Six Years

Today marks six years since that horrible tragic day that changed my life and wounded my heart and my family. Much has changed since then. I have grown personally, and pieced my life back together and moved forward. But the fact that I miss my brother terribly has not changed.

Several things come to mind this day as I reflect on the past year, and the past six years. June 19^th again falls on a Thursday. June 19^th 2008 was a Thursday, and for weeks, maybe even months after we lost Steve and Matt, I started to feel a bit down every Wednesday evening through Thursday. This is the first time the anniversary of our loss falls on a Thursday again. Maybe that’s why it hit me so hard this morning when I remembered what day it was. Not that I didn't know yesterday, and all month it was coming, but it still didn't hit me right when I woke up. I think that's probably a good thing.

A bit of wonderful news is that my husband and I will be welcoming a daughter to the world in a couple months! I am seven months pregnant and have every reason to rejoice in the new life and addition to our family! My parents are getting their first grandchild and I am becoming a mother! I relish the experience and couldn't be happier to be a Mom. With all this happiness however, the fact is not lost on me that she has already been robbed. She has been robbed of the opportunity to grow up knowing her Uncle Steve. Steve loved and wanted children, and I always thought that my parent’s first grandchild would be from him, even though deep down I think I always knew it wouldn't. He deserved children, and he deserved to see his nieces and nephews grow up. Little Anabelle deserves the opportunity to know her whole family, and although she will hear about her Uncle Steve, it bothers me she has already been robbed of the opportunity to know him. The crime that occurred six years ago today has robbed many people of precious memories that were never made. I can’t even begin to list them all, but right now I am majorly affected by that of the little life that is currently within me.

As I remember Steve and Matt the first thing that comes to mind is their smiles. I remember the little grins they would get when they were enjoying themselves and messing with each other. I remember their obsession with calling each other “bro” and how funny they got with it at times. I remember the little looks Steve would get on his face that communicated so much more than words! I truly miss the unspoken communication we had, and his ability to tell how much he cared for me, Mike, our parents, and the rest of our family with a simple expression, smile, or the tone in his voice! I could easily write pages of memories, but I have done that in previous years and quite frankly, it is draining. I just went back and looked at what I wrote on my blog a year ago, and am not sure I can do it again today.

So I will continue with this. Last year I quoted Psalm 23, and talked about how it takes on new meaning when you actually pass through the valley of the shadow of death. I also closed with Psalm 30:5b “…weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning” These verses still comfort me, and I hold to their truths, looking forward to the day promised in Revelation 21:4 when we will have a new heaven and a new earth.

“And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.”

However, another passage stood out to me about a month ago as I was reading one of my study Bibles. Psalm 109 is one of the “imprecatory” psalms. As described in The Defender’s Study Bible (Dr. Henry M. Morris 1995) in the notes on Psalm 5, an imprecation is a passage “wherin God-fearing men actually pray for God to torture and destroy their enemies.” He goes on to explain that although this may seem “alien to the spirit of Matthew 5:44” (Love your enemies), the distinction “is to be made between our personal enemies and the enemies of God.”

I have come to realize over the years, and watching too many times the interviews of my brother’s killers (including those shown in court where you see the true nature of both murderers), that they were not personally out to hurt me, or my family, or even Steve and Matt. They were so depraved as to not even really care about the effect of what they did on other people, but their bloodthirsty desire to strike out against the Image of God and kill whoever they felt they could get to shows them to be enemies of God. They had no personal motive or vendetta against the boys, merely a desire to take life and to steal. 

After years of not even wanting to consider forgiveness, I realize I may someday be able to forgive the crime committed against me and my family. Not because I feel like they deserve it, but because I know that: a) Steve and Matt are in Heaven rejoicing with our Savior even now and probably would be very upset with me if I somehow managed to wish them back to this earth, b) the crime was really committed against God, not us, and c) forgiveness is for my benefit, not theirs. It is the crime against God that deserves to be punished and avenged, and it is the crime against God that should instill a righteous anger. Vengeance is the Lord’s and He has only charged us with arranging the meeting (Genesis 9:6, a part of the Noahic Covenant never withdrawn). I won’t quote all of Psalm 109 (although I encourage reading it), but verses 15-20 are some verses that spoke to me particularly:

“Let them be before the Lord continually, that He may cut off the memory of them from the earth.

Because that he remembered not to shew mercy, but persecuted the poor and needy man, that he might even slay the broken in heart.

As he loved cursing, so let it come unto him: as he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him.

As he clothed himself with cursing like as with his garment, so let it come into his bowels like water, and like oil into his bones.

Let it be unto him as the garment which covereth him, and for a girdle wherewith he is girdled continually.

Let this be the reward of mine adversaries from the Lord, and of them that speak evil against my soul.”

I will close with a word of encouragement from Paul in 1 Thess. 4:13-14.

“But I would not have you be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.

For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.”

I am not as one who has no hope. I know that Steve and Matt are in heaven, along with many others whose loss I have grieved over the years. I still feel the pain of separation from my dear brother, but I rejoice in the fact that I know I will see him again one day when I myself am allowed into the presence of the Holy One.

I went with an old picture this year because we looked so happy!