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“Not many days from this photo Mitch would struggle in his bed and say, “Dad, I don’t think I can survive.” Words that are forever seared into my heart and soul. At that moment I thought to myself, but didn’t say the words aloud, “Son, I don’t know how to live without you.” Then death came gashing and crashing through our door.”

— Christopher M. Jones | Mitchell's Journey

Mitch was wearing one of his favorite new t-shirts a loving neighbor gave him when they learned he was dying. The shirt bore the words, “Watch me win.” Brave words we often say when we shake our fists at an implacable disease – as if our will alone could stave off our frail mortality. Though human will is powerful, it is no match to God's will. Though he didn’t win the battle with DMD (not a soul does), he did win the bigger, more important fight. Mitch was a good human – and at the end of the day, that’s the only fight that matters. His philosophy was to be nice to others and have gratitude for life – for in the end nothing else mattered. 

I remember asking Mitch what he was thinking just after I took this photo. He said, “I’ll tell you later, Dad.” He would have this same look of knowing a few more times – and each time I asked he would respond, “Later.” Mitch never got around to telling me. Yet, I think I know.

As my son played with his toys, I couldn't help but notice the vein just above the bend of his elbow punctured by a tube that ran up his arm and pumped medicine directly into his heart. At first Mitch thought the medicine was making him better, but as death inched closer, he came to understand it was barely keeping him alive and that it wouldn’t last.

Slowly, almost invisibly, an old soul began to reveal itself. Not only was my son changing … my eyes were, too. I began to discern things that were kept from my mortal sight until then. There were times I thought to myself, “Mitch who are you, really? What is your real age and what are you sent here to do?” Though he was my child and I was asked by a loving Father to raise him, I felt like his soul was much older than mine and that, in a very real way, he was raising me. Heaven, it seems, is filled with curious mysteries.

Yet despite my growing sense he had an almost ancient soul … there he was, still very much a young child in need of love and comfort. I was beginning to see two things at once. I think Mitch was, too. I think he didn’t share with me what he was sensing because he didn’t want to frighten or disappoint me. I think he tried to protect Natalie and me in the same way we tried to protect him.

Not many days from this photo Mitch would struggle in his bed and say, “Dad, I don’t think I can survive.” Words that are forever seared into my heart and soul. At that moment I thought to myself, but didn’t say the words aloud, “Son, I don’t know how to live without you.” Then death came gashing and crashing through our door.

I would soon learn to look upon grief in the same way I saw my son; two things at once. Although the surface of grief is plain to see, seemingly clothed in pain and agony; there is so much more beneath – a certain beauty the human eye alone can’t see. It isn't easy or pain free - but somewhere in the midst of suffering there is purpose and a greater meaning. There are always two things at once: the thing that happens to us and then its purpose and meaning. We just need eyes to see.
 

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A few weeks ago I took my sweet wife on a winter photo shoot. The night was bitter cold and the earth was covered in a fresh blanket of fluffy snow. Mitch would have been entranced by the quiet beauty of it all. I never go anywhere that I don’t take my little son with me in my mind and heart.

When we arrived at the secluded wood I handed my wife a lantern made of twigs I discovered several months prior. I then placed a light in the heart of the lamp. As Natalie began to walk through a darkened, wintry forest I shot what was in my mind and heart. It was a metaphor for something I was feeling and I had to get it out of me. Everything went as I had hoped.

We didn’t take long as it was cold and dark outside and we were anxious to be home with our children. Before we left I hung my lantern on the broken trunk of a fallen tree. The light from the lamp was warm and beautiful against the backdrop of a frigid, wintry night. 

I thought deeply that evening about what it means to be alone in the dark; how we must often walk by the dim lamp of faith and hope as we journey through our own wilderness of hardship and struggle. 

It is easy to talk of faith in the abstract, from a pulpit, citing other people’s words. But when life requires us to walk that dark mile, alone ... there is often a breathless silence. When it is our turn to truly suffer, and then take those first few steps into the pitch of night, faith takes on a different, more exacting meaning. 

Surely we may have people around us cheering us on, offering love and support. But they cannot bear the burden of the sufferer. They don't know, nor can they know, the horrors of the sufferers heart. And when the night comes, when we lay down to sleep, that is when the unfiltered horrors of loss and sorrow are ours and ours alone. As I wrote in an earlier post, "After all is said and done, the journey of grief is traveled by one." In my experience, going to sleep or waking up was when I was most alone in the dark.

Yet during my darkest moments … when I felt I was drowning in a rising tide of grief and sorrow, I would have subtle impressions and feelings of peace that defied my own understanding and soothed my weary soul. They didn’t take away my sorrow; they only gave me a measure of understanding and just enough strength to carry on a little further. 

I am no fanatic, but I believe that when this life is behind us, we will look back on our mortal moments of darkness and realize we were never truly alone in the dark … but that we were surrounded by beings of light we cannot yet see. We will come to know what ancient Elisha knew, “they that be with us” are far more than we realize. And were our eyes truly opened, we would see the mountains we once thought barren were in fact full. Helping us. Soothing us. Offering help and direction.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once observed, “Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us, or we find it not.” The same could be said of spiritual light. We must carry it with us, however dimly, or we will see it not.

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It was the summer of my son’s passing that I found myself alone for a few weeks. Circumstances were such that my kids were at various camps and Natalie was away from home helping them. On this night I lay on the grass next to my son’s headstone as the summer sun set. I loved to hear the sound of crickets and lay on the soft carpet of grass that covered my dear son. Though the world was harsh and hard, there was a certain softness to this place.

Looking back, this period of my grief journey was especially surreal. The gravity of grief was so great that I could hardly breathe most of the time. Beneath the veneer of my soft smile and dry eyes was a soul that was in a state of constant weeping and grief. It felt that earth and my life before was somewhere far away. 

If I wasn’t at work or with my wife and kids, I wanted to be at the cemetery, next to my son. I don’t entirely understand why I had such a strong desire to be near him – I think on some level the father in me subconsciously wanted to comfort my son who, deep inside, I worried was frightened. Looking back, I am beginning to wonder if I was the one who was frightened and in need of comfort.

So on this summer evening, as the sun fell behind the hills, I jotted the phrase “A Mortal’s Guide to Suffering.” I didn’t know exactly what to do with it … I only knew I needed to remember those words. It has been two years now and I haven’t been able to put that phrase down. It keeps surfacing in my mind and heart – as though it’s a whisper from that other place to explore its meaning in my life.

Since then I’ve begun working on a series with that title, A Mortal’s Guide to Suffering. It is not a pulpit or a collection of “life lessons” … for who am I to teach anyone? I am the least of everyone. I’m just a fumbling student who is trying to listen to my Father, a master teacher, who tenderly and patiently teaches me hard things. So in a way, it is a journal of observations and wonderings.

I have received many messages from people all across the world sharing stories of hope and hardship, love and loss. I have wept as I’ve read your own journeys. I have discovered there is a great deal of silent sorrow in this world, but there is also a great deal of hope and healing. At first I was confused why people found solace in reading another’s sorrow, my sorrow. I think I understand it now, at least to some degree. 

Perhaps the first healing step in a mortal’s journey with suffering is to discover we are not alone in sorrow and that other people understand a darkness we thought was unique to ourselves. It would seem the second step in our mortal journey with suffering is to not only find that others care that we hurt, but to discover the healing power when we learn to care for others, despite our hurt. I don’t believe it’s possible to overstate the healing power of empathy. I have discovered that empathy not only repairs part of the sufferer, it also repairs an invisible part of the person who does not appear broken at all. 

And therein lies one of mortality's great deceptions, to think any one of us are unbroken. To be mortal is to be broken; and while everyone is broken in one way or another, most of us are broken in many places, great and small. Some hide their brokenness in anger and bitterness – they lash out and try to harm others, mistaking that rush and thrill for wholeness. Others retreat in quiet sorrow. Some try to mask or numb their brokenness in things that ultimately hurt themselves and others. Still, there are some who hide their brokenness in egotism and by appearing to be exactly the opposite of flawed. There are many things I hope to become in this life – chief among them is I hope to always be real.

So, in the coming months I will share some of my own personal discoveries of being mortal and suffering – and what I make of it. They’re not life lessons nor are they meant to be a digital pulpit … instead they are a lowly journal ... a guide and road map for me, covered in dirt and dust from stumbling. I do this so that if ever I get lost, I can look back and see the journey and make sense of it all. I don’t know many things – but one thing I know is I am a mere mortal with broken bones; and every day, however much I stumble, I am finding my way home.

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As the winter sky drew dark Mitch began to fade. He didn’t need to say anything, his tired eyes said a million things at once. Natalie tenderly scooped him up in her arms and carried little Mitch to his room. My heart sank as I saw my little boy listless and drifting away. I could almost hear death violently gashing at our door … about to barge in like a terrifying home invasion to steal my son away. 

Later that night I prayed to my Father, knees bruised from prayer. I prayed the words of a broken son and terrified dad in need of comfort and council, “Oh Father, how am I to do this difficult thing? I’m so afraid. My hands and soul tremble. I love my son and don’t want to see him suffer. I will take his place, if you will allow me. Please … not my son. If there is any other way … please …”

I often hear people speak of God’s grace when their children are spared suffering or sorrow. Some will say, almost in a tone of victory, “God is good. All the time.” But what happens when our children are not spared? What then? What happens when things go from bad to terribly, horribly, unimaginably wrong? Has God forsaken us? Has he left us abandoned in a wasteland of grief and sorrow? My experience tells me no. In fact, I have come to see there is a purpose to all things … and when I quiet my mind and focus my spiritual eyes, however blinded by tears, I begin to see things as they really are. That gives me hope.

The death of a child is uniquely and exquisitely painful, whatever the age. At least for me, my son’s passing at the age of 10 was a scene from my worst nightmare. As his father, Mitch saw me as the ultimate problem solver, his protector and soul mate. He was so innocent and believing and good. Yet, despite all that we tried to do, I was unable to save my son. With that harsh reality comes unavoidable feelings of failure and regret, despite what I already know. Such is the burden of grief. And a terrible burden it is.

Though the path that lay before us was dark and frightening, I also know my Father put a dim lamp before our feet so we could find our way. We knew we were not alone. Despite our journey through the dark wilderness of grief, we have come to realize were not abandoned. Not once. To the contrary, in our moments of greatest darkness we were carried, sight unseen. I can see that now. I can see it plain as noon day.

I don’t know the secrets of heaven, however much I wish to see and understand them. I don’t know why innocent children are made to suffer. But they are … and they do. God could stop it, but He doesn’t. Clearly suffering is allowed to happen. So, rather than shake my fists at the heavens – as though my puny protests could change the grand design … I have learned to listen with my soul and see where I was once blind. 

I have learned that bruised knees and broken hearts are important keys to building our spiritual parts. Being human we would avoid pain and sorrow … but that is where growth starts: bruised knees and broken hearts.