(Friends, Thank you so much for your loving prayers, emails, messages, letters and phone calls concerning our miscarriage. We are just trying to survive right now, leaning into each other and into Jesus, taking one day at a time. We are desperately sad. I will write more about it next week. In the meantime, here is a post about a daughter who lost her father, which I wrote before I lost our child. Love you. e.)
Dear daughter of a man recently murdered,
You are two years old.
You know lollipops and Cabbage Patch and My Little Pony. You know bare feet and summer dresses, ABC’s and 123s, Curious George and Dora the Explorer.
You know the arms of a mother, Sharlene, who is holding it together because you are beautiful, she says, and because she wants you to know how much your Daddy loves you.
And you know the loss of the most important man in your life. Your father. Tim Bosma.
You lost him on my father’s birthday. May 6th.
You lost him when he innocently took two men for a test drive of his truck which he’d advertised as for sale in the Hamilton, Ontario community.
He told your mommy that he would be back soon, and your mommy tried to stay calm when he wasn’t. She called the police and she kept praying, sobbing and praying, and you hear her talk about God and love a lot. She and your Daddy pray with you at bedtime and you go to church–the Christian Reformed Church in Ancaster–every Sunday.
And then the police found your daddy’s body on May 14th.
He was killed by one of the men in the truck, and a second car was involved, and all you know is, your mommy’s trying not to cry and Daddy still hasn’t come home to say your bedtime prayers with you.
He built the house you live in. When he smiles, it’s like it’s morning even if you’ve just had your bath and are ready for bed because he loves you that much. He’s very handsome with blond hair and blue eyes and everyone loves him. Everyone wants to talk to him at church and you sit there in his arms so proud of him.
And now your mommy is holding you and everyone is talking a lot about this man named Tim and there are so many flowers and Kleenexes. And you just want to go home so you can build a fort with your stuffed animals.
Because they won’t leave you.
And you don’t know how to pray without him. But somehow, your mommy does. And when she talks about God it’s with the same light in her eyes as when she talks about Daddy. And she uses the word Love when she talks about both.
I don’t know you, little girl who lives miles away and who has suffered a loss no child should ever know, but I do know, you have a father who will never leave you. A heavenly father, the one your mommy talks about. The one who made you in your mommy’s tummy. The one who made your daddy’s face light up whenever he saw you.
That’s how God the father feels when he looks at you, sweetie. The heavens light up, and he can’t stop adoring you, because he made you and the Bible says he sings over you, but he’s crying with you. Because there is no one who can replace your Daddy. There is no sermon that can make it right. There is no prayer that will automatically fix the hurt.
But there are your mother’s arms. There is the church that has not stopped filling your fridge and your home with cards and casseroles. There are the memories of your Daddy throwing you up in his arms and kissing you on the cheek and saying you are his. And you will always be his.
One day you will understand that we are composed of both body and soul. And the soul part of your Daddy lives on, in a new body, in a world where Mommys never cry and Daddys never die. And he’s there,waiting for you, sweet girl, to join him, waiting to chase you and catch you and snuggle you and rub his cheek against yours. Waiting to take you by the hand, and your mommy with the other, and lead you down the path to the throne room where your Heavenly Father sits, and together you’ll sit on God’s lap and he’ll hold you. All three of you.
And he’ll never let you go, daughter of the King.
Never.
With prayers from across the provinces, on this Father’s Day, and always.
Emily.