the more because he knows about our loneliness, despair, anxiety and death. He knows our sorrow.

I’m a week late, but 2022, I just needed to hear him calling, and it’s an invitation to something beautiful, beauty for ashes, beauty because of the ashes even.

“What are your dreams for 2022?” My husband asked as we drifted asleep. The clock struck midnight ushering in 2022.

“Please, no,” I responded. “Just one day at a time, it’s enough.”