To the One who commented today! I just want to say the GOD of this universe loves you with an undying love! My heart jumped out of chest for you and your grandson! I know what it is like-- for my Leah (age 7) is struggling too! I do have to say, that the loving prayers of my sisters-in-Christ have brought her comfort! I am seeing many more smiles on her face! Her smile blesses me so--- with her two front teeth missing! Her eyes even have their twinkle back. I will pray for you and your grandson. You are special, I can tell. I too talk to Kole. Not like I talk to God. I tell him about all those who loved him and about the job he has left us to do. I just want him to be proud of the way we are carrying on his legacy. I can remember one day when he was so sick, and his mom was carrying him to go upstairs---Kole looked at me with love and the most precious grin! He could really love! He could get annoyed as well, for he was very human. I loved watching him wrap his body around my parents in the most enveloping hug you can imagine. He always coupled it with a squeeze and a sparkling smile. All this love being a reflexion of his heavenly Father. Where did our family get this love? It was never sourced in us! We have just known a taste of God's love and it has flown through us. We have not always been perfect in our love. Perfect love can only be experienced in heaven in the presence of God. I know Kole is feasting on amazing, perfect, and mind boggling love. All his annoyance is gone! Kole would tell us to take God up on this love that God so freely offers! We are all invited and we are all the same in value! The difference between the one true God and any other religion represented in this world.......is the fact that "God so loved the world, He GAVE his only Son". God sacrifices for us! Other religions asks for us to sacrifice ourselves or earn our way through good works. Other religions lead its followers to never be sure that they have done enough to earn heaven. God sacrificed His life, while we were yet sinners. Jesus earned it and we just accept it and receive forgiveness and heaven. He never asks for us to earn His love and forgiveness. He never asks for us to die on any type of our "own" cross for Him. He, in fact, tells us to get down from "our cross" (or attempts to pay for or earn His love) for He took our place. What He did for us was enough and complete. We are free and we do not have to add a drop of our own blood/sacrifice more. His blood is all we need! Kole did not sacrifice in dying young. He gained! It takes faith to believe that God loved Kole completely and fully in taking him to heaven at six years and two days. The enemy tells us Kole sacrificed his life in his death from terminal brain cancer. God was with Kole every step of the way. He was surrounded by love and I am positive that there were a host of heavenly angels ministering to his every need! God never turned His back on Kole, like He did to His one and only Son. He was forced to turn His back on Jesus when He became contaminated by the sins of the entire world! We all die, but not for our sins! Unless we choose to pay for them ourselves, instead of allowing God to do it for us! God died for Kole, now Kole truly lives. We cannot pay for ourselves and get to dwell in God's presence forever. If we attempt to live without Him in this world and pay without Him, than we choose to live without Him for all eternity. Living without God is darkness and emptiness! We are living without Kole and still have the light of Christ! Kole was a huge blessing and was our beloved boy, but he was never the source of our light and our love. God is calling us to His light! He calls us through our blinding tears as He leads us to Himself and to His hope. Sometimes, He blinds us with our tears, so that we can hear His call. I believe He is calling---Kole would say "go"! Kole would want all who loved him to be near him for all our eternal future. But most of all, he would want to share his treasure--being his Lord and your Lord. I cannot tell you the joy we feel, as a family, when you out there join the body of Christ with us! It wipes away our tears of sadness and loss and brings tears of joy and great gain. We cheer for you out there and value you all! Just as you have valued us and our Kole! We are all a product of our valued God, who values us with undying love.

Jodi

Not ever experiencing a death of someone so young, it is hard to know what to expect! God has not given us past experience to draw from, to which I am grateful! I believe that to be true with parenting and marriage as well. Life is truly a pilgrimage. I am glad God is our teacher, for He is patient and gentle in His leading and direction. We can look back and see His hand in our lives.

I have to say that we, as a family, had experienced Him in a way that we cannot explain! His presence was so real, that this earth, though we were still breathing and walking on it became less of a reality than God Himself. For most of our lives, the earth has been our center focus! We are a people who are scientific and depend on our sense of touch, sight, taste, hearing, and smell to govern much of our lives. But, when all those senses fail to get you through a heart wrenching and unbelievably difficult situation---then God. God became our rock and our fortress. We could not use our senses. We needed to learn to use faith. He helped us and led us all the way. In fact He carried us. Now, that we are back down to "earth". It is an adjustment, for we do not want to go back to living independent from Him. But, we do not have the dire situation holding us to His side. Today, it is a choice! Before, it was "do or die". I have learned that there was no way that Janni and Steve could not have stood this valley unless our Shepherd became very real and up close. There is so much more to our God, than what we in our finite minds allow us to believe. He is bigger than all trouble. He can speak our to our hearts very clearly and gently. He can speak through His Word. He can give a sense of peace and calm when all is shutting down! When life goes "spewing" blood, God can sustain and give us Himself as unbelievable comfort. Why does God allow such difficulty to His children? I can remember praying for Kole two days before Kole left this world---seeking God on my knees in such desperation. God's tender voice came through with such love,--" Jodi, Kole will live". I had immediate peace! However , two days latter Kole died. So , I thought to myself did I mis-hear Him. Like, I said this has been such a journey and God has chosen not to reveal all His lessons at one time. Yesterday, that lesson hit home and I know it was God, Himself teaching me! He is a kind teacher and I would have no other "principle" teacher in my life more than Him. His lessons can be difficult, but as Beth Moore states about trials--- hang on until the blessing comes. God will use your background everyday for you, instead of against you. She also says that this will cause the enemy to fall into the pit he designed for you. Anyway this was the lesson God so gently taught me.

I had been participating in a Bible study called "The Patriarchs" by (of course) Beth Moore. We have gotten to the last weeks lesson. I came upon this portion of scripture. God had pulled Jacob aside to reassure him that it was of God's own design that Jacob (new name being Israel) should move his entire family to Egypt, as Joseph had suggested. In Genesis 46:2-4 God spoke to "Israel in a vision at night and said, 'Jacob! Jacob!' 'Here I am,' he replied. 'I am the God, the God of your father,' he said. 'Do not be afraid to down to Egypt, for I will make you a great nation there. I will go down to Egypt with you, and I will surely bring you back again.
And Joseph's own hand will close your eyes."

When I read the 7 words I put in bold print, God reminded me of how He whispered in my spirit to not fret because "Kole will live". God always keeps His promises and yet how can that be when it was not fulfilled for me to see! Well, it happened to Jacob. God promised that Jacob would come back to the land. Yet he never did see his home land again in his lifetime. Jacob died in Egypt. His future generations did, but he did not. At least not while he breathed and walked this earth. I realized than, that God is prying my eyes open to see past the end of my nose. He was telling me that Kole is alive. That heaven for a believer is living. I did not see the reality of heaven in that way! I looked at it through "human eyes" and not "God's eyes". I was looking for the "here and now". God was trying to teach me that "heaven is here and now" even though I had to depend on faith and not on experience. His promise is fulfilled, though not in the way I expected. I wondered if Jacob thought when he was dieing if maybe he mis-heard God. Beth Moore explained it like this "God's promise to bring the patriarch back was to Jacob's family line and not just his dry bones". She goes on to say, "Modern, drive-thru thinkers like you and me frame events in such immediate terms we decide we either misunderstood God or He misled us if His promises are not fulfilled in our personal lives".

The promise is fulfilled or will be fulfilled, even when we have to wait to test it with our senses. God's ways are much higher than ours ways and His thoughts are unfathomable. He is right in everything He does. Even in this great hurt and loss, I know He is right in allowing it! It will not always be hurt and loss. Some day, He will turn it into healing and victory. I am clinging to His ankles, until then. We have to go through the process of healing in order to be, an even better "whole" again. It is healthy and good.

I pondered why God does not microwave our healing and give instant answers to our dilemma's more often. I believe it is because lessons that take a "process" to learn are more transforming and have broader effect and testimony, than those just given to us without much agonizing. "No pain, no gain". He is developing character and His likeness in us, through our seeking Him for answers through our struggle and in our struggle. I believe we all have struggles, as God pries our fingers off this world. To seek Him, is to have victory! To seek rebellion and bitterness, is to experience more despair and defeat! I have faith that victory is in store through seeking Him through the grief. We cannot bypass grief. We will all experience it. Take His hand and we will walk with Him together through the "fiery furnaces" of this life. Until the other side, when we will understand what real "living" is all about! Being in His presence constantly and consistently is real living and real loving! We truly have no clue yet, what that is all about! Faith looks to our future home with welcome! Our senses want to stay, where we know and experience life daily. We are better off growing our faith, and keeping our senses in check. We need to remind our senses that God is real!

Jodi

Hello to all! Here it has been almost one month, since Kole went on before us-- to our real home and to our real Dad. We have had some working through times this month! Janni is doing well. She deeply misses her precious son. Steve just finished reading the book "90 Minutes in Heaven". He loved it and has been sharing about his faith in Christ wherever he goes. It makes this sister-in-law very proud to have him as a part of our family! Anyway, I would say that the transition has been the most difficult (on my end) on my seven-year old, Leah. She was so crazy about her cousin Kole. As soon as she could speak to pray in Sunday School, Kole would be her number one prayer request. Even before Kole became sick, her Sunday School teacher came up to me and asked who this "Kole" was! Leah has been his loyal fan from the time she was a toddler. I can remember seeing Leah with a pouting face in so many pictures we had of Kole and my children. She was always pouting when Kole chose to sit with Josiah or Hannah over her! I can remember her saying that it would not matter if Kole liked her or not, or was sick, or anything--- for she chose to love him through thick and thin.

She has demonstrated "a love" that puts me to shame. Her "human love" being deep as it is, is truly nothing in comparison to God's steadfast love for us! God's very nature is love. He is the source of love. He has undefiled love. It is hard to believe that He loves us still, even when we stray from Him or become "ugly" in our attitude or actions. His love does not fluctuate. In fact, if given a chance God will demonstrate His love over and over to you every minute of every day! It is "us" who block His love, for His love is free flowing. I have done some blocking of His love lately and have experienced needless suffering due to it! I then find myself going on to pray that my daughter, Leah, senses God's love for her. When, I am rejecting it myself! Guilt has been my culprit and blocker! Trying to get back to raising my children, taking care of my spouse, and to the mundane duties of house and home has fueled my guilt. The "enemy" has been my accuser! He does not give us a break to grieve! God will turn "his" schemes around I am sure! I love to see God back fire satan's evil!

Getting back to Leah. She has had some grieving to do! She has felt ill since Kole died. I took her to the doctor, who said that she looked pretty good except for some swollen glands. Some wonderful sisters-in-Christ pray with me on Thursday mornings. They poured out their hearts, before the throne, this past Thursday for my daughter. I felt so loved, as they loved my daughter through their heartfelt prayers! Leah happened to see Kole just after he died. My dear prayer partners feel that God will use that experience in her future ministry. He was just a shell and she could tell that Kole was not there anymore! I can remember his frail lifeless body. A light bulb turned on in my head the minute I saw that his spirit had left. This world is just a "dying shell" in comparison to the world to come. This world seems like "our reality" until you get a glimpse of what" it truly is" through watching a person pass from this life to the next. You see what is left behind! What is left behind is an empty shell. Just like a locust shell found on a tree trunk! The life in it has moved on! Leah has many questions--some which are so deep and so thought provoking that I can hardly believe she can ponder so deeply at such a young age. She has been wondering why we even want to live here in this dying world. She truly thinks that going to be in heaven with Kole would be much better than staying here. She wonders if she truly loves God or if she just wants to escape hell and go to heaven?

We had a wonderful Sunday night church service, this past Sunday. A young father, in his 20's, was sharing his heartache at watching his young wife go through cancer surgery, chemo, and radiation. He stated if God takes her, he too would be jealous! She gets to go be with the Lord, and he would have to wait. He and Leah are of the same mind in that regard. We ended the service by singing "I'll Fly Away". Afterwards, Leah was perched on my lap as she said "I was just thinking about Kole when we sang that song. It made me sad!" She said, I think it would better to go to heaven now as a kid, don't you? To that, I pointed at my stomach that she was lying against! I began talking, as God was leading me-- "do you know what, Leah? You have a new baby sister coming soon and you have a job to do! You need to tell her about Jesus. You are her big sister. I also said that Kole was the big brother in his family. Now, I bet he would like it if you took over his job. That means you need to tell baby Judah about Jesus! She then, pipes in with a smile, "and Jaelle too". Jaelle has now taken on Leah's dedication and the tables have been reversed! Jaelle loves Leah, as Leah has loved Kole!

In many ways, our whole family has a new excitement for the day when we all get to "fly away"! But until then, we have a job to do! That job is to love God, love those still here, and spread the Good News of Jesus. May the Good News fly to ends of the earth! May it be God's love, His Word, and the power of the Holy Spirit that sets and fuels our flight!

Luke 17:33 "Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it"

John 12:24-25 "I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But, if it dies, it produces many seeds. The man who loves his life will loose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life."

Jodi