Lisa Appelo shares how she saw who God is through the shattering loss of her husband. Lisa describes how she was desperate for God in those hard moments, and how her family grieved together but in their own separate ways.
Welcome to the I Witness Podcast. I’m your host, Kelly Jo Wilson, and this is the show for women who struggle to accept their worth but want to embrace their gifts and share their witness for Jesus. We have a great show today about life after shattering loss.
Kelly: Our guest is my friend and fellow author, Lisa Appelo. Lisa inspires women to deepen faith in life’s storms and is an ECPA bestselling author. A former litigating attorney, Lisa is passionate about rich Bible teaching. Lisa founded a team of writers at HopeinGrief.com and currently serves on the executive team for Compel with Proverbs 31 Ministries. Her work has been featured at Life Today, Insight for Living, and many more. As a single mom of seven, Lisa’s days are filled with parenting ministry and long walks to justify lots of dark chocolate. Welcome to the I Witness podcast, Lisa. I’m so happy to have you here.
Lisa: Thank you so much, Kelly Jo. I’m happy to be with you.
Kelly: Yes, yes. Thank you. So, today I just wanted to talk about the wonderful but challenging journey you’ve traveled. Your faith and walk with God over these past few years. So I just wanted to share or wanted our listeners to hear a little bit more about your background and family and then go from there about your faith journey.
You’re really passionate about helping women through shattering loss and grief. I think it’s just so inspiring, and you have such a wonderful story to tell. So why don’t you start by telling us a little bit about your family, background, and even how you came to know Jesus. Like how old you were and just a little bit of what that looks like.
Lisa met God early in her life
Lisa: Sure, when you were asking that question, I was thinking about my story, and I thought, even now, it’s hard to believe this is the story that God has written. This is not what I would’ve expected. And I think so many of us can identify that we are living out a life that we didn’t expect things that have happened or that we wanted to happen that never happened.
I’ll start with when I came to Christ. I was a young girl. I was raised in the church, and I was in Sunday school from the youngest I can remember. In church, you know, things weren’t perfect. Even in my home, there wasn’t much teaching about Jesus.
Most of that was coming to church on Sundays, but I knew I needed a savior at eight. So I count that at eight years old, but we weren’t a family that wrote the date in the Bible or anything like that. So that’s really as best I can remember that I was eight, going forward and pastor, and getting baptized and all that.
But then, in my teen years, I did some teen things as a 15-year-old but rededicated my life. So, from that time on, owned my faith as an adult. You understand what you can as an eight-year-old. Then we grow older and almost have to make those decisions over again as an adult wrestling through some of these issues that seem so simple at eight years old, right?
Kelly: Oh, absolutely. Yes.
God’s unexpected journey for Lisa
Lisa: But, fast forward, I married my college, well, I married my high school sweetheart, so we actually were in Sunday school together. We met in seventh grade, but he was just another boy across the room, and then by high school, we were in a big group of friends. He was a surfer.
We’d go to the beach together, and he was my first date. He was my only date. We went to college together very intentionally because we knew we had a future together. We married sometime in college and ended up with seven children, which is another unexpected thing.
This was not in the plan, but God will tender our hearts and ask us to step out in faith in ways we never thought we could.
So, I have seven children. Five are launched and have their own families, and I am still actively parenting two. My two youngest are at home. My story … I think when we talk about shattering loss and how God really gave me a heart for the woman who’s walking that started 11 years ago.
Shattering loss changed everything
I went to bed happily married and woke up a widow and single mom to my seven children. There were no signs of symptoms, but I woke up in the early morning to my husband’s funny breathing on the pillow next to me and called 911 and started CPR.
The paramedics were there within minutes, and I thought, “okay, he’s in good hands. He’s going to be mad when he wakes up and finds out he has to miss work today.”
But he never recovered.
I went into the ER, and they called me into that room you never wanna go into, and the ER doctor said, “we’ve worked on him for over two hours and have never been able to revive him.”
I went home to tell my kids that was it, that their dad was in heaven. After that, life in every sense fell apart, just shattered into a thousand pieces. It would never be the same again.
Kelly: Wow. That definitely would cause your life to absolutely shatter. Being so young and loving him so much pretty much immediately. You went on a date, and you both were so young and full of life and dedicated your lives to one another. Then you have this family, and like you said, your life took a completely unexpected turn, which is even more of a blessing once you’re walking that path.
But then you wake up in the middle of the night, and oh my goodness, as you put it, you went to bed married and woke up a widow. Happily married and woke up a widow.
Brokenness led her back
But, first, I’m just so sorry you had to deal with that, Lisa. I just can’t imagine, and I’m sure you’ve had many people say that to you.
I will say, though, the encouragement, inspiration, and help just even by being here today as we talk through your story. And knowing you and your passion for writing and reaching women, I’m sure that you’ve provided a lot of comfort to a lot of people, and have really blessed them.
I’m so gracious that you’re here today to talk about this. Going back quickly, whenever you’re young, I just wanna point out one thing, which I think is neat. So you’re eight years old and like, yes, I love Jesus. Your family is going to church and you know about him, but it’s not like writing it in a calendar.
I completely identify with that. I feel like my family had always talked about Jesus, that it was kind of like well-known that you’re Christian, right? That you just know him, say prayers and that’s it. So you can’t really pinpoint the day. But like you said, when you were a teenager, after you come to know him a little bit as you were young, but it never left you just like he tells us it never departs from you.
But once you make some mistakes, dealing with all the hormones and teenage everything, you know? I completely identify with you there. Once you realize, once you see a little bit of the brokenness that you are and then go back, it has a little bit of a different meaning right?
Lisa made a choice
Lisa: Yeah, for sure.
I was doing things I shouldn’t have been doing, and I really felt the before and after, and I didn’t get saved at 15. I was saved at eight but wasn’t living fully for the Lord. I was wandering from him, and was really at a point where I could have kept wandering.
Maybe not come back, or I could say, “no, this is the truth.” So he is my savior, and I desperately need him. It’s interesting because I was actually at a youth camp. It was one of those things where everybody was emotional, and I never went forward. They were like, “come forward or pray.”
I never went forward. I stayed right in my seat.
But I remember praying, “Lord, do not let this be a mountaintop experience.” Just praying that over and over. Then I went home.
Dan and I were not dating. We were really good friends. Then, a few weeks after returning school had started in the fall, he said, “You’re so different. You’re so different.” So isn’t that interesting? Somebody who knew me so well could see the difference.
God puts people together for a purpose
Kelly: Wow. That is interesting. And you weren’t dating him then, he already saw the change in you, though, being your friend. Wow. And especially him too, you know, seeing that change in you maybe sparked a little something extra in him too. You never know. I feel like God really does put people together. It just seems like he really put you together for a wonderful purpose.
It’s just amazing how he can work in our lives. So, I definitely did not want to pass over what happened with Dan in that story. I just wanted to talk a bit about you returning to God when you were a teenager.
That’s so funny that you say that Dan really recognized it. I think that’s great. But you started your life together and had seven children, so that’s completely devastating. So share what you feel comfortable sharing.
Grief was different for each family member
I don’t wanna take you too much through every step of that, but how was the family unit?
How did you guys pray together?
Did your kids embrace Jesus, or was it kind of like they were questioning things?
Or do you feel like you were a very tight unit?
Lisa: When Dan died, my children were four years old, and then my oldest had just finished his freshman year of college. So they were at all different points and after he died, you know, it’s hard enough walking through your own grief, but then trying to navigate and shepherd your children through theirs, it’s really just overwhelming.
People will ask me, “how do I do this?”
I think the only answer I can give you because every family is different and looks different, is to just authentically grieve together.
Whatever that looks like, don’t feel like you have to show up all put together for your children. Don’t feel like that or make them feel like they have to, either.
I remember sitting down with my kids and saying, grief is going to look different for each of us, and we’ll have to have a lot of grace with each other this year. That’s how naive I was. Thinking it would just be a year until we got back on our feet. And it did look different for each of us.
Every day in the car, my four-year-old would randomly start crying and saying, “I miss daddy. I miss daddy.” Sometimes at very ironic times.
Grief struck in both dark and happy moments
I remember a few months after Dan died, my daughter went to a Florida event, it used to be called Junior Miss, but now it’s distinguished young women. It’s a scholarship program (slightly a pageant). She won for Florida. We had never done pageants, but this had streamers coming down and the flowers being handed to her. All the kids are going up on stage, and I’m holding my daughter on my hip.
With all this music and confetti coming down, she is whispering in my ear, saying, “I miss Daddy. I miss Daddy.”
That is such a picture of grief. These events are happening, these milestone events, and then in the midst of that is this gaping, painful loss.
It’s never one or the other. It is both coexisting.
How did my family react to that? I think I just tried to walk them through as best I could. We did a lot of reading aloud together. We were a homeschooling family and had the opportunity and the time to have that Bible time together every morning.
I remember we started reading books on heaven. Everything from picture books, from my little ones to bigger books with my older ones.
I kept an open conversation. I tried to keep a safe place for them to just be able to share and talk however it looked. It looked different for my daughter than for my teen sons and my six-year-old and four-year-old.
Grief still looks different
Kelly: Oh my goodness. I am sure it looks so different and probably still looks different for them in every stage you go through together.
I love that you pointed out that you have to authentically grieve together. Because there is no way that you’re going to have that strength for all of them, right?
You want to make sure that you can because you want to shelter them from all these big feelings and all this pain. But, like you said, the perfect picture of grief … wonderful thing happening, missing her father and whispering it. But I think that’s amazing.
I think that you guided them in such a wonderful way and I bet that a lot of women listening to this are probably thinking the same thing. “I don’t know how I’m going to do this. I’m just going to do it with them, and that’s it.”
That’s just a wonderful guide for somebody who’s kind of lost, because it would be impossible to really carry them through each thing while you’re feeling it yourself.
How did you handle that? How did you handle those really tough moments and maybe even angry at God or frustrated with him?
Totally overwhelmed, Lisa met God every day
Lisa: I was overwhelmed in every sense of the word, and I think when life falls apart, you know, we get to a place of overwhelm where we’re having decisions and massive change, hard emotions, and questions. I would get up every morning and get them settled and started for the day.
Then I would get into my minivan.
I say some people have a prayer closet, but I have a minivan. I would go around the corner to this little park and just park. In that quiet minivan where nobody could slip a note under the door or come into my room, I would just cry out to God. Sometimes I cried out audibly. Sometimes, I would journal. Every day I journaled.
But I would have that time to unburden my heart with everything I had been carrying. All the worries I had, all the fears, the missing, and the loneliness, just all of it. I never went through anger.
Desperate for God
I did go through questioning God, saying, “Why would you take such a good dad?”
Some of the ironies of the situation were that his mom, who was not in very good health at all, the last thing he had been doing was paperwork for her. Not that I wanted anything to happen to her, but just the irony of life. He died suddenly so young, and she was there with us for several more years, which was a grace.
I would get alone in my car. I would cry out to God and pour that out to him then open the Bible.
I happened to be reading through the Bible for a year, but I had not started that year doing that, Dan had actually been doing it.
I was just desperate for the Lord. I was desperate for the word more than I needed my own food.
I wouldn’t look for a passage that would meet or speak to me, but I would just open to that day’s reading. It never ceased to amaze me how God would meet me wherever I was reading, whether it was Leviticus, Psalms, or one of the gospels.
God reminded her of who he is
God would meet me on the words of that page. He would remind me who he is and how he cares for us, and it would give me enough hope to go back into the house and parent for that day. It was not enough for the week. I would have to go back the next day and do it over. It became like that daily manna.
I would go out and pick up my daily manna, which was enough for that day.
When we say God is enough, that’s what it looks like. It’s not like God is enough, and we never have to go through anything hard. It’s that God is enough to get through this moment, to get through this difficulty, get through this day, and it won’t always feel like this.
I kept telling myself that it won’t always feel like this, but I did have to have that hope to get through each day. Until we got our fitting and until my smile came back.
Daily walk through the pain
Kelly: Wow. That is so perfect to say how he’s given it to you for that day in the daily walk with him. Because it’s so unknown. When you say you were overwhelmed in every sense, I think that is an overwhelming piece of it. You think, when is this going to go away? When is it going to lighten up? When is it ever going to get better?
But I think you made a good point that you surrendered every day. You made that time, no matter how busy you were, no matter how intense or overwhelmed you felt. You made that time in the morning or whenever it was and took everything to him. Which I think is a really great thing.
Many women who listen to this podcast struggle with making time and even feeling good enough for God to meet them where they are. A lot of them feel broken and that they don’t deserve it. But also, especially if they’re angry at God for something that has happened.
How can you surrender your pain to God?
What would you say helped you to be able to lay it at his feet whenever you went there? Did it come very easy to you because you had been in the scriptures and walking with God through it? Or was there something or anything extra that you did to maybe help the woman listening now who says, “It’s so hard for me to just surrender?”
Lisa: It is for sure too hard for us. We were not made for death, divorce, disease, or devastation like this. We weren’t made for it. So when these things happen, it does overwhelm us. That old saying that God won’t give you more than you can handle. That’s just not true.
We can absolutely find ourselves in circumstances that are too hard for us.
I remember writing at the top of my journal every day for well over a year,
THIS IS TOO HARD. I CANNOT DO THIS.
All caps, bold, underlined. That was the reality of my heart. I’m sure people looked at me and thought, you’re so strong.
But I knew what was going on inside. I knew the war raging in my thoughts and my emotions.
I could feel the enemy and felt like the enemy was trying to get his toe into our family and just pull it apart.
This was not Lisa, who had everything together and was doing everything right. This was Lisa, who was desperate for the Lord.
Listen to God’s nudge
Sometimes I think we can feel that nudge to meet with the Lord, open the word, meet with him in prayer, maybe read a devotion or read the Bible, and we think it’s guilt. You think God is guilting us like, “You haven’t met with me. You’re so bad.”
But it’s not, it’s wooing us like somebody who loves us, somebody who is holding out their hands and says, “I have everything you need. Come to me.”
It makes me weep. Because I remember … I remember those days when I just was desperate. And he says, “Come to me.”
So I think for the woman listening to this right now and saying, “I’ve stayed away from God, and I haven’t opened the word. I am mad,” to just listen to that nudge. Open it and give God a chance to meet you where you are.
It won’t look all tidy, and everything won’t be wrapped up with the bow that first day. God will meet you where you are.
He will give you hope. He will encourage you and remind you how much he loves you. He will remind you of his promises and his faithfulness, and that’s how we do life.
We’re not promised that life will be easy. But, we’re promised that God will be faithful.
Bible Verses for Encouragement
Matthew 11:28, NKJV, “Come to Me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
Resources for You
Lisa’s book Life Can Be Good Again helps women to put their world back together after it falls apart.
In part 2 of this episode of the I Witness podcast, Jenny Leavitt shares how she coped with the grief after losing her youngest son, Jacob, to a drunk driver. The Leavitt family has been through extreme hardship, and Jenny shares how God’s peace has led them through healing deep wounds. In addition, she discusses how the event impacted her marriage and her older son, Caleb, who almost died in the accident alongside his brother.
I think there are multiple reasons He prepares us. It can be to heal past wounds, past insecurities, and areas where we don’t feel we deserve his love or care. But it can also be for something in the future he knows that’s coming that we don’t know.
Kelly: That’s a wonderful way to look at it and such a good point. I feel like you and your family have really embodied that so much … how he has truly prepared you. I am grateful to him for the peace that he gave to you.
Because as a mother outside looking in, and I’m sure you’ve heard this throughout telling your story, I don’t know if I could do that. I’m sure you’ve heard that, too, “I don’t know if I could handle that.”
But that’s kind of the point. We can’t handle it without Him, and I’m so grateful you had that peace.
Like you said, when he told you they were his, and then again, at that moment because that is tough.
I appreciate you so much for coming on and talking about that because it’s very hard. I love that your husband was trying to protect you even in the midst of it. He’s by your side through cancer, through all of this. That is so great because a tragedy can shake that marriage up big time in families, especially marriages.
But you guys are rooted in Jesus, rooted in faith.
How coping with grief tests a marriage
Do you feel like going through all this has strengthened you both and fueled togetherness in your marriage?
Jenny: Just three months before we lost Jacob, there was a little girl in our church who was seven or eight that died from brain cancer. My husband and I were the children’s leaders, so we walked that road with the parents.
So, just three months before, we had told the parents the stats were not on your side. In marriages that lose a child, the odds are stacked against you that the marriage will not survive.
Then we lost Jacob three months later. We had been in ministry long enough to know what we told them was right. Looking back now, I think we had a solid foundation in our faith, and we had been together a long time, but it still rocked our marriage in certain areas.
What I tell people is if there are cracks in your relationship, miscommunications, and things you don’t handle well … I’ll use myself as an example. I tend to withdraw and shut down.
My husband is the opposite, and that makes him feel like I want to distance myself completely from him and not want to work it out when that’s really not to me. I’m trying to process it. I don’t want to say something that I’m going to really regret.
It’s just a different mindset. Then you have a serious trauma like this hit marriage, and you have to go into it being aware. My husband and I are polar opposites on so many different things. We’re just completely different, night and day. Then you have the fact that we’re also male and female and grieve differently.
What can you do to save the marriage after losing a child?
You have to fight.
You have to fight for the relationships that you want to survive. It will not just be handed to you on a silver platter. We were good solid Christians too. We still had to fight through those human tendencies to revert to what is comfortable and familiar and not want to battle anymore.
You gotta fight through that and be like, “No! You know what? Our marriage is worth fighting for. Our relationship is worth fighting for.”
Not to say that we’ve arrived, because we haven’t, but we have come through a lot of the hardest times.
As you and I were sharing earlier, I read or heard a long time ago that before you share something so close to your heart, make sure that you’re speaking from a place of your scars and not your wounds.
I really feel like my husband and I have … God has brought a lot of healing to those deep wounds. So not to say that we’ve arrived, because we have not, but I do feel like our marriage is more of a place where God has brought some healing salve to those wounded areas, and there’s scarring now.
How long does it take to cope with grief?
It still hurts.
That pastor that I told you about, he’s in his eighties, that they lost their daughter. His wife told me, this actually made me feel better, that it had been 37 years at that point. And she was crying when she was talking to me. I remember thinking, okay, I feel normal.
If she’s 37 years away, and it still gets her thinking about her daughter that she lost. Okay. So, I’m not weird. It’s okay.
She told me, “Jenny, you can think about the what-ifs. Sometimes we’ll sit around and think, ‘I wonder how old she would be and if we’d have grandkids’, but I can’t let my mind stay there. It’s not healthy. We have to just say, you know what, God, thank you for those 15 years that we had, and we’re gonna have all of eternity with her now.”
So, shifting that mindset. And their marriage has survived.
They’ve been a great example to us that a marriage can survive. It’s worth fighting for.
Kelly: I love that you had them … I don’t love that they had to go through that too, but I love that you had them as kind of like a mentor. I mean, it really is so true how God puts people in your path.
Jenny shares how she coped with grief from a healing scar, not an open wound
I love what you said about sharing things from your scars, not your wounds.
It’s so profound. It really is. Because there is a difference. Once you have felt the scarring, the scars start to heal in your soul and heart. Then you can really help a lot of people.
I love that you are reaching out to help and walk alongside people, especially in your church.
Just sharing your story with somebody can make such a huge difference. Especially coming on and talking to me today, sharing how you have gone through it, is amazing.
People go through these things. But, especially once you’re a believer, once you believe in Jesus, and you declare him as your savior.
We are not meant to cope with grief alone
It is not saying you’re never going to have heartache. There will be times it’s almost harder because you know there’s a struggle. But having him, he’s there to walk alongside you.
I love that you’re taking that and your pain and trying to help others.
It even says in the Bible, Paul had said, how we comfort one another with these words. That’s kind of the point because no matter what, there will be suffering. There are going to be difficult times. Like you said before, how you’ve gone through these seasons and how this healing is building on itself.
That’s so true. I think because you had that foundation and, like you said, keep the focus on those small nuggets of wisdom and the peace and understanding that God gives you. Because in those moments, it’s not this big thing, sometimes, it’s that small, still voice that will give you that comfort and reassurance.
I love that you said that because it’s so true because we are human. We’re going to go to the muscle memory of anger and fear.
But those small moments and his small voice inside us will build and help us in our weaknesses. He even says in our weakness, he is strong.
How did Jenny’s oldest son cope with the grief of losing his brother, and what did his journey look like?
So I love that you had that through this journey because it is very difficult, the path you guys have walked, but you, your husband, and your son walked it together. So Caleb is doing well now? Caleb had a lot of healing to go through as well. How old is he now?
Jenny: He is 27 now. Before the accident, he already had his associate’s degree, and it took him about a year after the accident. He had to learn how to walk again like there was so much physical and cognitive therapy. I didn’t even know there were four different types of therapies that he had to do afterward.
So it took about a year for him to be able to rejoin the world. He went back for his bachelor’s degree and is currently an elementary school teacher in the county where we lived in northeast Florida. Some exciting news is he just proposed to his girlfriend on Black Friday …
Kelly: Yes! That’s wonderful!
Jenny: We’re excited.
Kelly: Oh, congratulations!
Jenny: We’re excited. They’ll be getting married next year. We’re super excited. He’s also been praying about and seeking God’s wisdom on if there’s anything that he can do.
He has a heart for people like him who have lost a sibling because he didn’t find many resources to help him. There’s more out there for parents, and when he told me that, I started looking to see if I could find anything to direct him.
There really isn’t a lot out there for people that have lost a sibling, and not just in a tragic way like this, but just on the whole.
There’s not a whole lot out there. So he’s been considering some steps he might be able to take to help other people. He’s got an entire testimony of his own. He had to navigate through anger towards God, the driver, and even himself.
What about coping with grief and survivor’s guilt?
He battled with survivor’s guilt, and he has his own story.
He could also help some people struggling with those issues from losing his sibling.
Kelly: For sure. Especially because they were so young, and it’s so easy when you’re young and don’t have years of experience behind you. But, I don’t know. You guys are pretty awesome. I mean, at 22, you dealt with cancer and everything too.
You were such a good example with that strength, you and your husband together. So I’m so happy that he had you to look up to, but yes, I was going to say that about the survivor’s guilt. I wonder if he struggled with that because it’s his brother.
I’m glad that he’s worked through that.
And he’s a teacher? What an amazing job! Also, at an elementary school, he’s shaping young minds every day, and then to want to reach out and share his story too. I think that that’s just so inspiring.
You guys are good people. It’s wonderful. Honestly, I love that you’re here talking about coping with your grief. I can’t wait to share the episode. I like that you said you always think it will happen to somebody else, and then it doesn’t.
And then when it happens to you, you think, how will I ever handle that?
But I love that God was always with you and all of you. Even in fear and anger, he walked you through that, which is wonderful. So I love you sharing your story.
How to cope with grief using God’s word
I like to ask the guests on the show to share a Bible verse, and I know you’ve already shared a couple of verses with us, so I appreciate that. I love the verses that you shared in Romans, and then also about how God doesn’t leave us or forsake us. I’ll definitely put those in the show notes.
When we go to that muscle memory with all that pain instead of going to what we want to do in our flesh, it’s so good to have a verse, even one verse, to take with us to have that truth.
So thank you so much for sharing those verses. Like I said, I’ll also put links in the show notes for the listeners, so they can always take those verses because God does work all things for good, even if we can’t see it.
Which, most of the time, we really can’t. I mean, God’s very mysterious in his timing and ways.
Jenny: There is one more I’d like to share.
Kelly: Yes, wonderful. Great!
Jenny: So, then after the accident, one of the verses that I felt like God gave me for that season of healing, everybody knows Jeremiah 29:11 “for I know the plans I have for you.” Everybody knows that one.
Many people don’t keep reading, though, and right after that, verses 12 and 13, so Jeremiah 29, all the way through 13.
So yes, he does have plans to give us hope and a future, but right after that, he says, “if you seek me with your whole heart, you will find me.”
And after the accident, that verse was crucial to me more than the most commonly known verse 11. Because there were times when God felt so distant, and I know part of that is the grief.
But there were times when God felt so distant, and I just didn’t understand.
I couldn’t wrap myself around why. But God would bring me back to that verse, that if you seek me and seek me with your whole heart, you’ll find me. And that was crucial in recentering me when I got off course.
What does God do when your grief takes you to a dark place?
I wouldn’t even realize I’m down a rabbit trail in my thinking. But God would remind me of that verse, and it would re-anchor me on hope, truth, and faith. If I just seek him, if I seek him with everything I have within me, I don’t have to understand. I may never understand. I may understand a little tidbit here, but then get the full thing in heaven, I don’t know.
But I do know that if I really seek him with my whole heart, I will find him. He has proven faithful even in that. Sometimes those questions have been answered, and sometimes they’re still questions that I may never know the answer until eternity. When I get to ask him one day, “why, why did it have to happen that way?”
That’s one thing that I would love to leave with your listeners: if you seek him, he will provide answers.
It may not be in the timing you want or even in the way that you think the answers will come, but he will provide those answers if you really seek it.
Kelly: That’s fantastic. I appreciate you sharing that so much because that is so true. Wow. That’s such a good point, too, the future and the hope, but then you seek him. I love that you shared that you were so honest about times of anger and fear and just getting frazzled with emotion because that’s going to come, it’s going to come, it’s inevitable.
The fact that you could go to that verse is great. I think that’ll really help the women listening to this who struggle with a similar challenge. Coping with the grief of losing a son or a child, or struggling in very fearful situations. Cancer. That diagnosis alone, especially metastasized and stage four.
I mean, it’s very scary. The number one thing that you want to say to God is, why? Why, why, why did this happen?
Your finding comfort is very encouraging. It encourages me very much. I’m sure it will encourage people listening to this and I appreciate you sharing.
We all have the same fears, but God is faithful
Jenny: Hey, you’re welcome. I don’t want people to think we’re superhuman or anything. We’re just like you. We have the same fears and same struggles. We’ve just found God to be faithful.
Kelly: That’s it, and we’re not even meant to. One of the things that I’ve shared on my blog and with different people, is that we are not meant to be like “good enough.”
We’re meant to have flaws. We’re meant to be that way, so we can rely on God to really guide us because, in our weaknesses, he’s strong. I love that you shared such a powerful verse. Well, verses is in Jeremiah too. That’s wonderful. I can’t wait to put that in the notes too.
How to learn more about coping with grief and the Leavitt’s journey with God
So where can we find you if somebody wants to learn more about you?
I understand that you actually just released a new book. Do you want to tell the listeners a little bit about that?
Jenny: Sure. Since my husband is a pastor, he kind of jokes that he’s the preacher, so he’s the one who does the speaking in the family. Since the accident, he’s shared our story everywhere, from mock DUIs at high schools to small groups at churches. Wherever they ask him, he shares our story, and he’ll tailor it for the audience.
And inevitably, people would come up to him afterwards and are like, “well, what’s the rest of the story?”
He says no, I’m the preacher. My wife’s the writer, so that’s kind of how it evolved. I just wrote our book, and we strategically released it on November 25th this year, which was Black Friday.
But it also would’ve been our son Jacob’s 25th birthday on the 25th of November.
So we released it on that day. It’s God Prints: Finding evidence of God in the Shattered Pieces of Life. So it tells the rest of our story. It goes into a lot more detail about when I had cancer, even when we lost everything, were homeless, and then the accident and everything.
So folks can check it out there. I have the photo gallery that goes with the book, and that’s open to everybody.
Jenny’s website is a place of hope for others coping with grief
Even if you don’t read or get the book, you can still scroll through it. I have captions so people can get a feel and look at some things. I’ve shared some tips and things that have gotten us through those hard times. I’m going to continue to build on that. I want it to be a place where people can come for practical help.
A place that I wish we had had seven years ago.
A place that I wish we could have gone to and been like, “Am I normal? Where can I go for help? Does anybody understand this? What are some resources? What are some podcasts?”
I want it to be where people can come and get some hope. So I’m hoping to have interviews with others who have overcome adversity and have those kinds of things too. So to be a place of not just help but hope and healing too.
Kelly: That’s fantastic. Thank you so much, Jenny.
God is working things for good through your ministry, reaching out and, like you said, even just helping. Even if you help one person struggling with a similar thing, then it’s powerful. I appreciate you so much for coming here and sharing your story today.
I will put links to your website and the God Prints book in the show notes. And Jenny, thank you so much. I appreciate you so much for talking with us today on the I Witness Podcast.
Jenny: Thank you so much for inviting me.
Listen to Part 1 of this Interview: What happens to a mother’s faith when tragedy strikes?
2 Corinthians 12:9, NKJV “And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”
Jeremiah 29:11-13, NKJV “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.”
Bible Verses from Part 1 of the interview with Jenny:
Hebrews 13:5, NKJV “Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
Philippians 4:7, NKJV “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
Romans 8:28, NKJV “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”
This episode is brought to you by The Wilson Shop. Visit The Wilson Shop on Etsy for beautiful, Christian-inspired designs on your favorite home decor, apparel, and accessories.
In part 1 of this episode of the I Witness podcast, Jenny Leavitt shares her journey through faith when an unthinkable tragedy struck her family. The Leavitt family is no stranger to difficult times, and Jenny shares how God prepared her for her worst nightmare.
Kelly: Welcome to the I Witness Podcast. I’m your host, Kelly Jo Wilson, and this is the show for women who struggle to accept their worth but want to embrace their gifts and share their witness for Jesus. We have a great show today about tragedy that shakes faith. Our guest is Jenny Leavitt a pastor’s wife, mother, author, and follower of Jesus.
Jenny is amazed by God’s reach to rescue broken, hurting people, and has witnessed God’s faithfulness through shattering loss. Jenny’s passion is encouraging others to lean into Jesus during life’s ups and downs. Jenny lives in Florida with her husband of nearly 30 years, Myron, and her dog Molly, who thinks she’s a cat.
Welcome to the I Witness podcast, Jenny. I’m so happy to have you.
Jenny: I’m so happy to be here.
Kelly: Great, great. Today we want to talk through a little bit of your journey and your struggle with the tragedy that happened to your family. As I said, you can share whatever you feel comfortable sharing. So why don’t you let our listeners know a little bit more about you and your family?
Jenny: Well, I became a Christian when I was 15. I met my husband when I was 16, and we got married when I was 18, so very young.
Kelly: Wow, that’s wonderful.
Jenny: Both of us had parents who were married for a long time, but we had at least one parent that battled with some addictions.
So we carried some baggage into our marriage and then married young. So, obviously, there were some maturity issues that we had to work on together and grow together. Then, we both fell in love with Jesus in our late teens.
God has a way of changing life’s plans and testing faith
So, God has a way of reaching in and changing your life’s plans. And neither one of us really planned on being in the ministry when we were growing up, but God had some other plans. So, we’ve been in some form of ministry almost all of our adult lives. This is the third church he’s pastored that we’re pastoring right now.
Kelly: Wow, that’s wonderful.
Jenny: We’ve also assisted with youth ministry, for years and years back in our home church. That’s actually where we were, in our home church in Jacksonville, assisting with the children’s ministry at the time when the accident happened, back in 2015.
Kelly: So that’s pretty cool that you guys met whenever you were in high school and that you’re like high school sweethearts. You have been married for what about 30 years now? That’s great.
Jenny: We just celebrated our 29th anniversary this past Monday.
Kelly: Congratulations! Happy anniversary.
Jenny: Oh, thank you. Actually, he’s four years older than me, so I was a senior in high school. He was in the military when I met him. I was trying to do the math in my head.
Kelly: Oh, no worries. Yeah, no, he was 20-something. So that’s what we could say.
Jenny: Yeah. Yes.
Kelly: So that’s great, you guys are high school sweethearts celebrating your anniversary. You were into the ministry, which is funny because I agree with you, God definitely works in very mysterious, funny ways. So you had some struggles before the accident. You had some things that you had to fight through.
God prepares ahead of time
Do you want to talk about that a little bit? Talk about some of those major struggles that really shook that faith, shook your faith.
Jenny: Probably the first really big struggle was, I was only 22 years old married just a few years, and already had our two boys, but I got a phone call on a Friday afternoon. I had recently had our youngest Jacob in November of 97. Ever since then, I’d been having a lot of weird, symptoms that they kept trying to blame on postpartum issues, but it was like weird things. One pupil would dilate while the other would stay large, and then they would flip.
So it was like bizarre symptoms. It wasn’t your normal postpartum symptoms. And I never had anything like that with my oldest son anyway. So anyway, finally, after I started passing out and what really got them looking was I got jaundiced, and that’s when they really started taking me seriously.
But I was still only 22 when I got a call on that Friday afternoon. The doctor, the specialist, said, “I hate to tell you this over the phone, but timing is critical. So, I have to tell you over the phone that the test came back, and it’s non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.”
I was 22, totally naive. I said, “I don’t even know what that is.”
He said, “It’s cancer, and it is in every lymph node in your chest. Your chest is full of it.”
He felt pretty confident that they thought the tumor in my pancreas was the non-Hodgkins lymphoma metastasizing down to my pancreas.
Faith in God was tested and rocked
I was only 22 and I think that was probably the first time that, my faith was really tested and rocked.
I gave my life to Christ when I was 15 and thank God that he led me into a good Bible-believing church. At that time, I didn’t realize it, but God was putting some foundational truths in me that he knew I would need.
Like for instance, when I became a believer. I think that one reason God gave me the scripture I’m about to share as a new believer was partly because of my upbringing. My parents were together, but it was rough. One of the scriptures that in those first years before cancer really just was like an anchor for me was where Jesus said, “I’ll never leave you. I’ll never forsake you.”
As much as I loved that scripture, I didn’t realize how much I needed that anchor until I went through cancer.
There were some times, I mean, my husband, God bless him, he was there as much as possible, and he has continued to be throughout the years as I go back for treatments and cancer scares and all kinds of stuff, he’s continued to be there, but the one constant through it all has been that Jesus has always been there.
Jesus never left me
He’s never left me, never forsaken me. Looking back, it seems through all these different seasons of my life and things we’ve gone through, there was always a verse that God was speaking to my heart ahead of time. I didn’t even know why he was giving me that one to focus on, but he’s just so good and so faithful like that to prepare us even when we don’t know. That’s what he’s doing, giving us that little kernel of truth to hold onto.
Fear grips faith
Kelly: For sure. That had to be scary, especially young, 22, and a new mom, you’re just trying to navigate that with two, two young boys. But, then getting the call. I can totally understand how it can resonate there with you and I love that you had that to carry with you. Personally, I had a similar, similar scare too. I got the call too, and I had to have surgery.
It was cervical cancer, though. But a similar thing. The fear that grips you is so inexplainable because it’s more so for everyone else, I felt like. Did you feel like that? Like you look at your boys and your husband, and you’re like, “I can’t imagine. I have to be here for them.”
I think the scariest part for me was the PET scan. That was probably the scariest part for me. Because going into that, it’s like they know it’s there. But it may be a little bit different for you just because of the nature and type you had.
But for me, it was like, “Okay, is it everywhere, or is it just in this one spot?”
I don’t want to focus too much on that, but I can understand a little bit of your fear. So what a great verse to carry you through.
Faith in God is shaken
Jenny: That fear was so … I mean, I totally agree with you. I had settled it with Christ, so I felt confident that if God chose to take me home, I knew I would make heaven my home. My fear was my boys. I can’t tell you how many times I would be like, “God. We have a three-year-old and a baby. How is Myron going to do this?”
I know he’s a tough man and everything, but that’s a lot. And that’s a big part of my testimony I’ve shared many, many times over the years with other moms. I remember one night in the throes of all the treatments. I had six months of chemo treatments and 56 radiation treatments.
So somewhere in the middle of all that, in the middle of the night, I couldn’t sleep. My mind was just whirling with all that fear over the boys, “What’s gonna happen to them if I die?”
I found out later that I had stage four and I didn’t know that at the time. I just knew that the prognosis wasn’t very good. I just remember I went out in the living room in the middle of the night and I said, “God, I am not leaving until I get some peace from you about our boys. I can’t keep living in this fear. I just can’t.”
Peace surpasses all understanding
I don’t know, it was probably an hour, hour and a half later that I just kept wrestling God about that and just praying. There is no other way to describe it, which the Bible actually says that peace that passes all understanding. You can’t describe it.
It was like this peace just settled on me. God spoke that, that quiet, still voice that he does, and he said, “They’re mine. I love them even more than you do. I’m gonna take care of them.”
There was such a peace that just settled over me that I mean, I kid you not even as they were growing up, obviously, I survived cancer. But, still, as they were growing up, there were times when I probably should have been scared at some of the things they were doing and places they were going. But that peace carried with me.
Wrestling with God
I wrestled with God about that and he gave me that peace and that stayed with me. It was a staying factor. Actually the night of the accident, that was crucial in my receiving the news about our boys. That was actually a reference point that I have no doubt that he’s the one who brought that back to my memory.
Kelly: I’m sure. That is intense. That peace is very difficult to describe unless you have experienced it. It’s like when you should be writhing, you’re still. It’s only him that can really do that. Right?
Jenny: Mm-hmm.
Kelly: I think it’s interesting, like you said, how he prepares you with the verse before going through the actual thing you’re gonna go through. So you get through cancer, get through all of that.
So having that peace, and him telling you they’re mine, and you know he will hold them in his hands. Why don’t you tell me what happened later? So, in a way, that was preparing you for the next thing, right? The accident. Like I said, you don’t have to go into a ton of detail, but what happened with the accident. How did you handle that?
Jenny’s faith in God is tested even more
Jenny: In the interim. Because I’ve been cancer free since November 1998.
Kelly: Oh, praise Jesus!
Jenny: Yes. The accident happened in August 2015. So in that interim of, what is that, like 17 years or so, another verse that, when I look back in my life, it’s the verse that held those years together.
A lot of people know it. It’s the Romans 8:28, how God works all things together for the good of those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.
Because so many times over those years, we saw how. Even on this side of eternity, we may never understand exactly why I had to go through cancer. But we’ve seen how God has used it for good.
Steadfast faith, even when they lost everything
There have been so many times that a coworker, somebody from the church, our pastor, or somebody will say, “Hey, I just met so-and-so and they just found out they have cancer. Would you guys mind talking to them?” Or, “Hey, I know so-and-so and his wife, and it’s not looking very good. Can both of you talk to them? Because I think the husband could benefit from Myron talking to them too.”
Times like that, just seeing God work good out of it. There was also an interim time when my husband broke his back. I mean, horribly. He’s had two back surgeries since then.
At that time, my husband, who’s a very hard worker and has one of the strongest work ethics I know, was sent home because he wasn’t allowed to work for almost a year and a half.
We lost everything.
We had two houses, we had cars, and we lost everything. So in that interim, we even saw God work those things for good because, during that time of being homeless, we could look back and draw from the times that God brought us through cancer.
My husband would even say, “God brought us through that. He’s gonna bring us through this.”
We could look back and use that as a reference point. So even those things in our life, that scripture, I feel like, was the overall theme for that time. Which led us up to the greatest time of trial in our lives.
A mother’s worst nightmare
So on Saturday, August 29th, 2015, our whole family had been volunteering at our church in Jacksonville. My husband and I worked with the youth, and they were doing a special event for the community. My husband and I were involved and our oldest son was actually in the event.
Our youngest son, Jacob, it was his first time being in the lights and sound ministry. He was so excited.
When you volunteer like that, you’re the first ones there and you’re the last ones to leave. So we had just gotten home, but it was super late. It was almost midnight we got a call from our pastor’s wife, because they drove home a similar way from us, asking us if we knew where the boys were.
When you’re faced with something like that, even with a cancer diagnosis, sometimes that shock and numbness can be like, “no, that happens to other people. That doesn’t happen to me. That doesn’t happen to us.”
So to make a long story short, our boys were in our oldest son’s Ford Escape, and they were hit by a drunk driver.
Our youngest son, Jacob, was 17 at the time, Caleb was 20, Jacob was 17. Jacob died on the scene and Caleb almost died.
A miracle emerged from the devastation
To this day, I’m so grateful for the first responders who were there. It was a dark, dreary night, like drizzling rain out in the middle of the country, so it was not a well-lit intersection.
Without them getting there quickly and getting them in, we would’ve lost him too. It was still touch and go with him for at least a couple of weeks. He was in a coma for eight or nine days. He, he’s had so many surgeries that we have to start with the top of his head and work down to the bottom of his feet to remember everything wrong.
He’s a miracle. When people see him now they can’t believe it because he just barely has a limp when he walks. He’s got so much titanium in him, it’s amazing. He came home in a wheelchair and C-collar and is walking today.
God’s faithfulness all along
All those lessons we learned kind of converged all in that timeframe, which was instrumental in how we were able to heal and process. Looking back on our lives, seeing God’s hand of faithfulness, and how he prepared us even when we didn’t know he was preparing us. All those lessons that we learned that was because he knew what was coming.
He had placed people in our lives … one of our dear friends in the fellowship of churches that we’re in, he’s a mentor, almost like a grandfather to us.
Our pastor’s pastor is in his eighties, and he and his wife lost their daughter when she was 15, like 40 years ago. So, we knew that about him. He talks about it frequently when he’s preaching. So things like that God had put into our life, and we didn’t realize the significance.
Until you’re going through that, and even then, I’m condensing months, even years of healing after the accident. Things that God helped us work through. Deep wounds that he had to heal.
These lessons and the people God had placed in our lives were instrumental in that healing.
Healing through faith and surrendering to God
Those verses that I shared with you already, they came back around where we were like, “Okay, all right. You said you would never leave us. You said that you’re gonna work all things for good, all things God. So you’re not a liar. If you said you’re gonna work ’em all for good, we don’t see it right now, but somehow you’re gonna bring some good out of this somehow because you’re a man of your word. You’re faithful. You’ve proven to us that you’re faithful in our times of homelessness, our facing cancer. In me lifting the boys up to you.”
Earlier, when I told you that that was going to be, I didn’t realize how much me wrestling with God about that and finally surrendering and getting that peace.
The night of the accident, when Myron got that phone call in our house, he went to the accident scene. He didn’t tell me this until a lot later, but he was really in the back of his mind thinking, if it is the boys, I don’t really want her to be there until I know what to expect.
So even in the middle of that, he was trying to shield me just in case.
What he did when he found out that it was our boys is he sent one of my good friends who’s also our assistant pastor’s wife, out to our house to pick me up and take me.
In that timeframe, when I knew she was about 20 minutes away, I was just pacing back and forth in the kitchen and in the dining room. Just pacing and trying to pray, and at that point, all we knew was that it was our boys.
The unknown strangled her until she had enough
We didn’t know anything about their status. I was praying, and I couldn’t wrap my mind around it. I couldn’t get focused.
Finally, I still remember, I stopped by the dining room table and said, “God, you know what. Enough! If you told me all those years ago that they were your boys and that you loved them even more than I do, then I’m gonna have to take you at your word that you still love them more than I do, which can’t fathom, but okay. And so God, I’m choosing, I’m gonna choose right now to trust you. I’m just going to put it back in your hands that even if it’s our boys, I’m going to trust you that you said you love them even more than I do.”
And once again, that peace came over me where I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt. Even all these seven years later, I can still feel that peace when I talk about that time because God knew I needed that anchor. He knew that Jacob was already gone.
Faith in the little things
I didn’t know that, but he knew that and knew I would need that anchor. So, once again, it was just those little times, those little nuggets. Sometimes I have told people when I’m talking to him, don’t discredit those little times that God plants those seeds in your life. Hold on to him with everything you’ve got because you don’t know why he’s putting that there.
Our God is so good.
I think there are so multiple reasons He does it. It can be to heal past wounds, past insecurities, and areas where we don’t feel like we deserve his love or his care. But it can also be for something in the future he knows that’s coming that we don’t know.
Bible Verses for Encouragement
Hebrews 13:5, NKJV “Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
Philippians 4:7, NKJV “and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
Romans 8:28, NKJV “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”
This episode is brought to you by The Wilson Shop. Visit The Wilson Shop on Etsy for beautiful, Christian-inspired designs on your favorite home decor, apparel, and accessories.
In part 2 of the podcast interview with Laurie Christine, she explores the meaning of God’s peace and how it overpowers understanding. We talk about how God’s peace affected her situation with her son’s heart condition.
Laurie Christine: I thought, okay, we’ve been through this before. We’ve done this three times, and now we can do this. I felt at those moments when we got that news, this is really bad. We’re going to have to do this.
But those were the moments I felt God’s peace.
The verse in Philippians says don’t worry about anything, pray about everything and you will experience God’s peace. In the King James version, or what I memorized when I was a little girl, it said the peace that passes understanding. I never understood what that meant.
What is God’s peace that passes understanding?
What is the peace that passes understanding? I didn’t understand the peace that gives us understanding. It didn’t make sense.
But, as I grew and have been exposed to other versions of the Bible, the New Living Translation says you’ll experience God’s peace which exceeds anything we can understand. It’s the peace that surpasses understanding.
It’s the peace that God gives us that we can’t understand.
Like, where did this come from? This is a terrible situation. I should be very anxious, but I’m actually experiencing God’s peace.
I feel that I’ve experienced the promise in that verse.
We will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and your minds as you live in Christ Jesus. So just in aside from Elliot’s story, I definitely felt God’s peace that surpasses understanding in those situations.
Anyway, back to Elliot’s story, but I have to throw in those little nuggets of truth.
Kelly Jo Wilson: Yeah, for sure. It’s the best.
Laurie Christine: So they ended up doing the fourth open heart surgery. They fixed the aneurysm and put in a different valve. This is the third one now in that same position. They put in a third valve that was actually bigger.
It worked out well in the end because they could put in a bigger valve, which would not need to be replaced for much longer.
So that was now seven years ago. Elliot was five when that last surgery happened, and he’s now 12. He has been doing really well ever since.
Kelly Jo Wilson: That’s fantastic.
God’s design.
Laurie Christine: He has very few restrictions on life. I think by God’s grace, he doesn’t really love sports. But people always ask me if he can play sports and does he have any restrictions.
I’m like, well, he doesn’t like sports, so that actually worked out okay. He could play sports if he wanted to, but he couldn’t get hit in the chest. He has a very weak sternum and rib cage. So contact sports would not be the best for him.
But, the way God designed him, he doesn’t desire to do that. So it all worked out, but we still see the cardiologist. First, it had been every three months and then every four months. Now it’s every six months.
It’s a journey, but God’s peace prevails.
They continue to monitor everything. There is still a possibility down the road, actually a likelihood, at some point in his life, that he’ll need additional surgeries as he outgrows something in his heart.
He had a conduit placed in his heart and a valve replaced. He’s got some coils in his arteries, so as he gets older, some of those pieces may need to be updated or replaced. If a valve fails or something like that.
But it’s not anything on the schedule. It’s not anything anticipated at this point.
I often tell people it’s kind of like your car. You know you’re going to have maintenance on your car at some point, but you don’t know when the muffler’s going to go out. You take it to get a checkup every couple of months or once a year, and then they tell you. Time to replace the muffler.
That’s how it will be with his heart. I want to say that I’ve put all worry and anxiety behind me, but …
Kelly Jo Wilson: Not for mama
Laurie Christine: For the most part, that is true. We’re not living daily in the reality of his heart condition.
We continue to trust God through the anxiety.
A couple of times a year, when we go to the cardiologist, I am a little nervous. I think, this is when they say you need to head up to Boston again. Or something is not going right, so you need to check this out.
There’s always that underlying little bit of anxiety. But we continue to trust God, that he’s good, in control, and that He loves Elliot. He is working in Elliot’s heart. His physical heart and his spiritual heart as well. We continue to trust God with him.
Kelly Jo Wilson: That’s wonderful. That is such a good picture of the journey itself. I mean, it’s never the one thing, like you said, and it’s been seven years since his last surgery, but every six months, every three months, it’s always a reminder.
I can imagine how in that time it’s like, here we go, God, I need you to do it again.
But I love that you guys are so faithful. I think it’s so important and so sweet that you said the peace that passes. That’s how I’m going to remember that going forward, is the peace that passes.
It’s interesting that you say it was an overwhelming peace. I’ve heard other people in different situations talk about that too. I’ve actually experienced it myself, for a heart issue for my son who just turned one.
Jesus shows up.
Just a quick little story.
We went in, and they did the ultrasound at the five-month mark when they check the anatomy. We had about six different people trying to find the large vessels in his heart. By the second group of people, I was looking at my husband like this is not good.
It took a long time to find, and they didn’t see the major vessels in his heart. So they thought maybe he didn’t have them. They weren’t able to visualize it correctly.
You were much more graceful in what you shared about how you guys were in those moments.
At that moment, I was like, “Jesus help us!” Literally screaming out of my soul. I can tell you that minutes later, he showed up because the doctor suddenly said, “oh, I see them. I see them. It’s okay.”
It was very intense. But, it is interesting, the overwhelming peace. It’s how it is when you live through that, and hard to describe in words sometimes.
Being your friend, I love that you guys could experience that, and it didn’t have to be an overwhelming peace with a different decision that God had made with Elliott’s life.
I just love that he’s doing well now and that you guys are taking the journey each step at a time.
There was one thing that I wanted to point out from your podcast episode. I thought it was so wonderful, and I was hoping you could share it with the listeners.
Everybody always says in times like this, very challenging times where you have to trust God, that God doesn’t give you more than you can handle. I love what you said about that. Would you mind sharing that? What your take on that is?
God does give you more than you can handle.
Laurie Christine: Sure. You hear all the time that God won’t give you more than you can handle. But I don’t believe that’s true. I think that God definitely gives us more than we can handle.
I actually have a scripture verse to back it up.
Many times people quote the verse in first Corinthians 10:13, which says, “no temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful. He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear.”
I think many people take that out of context and say, well, this applies to any situation I might be struggling with.
But that verse is specifically talking about temptation. So I think when we are tempted to sin, God gives us a way out. He does give you an option. You don’t have to give in to that temptation, but this verse does not apply to other challenges, struggles, or trials.
Because God definitely gives us more than we can handle. Anyone who’s gone through something like this says, “I can’t handle this. This is too much.”
We aren’t equipped, that’s why we need God’s peace and strength.
When someone tries to tell you, “God knows that you, he chose you to go through this because he knew you could handle it, or he knew that your character was really strong.”
Anyone on the other end of that conversation is like, no way. I know that that’s not true of me. I know that my character is flawed, and my character was not anything special that God chose me to go through this.
There’s a verse in 2 Corinthians chapter one, and it was Paul writing to the Corinthians about a trial he was going through. He said that “we were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure,” far beyond their ability to endure so that “we despaired of life itself,” they wanted to die.
This was such a difficult situation that they were going through, and he said we felt that we had received the sentence of death.
I know some of you listening may have gone through situations where you have gotten news of a diagnosis or a tragedy, and that’s what it feels like. Your despairing of life. You feel you’ve received a death sentence beyond your ability to endure.
But the next verse says, “but this happened that we might not rely on ourselves, but on God.”
We might not rely on ourselves but on God. I absolutely think that God gives us more than we can handle, but his goal is to cry out to him and rely on him, and we come to a point in our life where we realize that we can’t do it.
We need God’s peace.
We can’t handle this situation on our own or do it in our own strength. His strength is what we need.
We need God’s peace, joy, and love.
That’s what we experienced going through the situation with our son Elliot. I called out to God, saying, “God, we can’t go through this on our own we need you.We desperately need you to walk through this with us, to be right beside us, to give us the strength, to give us peace.”
We definitely saw God’s faithfulness through the situation and God being faithful to give us his peace.
We saw God being faithful to give us his joy, and I hesitate to say that God was faithful in healing our son because no matter what the outcome had been, God is still faithful.
You know, we are very thankful. We’re incredibly grateful that God chose to heal our son. He chose to give us the outcome we had been praying for, but God would still be faithful. Even if that had turned out very differently.
Kelly Jo Wilson: For sure. I love that you highlighted that and shared the scripture too. I can’t wait to put that in the show notes so everybody can go right to that scripture and say, yes, he does give us more than we can handle to rely on him because, in our weakness, he is strong.
With God’s peace and compassion, we comfort one another.
Laurie Christine: I’ll just point out real quick right before that verse, and if you’re, if you’re wanting to dive into 2 Corinthians chapter one, it says God is the father of compassion and the God of all comfort. I love that verse that promises God gives us comfort.
“He comforts us in all our troubles and has compassion on us.” It says, “so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.”
I see how we went through this really difficult situation. Still, now here seven years later, I am here talking with Kelly. I can share God’s goodness and faithfulness, able to offer comfort to other people because God has comforted us.
I just wanted to encourage you all with that.
Kelly Jo Wilson: That is a huge encouragement. Thank you so much, Laurie. You’re so right, absolutely. That’s the purpose of this podcast: to comfort one another with how God has comforted us in the challenges we’ve gone through and how it builds your faith and relationship with him.
I appreciate you sharing, especially about your baby boy. I’m so happy that he’s doing well now.
Really quick just to wrap up. If another mother is listening today and struggling with a similar situation in her child, what takeaway would you want her to remember from this episode?
What is the one thing that you would give to encourage her?
God is with you, even when it’s really hard.
Laurie Christine: Just remember that God is with you in your struggle. It doesn’t mean the struggle or the situation will go away, but that God will walk with you every step.
I would encourage you to be in the scriptures, to be in God’s word. That’s how God communicates to our hearts, through his spirit to our hearts. Through his word. That was lifesaving for me when I was going through the situation with Elliot.
Clinging to those promises of God and to the scriptures, reading them over and over again, memorizing them, meditating on them, and just claiming those promises to be true.
Even when the situation around me felt really, really hard.
Resources for you
Kelly Jo Wilson: That’s beautiful, Laurie. Thank you so much. I’m sure that’s a huge encouragement. I will definitely share the verses Laurie has shared with us today in the show notes to give anyone listening to that encouragement. You can pick specific scriptures to help you along the journey as well.
Laurie, we can find you on your website, but I also wanted to just talk about your website. You have so many wonderful resources to share with moms with different focuses.
Is there one of them to share with the audience today or just to talk about? I can put a link to it in the show notes.
Laurie Christine: Sure. Like Kelly said, I have a lot of free resources on my website.
The one I’m most excited about is a recent book I wrote that is available for free.
It’s a free download on my website right now, especially for boys. So if you’re a mom of boys, I’d love for you to go check out my podcast, Redeeming the Chaos.
Kelly Jo Wilson: It’s great. Check it out.
A special book for your son
Laurie Christine: Also, if you have boys between the ages of 8 to 13-ish, I have a devotional book specifically for boys, and it’s called Rise of the Enemy, and it’s the first book in my Dragon Slayer Bible series.
It’s an action-packed adventure that’s a retelling of a Bible story. There’s a devotional and a short Bible study. The whole theme of this first book is spiritual warfare. Putting on the armor of God and teaching our boys how to defend their hearts against the lies of the evil dragon.
Right now, it’s a free download on my website. You can get it for free, but later this year, I’m hoping it will be available in print for you to purchase.
If you want a free copy now, head over to my website, and you can download it at www.dragonslayerbible.com.
Kelly Jo Wilson: Wonderful. It looks like a very exciting book! I cannot wait to download it and read it with Jake. It looks fantastic.
Thank you so much, Laurie.
I appreciate you talking about your journey through Elliott’s heart condition and your faithfulness, and the grace God has shown you and your family with us today. I’m sure that it’s going to be encouraging to a lot of people. So thank you so, so much.
Laurie Christine: Well, thank you for having me on the show, Kelly. It’s been really great chatting with you, and I appreciate being here.
We have a great show today about trusting God through challenges. Our guest Laurie Christine had to rely on God’s will for her firstborn son through a difficult diagnosis.
Laurie Christine is an author, podcast host, certified biblical parenting coach, wife, and mom of four wild, loud, adventurous boys. Her podcast, Redeeming The Chaos, invites moms of boys to join her in the wild, wonderful adventure of raising courageous boys and connecting them with Christ.
Kelly Jo Wilson: Laurie, thank you so much for coming. I’m so happy to talk to you.
Laurie Christine: Hey Kelly, I am so happy to be here. This is so fun.
Kelly Jo Wilson: Yes, absolutely. Laurie and I are in a mastermind group together to help grow in our writing, influence among other people, and foster the call that God has given us. So, I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Laurie for a couple years now, and I am so happy to have you on here.
Laurie Christine: Thanks so much. Yeah. Three years. We’re coming up on three years here.
Kelly Jo Wilson: Three years. It’s so crazy! Laurie has a very interesting story that I just wanted to expand on a little bit. Laurie, your podcast tries to reach moms of boys, and I am one of your target people with two crazy boys. But before we get into a little bit of the story that you shared on your podcast, why don’t you just tell the audience, tell the listeners a little bit about yourself, your family, where you’re from and just a little bit more about you.
Part 1 of the interview with Laurie Christine
Laurie Christine: I am from Pennsylvania along with Kelly, and I am a mom of four boys and a wife. My boys are ages 6 to 12. We’re right in the middle of raising our kids. We’re out of the baby stage, the toddler stage, and I almost have a teenager, so that’s getting a little, I’m getting a little nervous about that.
Kelly Jo Wilson: A little nerve-wracking with that age for sure. But what a great range of ages. How fun is that? Right now as we record this it’s right before Christmas, so that probably looks really fun in your house.
Laurie Christine: It gets a little wild and crazy. They’re very excited. Lots of energy in our house.
Kelly Jo Wilson: I’m sure. It’s probably just wonderful. I wanted to expand a little bit on what you shared in your podcast episode about what happened with Elliot, your oldest son, and his journey through his heart condition.
The initial diagnosis shocked everyone.
A lot of our listeners really struggle with trusting God and facing different challenges that are very difficult. We do have a lot of moms that also listen. If you don’t mind, why don’t you tell us about that journey with Elliot whenever he was very young and expand to let the listeners know about your journey through that too?
Laurie Christine: Our oldest son, who is now 12, was born with a congenital heart defect, and we were not aware of it at the time he was born. We found out when he was about three months old. Then we took him to the cardiologist and found out that he was in congestive heart failure, and you know, that’s not the news you wanna hear about your three-month-old little boy.
That’s something that you hear about older people. Congestive heart failure, isn’t that an older person’s disease or ailment? We were told that he would need heart surgery within a month.
When he was four months old, he had his first heart surgery. We didn’t know at the time, but he would end up, over the next two and a half to three years, having four heart surgeries to fix the problem in his heart.
It was a scary time. We didn’t know what to expect, but looking back, we saw God’s grace through all of it. I think one of the ways that we saw God’s kindness and His grace in our lives was that we didn’t know everything that was gonna happen. we didn’t know, we couldn’t see the whole picture. We only knew that he had this heart defect and he would need one heart surgery.
The easy fix turned into a rare condition.
The cardiologist said, “oh, you know, it’s not that big of a deal. You know, this will be an easy fix. Now, look up this one thing.” We went home and Googled it and it was a rare heart condition. I said, wait a minute. He didn’t say anything about it being rare. What’s going on?
It just seemed we learned a little bit more with each step of the journey. We could see God gave us grace for that next step. We just saw God’s kindness in that.
He had his first heart surgery. We found out during the surgery that the condition was a little bit worse than they had originally thought. They couldn’t perform the procedure they thought they could.
They did a palliative procedure to hold him over until he was a little older. We were disappointed they couldn’t fix his heart then but thought it’ll just be one more, and then they’ll be able to fix it.
“This is the last one.”
During the next surgery, we thought it was the last thing that’s gonna have to have to happen. This is the last one.
In the second surgery, they went in to do the repair, and we found out it’s actually way worse than we thought.
They told us, “you’re gonna have to have two more surgeries.”
God gives grace one moment at a time.
Looking back, I think if we knew, here’s what you’re gonna have to go through, that this is serious, and he’s going to have four heart surgeries before he turns five. I think that would’ve been so overwhelming.
Kelly Jo Wilson: Oh yeah.
Laurie Christine: But just knowing one step, then the next step, like, “okay, what do we need today? What do we need to do next?” I think it was God giving us His grace one moment at a time.
Kelly Jo Wilson: I think that’s such a good thing to touch on because, you know, at the moment, it probably didn’t seem like that at first. Because you have that fear. As a nurse, I’ve seen many patients and families handle terrifying news and diagnoses.
But like you said if you knew everything at once? It’s so overwhelming already, just one element of it. Especially you being a new mom, and your son is being diagnosed with anything, any type of condition is very scary. But I think once you realize that it’s a journey, you have a different perspective. Initially, that is something God does share in His grace. He shares that preparation for each step, which I think is such a great way to look at it.
But at the time, were you feeling anxious? What were you going through at the time, initially in that office when they were telling you?
Trusting God through fear and anxiety
Laurie Christine: Yeah, there were definitely times of fearfulness and anxiety. But also times of just overwhelming peace too. In situations where I would’ve thought I would be so upset or worked up, I could feel God’s peace in my heart, helping me to think rationally and take the next step.
But yes, for sure, there were definitely a lot of times when we didn’t know. We didn’t know what the outcome of the surgeries would be. We didn’t know what his long-term prognosis would be. There were a lot of times that I was fearful and anxious.
I tend to be an anxious person in general. Situations like this kinda escalate those feelings of anxiety.
Do not fear, for I am with you.
But during those times, I really just clung to God’s promises in scripture. Throughout the Bible, there are so many times where God says don’t fear.
Do not fear, do not worry. I went through and did a word search in a Bible app. I just looked up all the passages and verses when God says, do not fear or do not worry. There’s a whole bunch, but I came up with maybe 8 or 10, and I printed them out on card stock. I carried those around with me for those years.
I just had this pile of Bible verses and would read them, meditate on them, and just focus on those promises God had made.
One in particular that I loved was Isaiah 41:10, which said,
“Do not fear for I am with you. Do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”
So many times and in many verses, I found the reason to not be afraid. God wasn’t saying, don’t fear because nothing bad is ever gonna happen. Or don’t be afraid because everything’s gonna be totally fine.
That wasn’t the promise. The promise was, do not fear because I am with you.
Laurie Christine: God’s presence, the reminder of God’s presence, and clinging to that promise of God’s presence was something that just helped to get me through those periods of fear and anxiety.
Cling to God’s promises.
Kelly Jo Wilson: That is so wonderful. It’s so reassuring. I think it’s so great that you printed out the scripture that you’re like, no matter what, he’s coming with me in my purse.
But I think it’s a really important point to make sure that we hold His promises close. That’s what’s so great about having His word at our fingertips. In free Bible apps and things like that, we can go right to the source and remember what He tells us.
But you also pointed out how He says, don’t fear because I’m with you. That comfort He gives you to know you’re not alone is so profound. It’s just so amazing. I’m so happy you felt that in those moments. I think that’s important.
How was it between you and your husband? Were you two handling things? I would imagine handling as a unit, but sometimes things like that happen, and it’s almost like a grieving process. Because you’re trying to handle what’s coming at you, and both of you are probably taking things in a little bit differently.
So how did you two walk together on that path? Was that a challenge in itself, or did you guys have a connection?
Complete surrender of our son in God’s hands.
Laurie Christine: I felt like we were on the same page. I feel it probably brought us closer together during that time.
We had to trust God and put our son in God’s hands, praying for him and our families surrounded us with support.
I wouldn’t say that it caused extra stress between my husband, and I think that it was something God probably used during that time to help us. Connect in a common cause almost. A lot of times, there’s conflict. If there’s conflict in your life, or in a marriage, many times it’s between the two of you. The conflict gets between you.
But when the conflict is outside of you, and a difficult thing to go through that was outside us, we were going through it together. I felt that was helpful.
But, just talking about trusting God, I think my faith was challenged.
I really had to wrestle with, do I trust God?
It was strengthened but challenged at the same time. I really had to wrestle with, do I trust God?
Do I trust that he is good?
Do I trust his character and that he wants what’s best?
I never doubted his power, which was interesting. I never doubted God’s power because I knew that God was powerful, and I knew he could heal my son.
He had the ability to work through the surgeons and allow everything to work out how we were hoping. But I didn’t know if that was his will. I didn’t know if he would allow something more tragic to happen so that we would be drawn closer to him.
God works in mysterious ways. I sometimes found myself trusting in the surgeons more than in God. I thought the surgeons had my son’s best interest in mind and they want to heal my son. They want to fix his heart.
But I didn’t know if they could. I didn’t know if they had the power. I knew that the surgeons would fix Elliot’s heart if they could.
Trust God could, but unsure if He would.
But on the other hand, I knew that God could do it if he were willing and would do it. I just had to trust in God’s character, you know?
In the Bible, through scripture, what is God’s character? God is loving. God is good. Even if this doesn’t feel like a good thing in our lives.
Even if this doesn’t feel like a loving thing for God to do, I know that this is true of him, and I’m gonna continue to trust that it’s true no matter what the outcome.
Kelly Jo Wilson: That is so hard to do. Because if you look at anybody in a situation like that, similar, you could say, Yes. I love how you said, I know God could if he would, and that’s the thing. We know God can, but you trusting him isn’t if he can fix him. It’s trusting him if he’s going to fix it or not.
So I can see where you could say, I know the surgeons really want to heal him, but if God doesn’t, I need to trust that he is taking us through a different journey here.
We didn’t choose it, but He gave us grace for it.
That is so hard, especially as a new mother. I’m sure you had plenty of people saying, I don’t know if I could go through that. Because when it’s yourself versus your son, it’s so different, right?
I mean, it’s just so different. You would probably die for your son, you know? So it’s just a different kind of thing. It definitely takes you through a different trust journey there.
Laurie Christine: It’s interesting that you said about people’s comments, “how do you handle a situation like that? How could you have? I could never go through something like that.” We had people say that to us, and I just had to chuckle a little bit cause it’s not like we chose this.
I don’t feel God chose us to go through this because we had any special abilities or special qualities. God gives you the grace to go through what he gives you, what he puts in your life. He gives you grace when it’s needed. People would be like, “oh, I could never handle that situation.”
It’s when you’re forced to handle it, then you do.
Trust God’s grace for today.
God doesn’t give you grace for the things that might happen, or the things that you’re worried about might happen. He gives you the grace for today. He gives you grace for what is happening right now. So you take the next step, and continue to trust him.
We were thankful for God’s faithfulness in being who he is and who he said he is. His character, his goodness, and his lovingness.
Kelly Jo Wilson: Absolutely. I think it’s so important to really focus on his word and what he tells you. Because it’s so easy, like you said how you felt anxious and fearful, to listen to everything else, such as people close to you who generally have good intentions.
It’s easy to get distracted by your feelings and your emotions in situations like that, especially with your baby boy. But it’s just like you carried the promise cards around. I love that so much. I think it’s so strong.
Even when you probably felt weaker than you ever felt in your whole life.
What ended up being the outcome? You guys realized pretty early that this wasn’t gonna be a one-time thing. That this was a journey. What was the outcome of Elliot’s journey? How is he doing now?
A blessing emerged.
Laurie Christine: That’s a great question. So after his first two surgeries, we ended up getting a second opinion from a different cardiologist who sent us to a different Children’s Hospital in Boston.
We went to Boston Children’s Hospital, the best in the world for pediatric cardiology. We were so thankful that God brought her into the situation, and we connected with her because, in Boston, they were able to repair his heart.
They were able to make the repair that the other hospital couldn’t. And so, after his third surgery, Elliot was two. Anatomically it looks very different, but it’s functioning properly.
Trusting God through the unexpected
His fourth surgery was actually very unexpected. That was when he was five we had another opportunity to trust God. We thought this was behind us. We thought that we were moving along.
When he was five, one of the valves in his heart which had been replaced during the previous surgery, failed.
He needed a valve replaced. We went to Boston again. I know Kelly, you know all about cath labs, but for those of you listening who have no medical experience, basically, they were going to go in through an artery with this long tube and put a valve into his heart and not even have to cut open his chest at all.
That was the plan.
They did the heart catheterization and put the new valve in during that procedure. But he developed an aneurysm on his pulmonary artery.
An aneurysm is basically a bulge, like a weakness in the artery. It got bumped or knicked, and this big bubble was a weak spot. It’s a pretty dangerous situation.
There were a couple of days he was under general anesthesia and intubated, so for two days, we waited to see if it would resolve itself. He was in a very fragile state.
Then the surgeon came in and told us we would have to operate again. We’ll have to go in and do a fourth open heart surgery to repair what had just happened.
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