How do you deal with the death of a child? With such deep grief?

We suffered a miscarriage oh so many years ago. After all that time, I still find myself wondering, “What if…”

When my wife and I were first married, she got a phone call. A hard phone call.

It was one of those seasons where the spring rains came, and they never seemed to stop. The rivers and creeks rose and, with the ground already swollen, the region was prone to flash floods.

It was on one of those nights that a young friend, Jodi, was driving home to her parents’ farmhouse. But her route crossed one of those rising creeks. I’m sure that she’d navigated high waters in the past, and so she tried to go through the waters.

She was just a kid trying to get home.

But this time the waters were higher and faster, and they swept Jodi away. You can imagine the terror of the parents, and the grief. I still feel it now—the phone call, my wife going silent. A long drive, a memorial service to remember a beautiful soul just trying to get home.

Just a year before, Jodi came to our wedding and helped us celebrate. She brought a gift—a simple reminder to live well and to celebrate our marriage. We hang it on our wall, and I pass it by and remember Jodi.

This thing called grief is a powerful thing. It reaches us to the core and holds on. Now even after all these years I remember it.

Platitudes don’t satisfy, so we hold on to memories and the hope of the long tomorrow—that Day, not this day.

Photo by Roman Synkevych on Unsplash

Bill High

Bill is CEO & Founder of Vyne Legacy. He works with families to equip them with tools to build multigenerational legacies, and he teaches givers and financial advisers on transformational biblical generosity. He is the co-author with David Green of Giving It All Away and Getting It All Back Again: The Way of Living Generously.

Published June 4, 2020

Topics: Lessons with Bill

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