In preparation for Ethan’s party on Sunday, I can’t help but take time to reflect on how God has brought us to this day.
On June 15, 1983, Maggie Kathryn Lasley, daughter of Kevin and Kathy, was born in Fayetteville, Arkansas. She was Emily, Scott and I’s big sister, the oldest of us Lasley kids. To briefly describe her, she was the pillar of the four of us – the one who, growing up, could always be counted on to show us how to follow Jesus. She definitely wasn’t perfect (as her brother, I feel it’s my duty to point this out… :) ), but growing up, I knew Who she loved and was living for.
Where to go from here? Years passed. We all were doing our own thing. She had gone to Argentina as an exchange student, returned for school at U of I Champaign/Urbana, and had then returned to Argentina to teach English. She had been doing this for a while.
Then, in November of 2006, Maggie was diagnosed with Lymphoma (a form of cancer).
I don’t want to try to sell the next part of the story short, nor do I want to be too exaggerated. Forgive me if I end up on one extreme or the other. Can I just say that the next year was horrible, hellish. Maggie kept trying treatments for the chemo. It seemed like the cancer would be responding and we would all get excited. Then, the next thing we knew, she would take a turn for the worse again. I can’t describe the constant emotional roller coaster this was. My sister was suffering right before our eyes and there was nothing to do about it except pray for her, make sure she was comfortable and hang out with her. Our prayers kept being answered for certain things (like provision for hospital costs…which was a ridiculously crazy miracle), but not the big one we obviously wanted.
I don’t know what else to say.
When I was student teaching in the fall, Maggie began to die. I had to leave Lanphier in a rush and head to Minnesota with my then fiancé Lindsey. We thankfully got to spend a few good days with her before she died on Monday, October 29, 2007.
We were obviously reeling from this. Unfortunately, Satan is such an awful being and I hate that this wasn’t the end. Following my sister’s death, others we loved died as well, and in relatively quick succession. The world seemed to be falling in around us. It was capped off by my grandmother’s illness, recovery, and then unexpected death, 3 months after Maggie died.
In the midst of this, God, for whatever reason, decided to bring Linds and I together and we ended up getting married smack dab in the middle of it all – December 29, 2007. This fact was a bright spot for our family in the midst of the junk. I have no idea why it would happen this way…but regardless, it was a welcome joy amidst the pain.
2 years passed and we all worked as best we could at grieving well.
Linds and I began talking about kids. We didn’t have any serious expectation of children entering our family soon. Lindsey’s family history was such that childbearing would probably be challenging so we figured we should start trying soon, but kept praying and waiting for the go-ahead.
Summer of 2009, we were on a mission trip to Kenya, Africa. Everything had been packed, including the essentials for baby-prevention (pills, to be exact). When we arrived in Kenya, the pills were nowhere to be found. It’s important to point out that this a rather normal circumstance to experience in Africa. Stuff is often stolen out of travelers’ luggage. What was odd was that nothing else, including the many more expensive and accessible items in the bag, was taken. We were weirded out by this enough that we took it as a sign from God and started trying to start a family.
2 months later, to our surprise, Lindsey was pregnant. I started asking God through lots of tears and in fear of all the death and suffering we had seen, to keep Lindsey and the baby healthy, protected from all of those terrible things.
The pregnancy was smooth. There was one pretty big scare midway through, but everything turned out to be fine. The delivery was quick, natural, and awesome(ok maybe it was a little disturbing to watch…but everything was definitely smooth). We left our house at 12:00 a.m. and Ethan was born, healthy as can be at 3:24 a.m. on June 15, Maggie’s birthday. This was one week earlier than we expected him to arrive.
We don’t claim to understand why or how all this happened, but there is a reason Lindsey and I always refer to our son as a gift and why we want Sunday, and the following Wednesday on his actual birthday, to be a celebration of epic proportions.
Ethan’s currently standing next to me, staring at the laptop and saying “dadadadada”. His story and his presence has been a much needed reminder that even though there is a bunch of garbage going on in the world, there is certainly a power at work, bringing healing and restoration to hellish, broken situations. We’re convinced it’s Jesus behind all of this.
