TIM E HOLDER

My mom was in the hospital in Searcy for an entire month. All us siblings joined together to make sure she was comfortable and that she knew at least one of us would always be there with her. She has congestive heart failure, which is being handled with medications. She was having a really tough time breathing. It was so dramatic that she could barely put three words together without having to pause to breathe. If she walked 10 feet to the hospital bathroom, she was completely out of breath and dizzy when I helped her back into bed. She would close her eyes and take shallow breaths until she felt a little better.

When she ate, or drank anything, some of it was going down her wind pipe into her lungs because the flap that was supposed to close to keep that from happening wasn’t functioning properly. She was having to drink everything mixed with thickener, so it was like drinking a soft gel. We secretly discovered that she preferred Dr. Pepper with thickener.  Or a Route 44 thickened sweet tea from Sonic.

She was also diagnosed with atypical pneumonia, which is more like bad, bad bronchitis. It was discovered that her aortic valve was not working properly. So the doctors were trying to make her strong enough to have heart surgery. The doctor finally told us his plan wasn’t working and he was sending her to Little Rock for surgery.

We were scared.

We didn’t know if we were walking with mom through her final journey before she went home. All of us kids talked about final earthly things and preparing ourselves for what the immediate future might look like.

Mom, of course, loved having us there. She would brag on us to all the nurses and doctors. Even though she struggled to breathe and get words out. And they, in their own hurried kindness, would listen to her and encourage her.

One night, I was sitting beside her on her bed, rubbing her arm and holding her hand. She smiled at me and looked away for a minute. Then she turned back to me, and with a serious, searching look in her eyes, said, “You know, the older you get, the more you look back at your life and realize that you didn’t always make the best choices for your kids. Sometimes, you wish you handled things differently.”  I smiled at her and brushed back her hair and leaned down and kissed her on her forehead. And I squeezed her hand.

“Well, Mom, there are no perfect parents. And there are no perfect kids. All of your kids love Jesus. All of them are involved in the church. The ones who have kids have raised them the same way. None of us are drug users or alcoholics. None of us have ever gone to jail. Except that one time, after a late-night play rehearsal in downtown Nashville, when I ran a red light and the officer sitting at the opposing green light pulled me over and discovered my tags were expired and I already owned a ticket for that and he hauled me into the slammer for a couple of hours until a friend bailed me out. In spite of our flaws and eccentricities and drama and a cornucopia of minor dysfunctions, you did a pretty good job. Actually,I think you did a really good job.” Her sweet eyes glistened as she reached up and put her hand against my cheek and whispered, “I never regretted any of my babies.”

The doctors worked hard to get mom strong enough to have a special procedure called TAVR or Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement. I felt strong unease and anxiousness, not knowing if this was right for her or not. Then Christina, the TAVR coordinator came in and very meticulously explained the strength building and tests that would be administered to get her as prepared as possible to be a candidate for this procedure. She gave me several brochures to read, obviously with pictures, so I could understand better. I devoured every page. TAVR is much less invasive than open heart surgeries. Instead of having to crack her sternum, they go in with a tube through the groin and knock the old valve out of the way and place the new one in its place. It expands outward and takes over the space and the work. I also heard from several friends who either experienced this same procedure or their family members were walking around with this little miracle device that looks a LOT like a crown. The recovery time is greatly reduced. And with most cases, dramatically noticeable improvement is almost immediate.

The amazing thing that was absolutely NOT lost on me, was how calm I was after reading the info and talking to other people. Peace replaced fear. It was knowledge and understanding the procedure instead of the insecurity and mystery of not knowing that dispelled apprehension and worry. We stood around her bed, all her babies and a couple of nurses and prayed. Mom was wheeled into the surgery room and we waited. Dr. Glover came out after 2 hours and told us the procedure was successful. We went to her room when we were allowed and hugged her and told her we loved her and “go to sleep.” She did.

The next morning, when I walked in her room, she would NOT shut up. She was talking non-stop and her face was pink and precious. Her words were coherent and she spoke in complete sentences without stopping every few seconds to breathe. It’s amazing how good you feel when blood is actually flowing through your body. I said, “Mom, do you hear yourself?” She stopped talking just long enough to smile and then said, “Yeah.” And then continued on her verbal torrent about how she was tired of some form of carrots on every food tray.

It was a miracle. She’s back in rehab in Searcy for a couple of weeks and then will hopefully get to go back to her assisted living home where all her friends are waiting for her to come in sipping on her unthickened  Sonic Route 44 sweet tea and jump into an aggressively vicious game of Bingo.

When I was a child, we didn’t talk much about heaven. I remember the verse most often connected to this absence of seeking out scripture about our future home was 2 Corinthinas 12 where Paul said he knew a man who was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things that no one is permitted to tell us. And since no one was permitted to tell us, apparently, we all assumed we weren’t supposed to talk about it at all. It wasn’t until I was much older that I began to wonder why nothing ever completely brought me complete joy, total happiness or a sense of any project being perfectly finished.

When my thoughts turned toward heaven, I couldn’t feel excited about being a disembodied spirit in a place that could very likely become fairly boring after a while. Even with Jesus there.

So, I began a journey to try to discover if there was more that I was missing. And guess what. There was. I found a book that has become like my second Bible called Heaven, by Randy Alcorn. I read it and have just started reading it again. I have never looked at this life and planet the same sense then.

Again, it’s about knowledge. Not knowing, or even thinking I should believe I have a right to search out information about heaven, left me unnerved about what I should reasonably expect about my forever home. Gaining knowledge, again, has made all the difference.

We will not be strumming harps all day. The extraordinary, magnificent reason no earthly experience has ever felt complete or completely satisfied me is because God has put eternity in my heart. The knowledge of heaven has changed how I live my life. Our future home is vibrant, and bright with colors we can’t even imagine. We have real bodies and real jobs, jobs that we were originally created to do. It is rich and full with the presence of God, the creator of the universe. We enjoy perfect relationships with each other and close, face to face, laying in the grass, looking at stars, conversations with Jesus. “We eat, drink, work, play, travel, worship, and discover a New Earth as God always meant it to be. We will see God and fully realize He is the one we have longed for all along. In His presence, all the dreams that seemed to constantly diminish here on earth, will forever expand.” I love how Alcorn puts it. “We, on this dying Earth can relax and rejoice for our loved ones who are in the presence of Christ. As the apostle Paul tells us, though we naturally grieve at losing loved ones, we are not ‘to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope’ (1 Thessalonians 4:13). Our parting is not the end of our relationships, only an interruption. We have not “lost” them, because we know where they are. They are experiencing the joy of Christ’s presence in a place so wonderful that Christ called it Paradise. And one day, we’re told, in a magnificent reunion, they and we “will be with the Lord forever.” “Therefore, encourage each other with these words.”

Picture it. Think of friends or family members who loved Jesus and are with him now. Picture them with you, walking together in this place. All of you have powerful bodies, stronger than those of an Olympic decathlete. You are laughing, playing, talking, and reminiscing. You reach up to a tree to pick an apple or orange. You take a bite. It’s so sweet that it’s startling. You’ve never tasted anything so good. Now you see someone coming toward you. It’s Jesus, with a big smile on his face. You fall to your knees in worship. Then He pulls you up and gives you the biggest bear hug in all of history. “Every kingdom work, whether publicly performed or privately endeavored, partakes of the kingdom’s imperishable character. Every honest intention, every stumbling word of witness, every resistance of temptation, every motion of repentance, every gesture of concern, every routine engagement, every act of worship, every struggle towards obedience, every mumbled prayer, everything, literally, that flows out of our faith-relationship with the Ever-Living One, will find its place in the ever living heavenly order which will dawn at His coming.”

Then I glance over and see a big shade tree with a picnic table under its branches. And there’s my mom, sipping on her Sonic Route 44 sweet tea, with all her friends, playing an aggressive, vicious game of Bingo.