The death of a child is particularly heart wrenching

The death of a child is particularly heart wrenching. 

I was unable to be part of the funeral for a two-year old child last night.  But I did participate in the Closing of the Casket Service this morning.

It brought back memories, some I had not thought of in years.

When I was 7 my two-year old cousin died.  We had gone to my uncle's home to visit and the child had a sever cold but was running around bare footed on wooden floors in the winter.  He died a day or two later.  I don't think my parents ever let me go barefooted in the house again.

A year later, when I was 8, my 16-year old cousin died while having his tonsils removed.  They overdosed him with anesthesia.  This happened in the middle of the week before Easter.

Every Memorial Day my parents went to the graves of their grandparents.  Next to my dad's grandparents was a single tombstone with two names on it:  Ralph and Leon.  They had both died on the same day moments apart in 1911.  They were buried in a single grave, one coffin on top of the other.  They died during a flu epidemic.  They were both younger than 15.  Their mother also had the flu, was delirious from it, and did not learn her two sons were dead until days later, after they were buried.  She never forgave her husband, my great-grandfather.  Nor did she forgive her 7 year old son, my grandfather.  She moved out and they never lived together as a family again.  My grandfather, who had tended his two brothers and had witnessed them die and who was then blamed and abandoned by his mother, bore the pain of that all his life.

My aunt and uncle, who lost their 16 year-old son, hardly ever laughed again.  They never opened the curtains in their home and let the light in.

My aunt and uncle who lost the two year-old had more children and went on with life.  Some how they found a way to rebuild their lives and move on.

When I pastored a small country church I watched a 7 year-old girl die in a hospital room in 1980.  She died from cancer.  Her 5 year-old brother had the same cancer.  A year later I watched her brother die at home and helped his parents carry their son's body to the hospital.

Because the cancer may have been genetic, they never had anymore children.  Thirty years later they still battle the sadness of having lost both their children.

The death of those two children forever impacted my own life.

Two years ago, a young couple here at St. Elijah never got to take their baby home from the hospital.  He died two months after he was born.  It was absolutely the smallest casket I have ever see, barely larger than a shoe box.

That young couple got pregnant again and had another son born recently.  We hope the future is bright for them.

And then today.  He was two years old.  He had been born blind.  He underwent 13 surgeries and other complications.  When he died and was taken to the funeral home, they removed all the I.V.s and tubes.  It was the first time ever that he did not have a needle sticking in him.

He died this past Sunday.  My granddaughter, Sophia Grace, was born this past Sunday.  Mother and daughter are doing well.  They are coming home from the hospital today.  The two-year old who died is being buried today.

I have 7 children and 10 grandchildren.  All healthy.  I have been blessed beyond measure.

He makes the sun to shine on the just and the unjust; the rain to fall on the just and unjust.  We say in our Communion Prayer that Christ came into the world to save sinners, "of whom I am chief."  Sinner that I am, I have no explanation for the sun that has shone on me and mine.  Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy, Lord have mercy.

May the souls of the departed children mentioned herein rest in peace.  And may their memory be eternal.

Father Deacon Ezra
(reposted with permission)