One of my touchstone songs during these months of grappling with Heidi having cancer has been Danny Gokey’s Haven’t See It Yet.

I know–it’s total Christian pop. YES. And I love it, unapologetically. This song in particular feels like it was written for me.

Have you been praying and you still have no answers?
Have you been pouring out your heart for so many years?
Have you been hoping that things would have changed by now?
Have you cried all the faith you have through so many tears?

This so perfectly describes the state of the past few months. We’ve been praying, hoping, crying–and nothing.

It’s like the brightest sunrise
Waiting on the other side of the darkest night
Don’t ever lose hope, hold on and believe
Maybe you just haven’t seen it yet
You’re closer than you think you are
Only moments from the break of dawn
All His promises are just up ahead
Maybe you just haven’t seen it yet

This chorus always inspires such hope in my heart. Because it’s the story that I want to be true, most of all. All his promises are up ahead? I’m closer than I think? Only moments away from a break-through? I have felt like I’m in the darkest night. And the idea that there could be a sunrise on the other side? Just moments away? I want it more than anything.

He is moving with a love so deep
Hallelujah for the victory
Good things are coming even when we can’t see
We can’t see it yet, but we believe

Every time the song gets to this part, I have to start praising God. Maybe I haven’t seen it yet–the thing I’ve prayed for and longed for–Heidi’s complete healing. But I will. So hallelujah.

I can’t always praise God in the midst of this. In fact, after the week-long prayer posts that you all joined me in, my mom contacted me and said, “you should do a thanksgiving prayer.”

Thank God? I remember thinking. No. I can’t do that right now. I can’t. I just poured out my heart to him in public and now I’m exhausted. Now it’s his turn.

I knew I should. But even when he worked healing in Heidi’s eye, freeing her to drive and read, which was the first prayer you all joined me in, I couldn’t let of the fact that he didn’t do the other stuff. The eye is great, God, but we really need the kidneys.

But today, nearly a month after we all prayed through those six posts, I’m setting aside all my complicated feelings, to say this:

God, thank you. Thank you because you’re moving (even though I can’t see how). Thank you because you’re moving with love (even though it doesn’t feel like it). Help this heart of mine praise you in the storm. I can’t do it without your help. Help me, in the battle, even if Heidi dies, cry out your praise. Hallelujah for the victory.

God, you know it hurts me to type those words. My chest is tight and I feel angry. I’m only doing this because I think I should. I’m not feeling thankful. In fact, since that intense week of prayer, I’ve been holding you at arm’s distance because I put everything out there and you didn’t fix Heidi right away and I had to retreat into my hidey-hole.

This morning, I’m coming back out of the hole. I want to obey you . . . even when I don’t. I want to praise you . . . even when I don’t. Help my unbelief. Help my anger. Let me praise you in the darkest night. Before the brightest sunrise. While it’s still dark and confusing and painful.

And I’m latching onto this song that I’ve heard on the radio so many times to help me do it.

Thank you because all your promises are up ahead.

Thank you because the darkness won’t last forever.

Thank you for setting a table that welcomes me, your often-rebellious and often-doubting daughter.

Thank you because there is healing in store for Heidi.

Thank you for all the people you’ve brought into Heidi’s life to walk with her through this time, to serve her family, to pray for her and with her.

Thank you for healing her eye.

Thank you for giving me your presence in some of the deepest suffering, blazing like a fire during moments of despair.

Thank you for the beauty of your promised hope–eternal life, healed bodies, no more tears.

Thank you for your good news, which is all these things and more–which will sweep us up, satisfy our every longing and desire, and shine upon us like a sunrise, banishing the dark.

Amen.

Post written by my sister, Erica.

“For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God’s people, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know Him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which He has called you, the riches of His glorious inheritance in His holy people, and His incomparably great power for us who believe.”

~Ephesians 1:15-19

“[Paul] believes that the highest good is communion or fellowship with God. A rich, vibrant, consoling, hard-won prayer life is the one good that makes it possible to receive all other kinds of goods rightly and beneficially. He does not see prayer merely as a way to get things from God but as a way to get more of God Himself. Prayer is a striving to “take hold of God” (Is. 64:7) the way in ancient times people took hold of the cloak of a great man as they appealed to him, or the way in modern times we embrace someone to show love.”

~Tim Keller, Prayer, p. 21 (emphasis mine)

Jesus, you were abandoned in your suffering so we wouldn’t have to be. We all remember those soul-piercing words. “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” (Mtt. 27:46). In total physical suffering, you also were in the greatest agony of all- the absence of your Father.  

The kids’ VBS song (which one is singing as I type this) says:

“He loves us oh so much, He gave His only Son, so we could live with Him foreverrrrrr”

YES. That’s why you died. To pay for the debt and harm of our sin which rightly split us from you. Then you yourself suffered total separation from God, so we wouldn’t have to. So the Father could have nearness with us again, and so that our sin no longer would necessitate him turning his face away from us.

Don’t abandon Heidi or let her go through another minute of today without a distinct and undeniable sense of your presence with her. I want you to give her more of you in every way.

Jesus, the greatest good Heidi can get out of this–that any of us can get out of anything in this life–is God Himself. It’s you. Suffering is not lessened, but it is made more bearable by you being with us and showing us more of you. It is made more bearable by you making us know your incomparably great power for us who believe. Where is that power today? Paul wanted that for his churches, and I want that for Heidi!

Lord, it feels like in those moments of total suffering for Heidi, you aren’t there. That maybe you have forsaken her. She can’t always feel your nearness. I’m asking you to change that.

The little voice of accusation in my head says “feelings? Really, Erica? Come on. Those never amount to much. They are SO deceptive! What does it matter if Heidi can feel God? He says he’s there, and that he will never leave her nor forsake her. Isn’t that enough?”

But I say to you, little voice, be silent in the name of Jesus! It does matter. When God is near and we can feel him and know him more, when we have the eyes of our hearts enlightened to know the hope to which he has called us, even the worst earthly suffering holds a sweetness.

Father, that’s what I’m asking for Heidi. That you clearly, irrefutably, boldly, lavishly give more of yourself to Heidi. When she struggles to breathe, when dialysis is happening, when she feels the sorrow of looking at her children and wondering if she will get to raise them, God SHOW UP!!! Please. Yes, I’m begging. And hoping but struggling with unbelief that you even want to show up. Forgive me for that and work anyway! You say you want to be known by us all over the place in the Bible.

I don’t know what parts of you she needs to get to know better. You do! Make yourself known to her! It’s the only way we can know you–if you choose to be known and lead us by the hand. Tuck Heidi in your arms and lead her closer to you.

He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms;

he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.

(Is. 40:11)

Heidi knows the sound of your voice (John 10:27). She follows you. Don’t be silent and unreachable now when she most needs you! She has young, she needs you to gather her in her arms and gently lead her closer to you.

Heidi has faith–faith that you have given her–in you and love for all the saints. So I’m asking you to give her the Spirit of wisdom and revelation and the Comforter himself, so that she can know you better! Not on her merits. On yours. On the other side of this, in the middle of this, reveal more of yourself to her. What a prize! What a comfort! What a treasure beyond any other! Not just a list of your attributes, or disconnected facts–knowledge–but an I-know-you-and-love-this-about-you intimate kind of knowing. The kind that brings warmth, close connection, amazement, reverent awe, and that spills over into heart-bubbling praise. The kind of knowing where Heidi will feel simultaneously cuddled into you like the precious daughter she is, and filled with awe at your great incomprehensibility and holiness. That amazing on-her-face worship that is so right and good when we are confronted with your awesome presence.

All my words and desires boil down to this. Hear my prayer, Lord!! Make yourself known to Heidi.