Last August, almost a year ago, I woke one morning with an urgent feeling. Be in the Easter Pageant. I mulled the idea over in my mind for weeks and kept feeling the same prompting. Be in the Easter Pageant.
"Really?" I thought… I have 5 kids which means I have violin lessons, dance lessons, gymnastics classes, cub scouts, activity days, Youth group activities, piano lessons, baseball, basketball, volleyball team, golf team, and EVMCO choir practices simultaneously during the months of March & April. Not to mention the countless other activities and obligations we have as parents. There seemed to be no way.
And the thought persisted.
By September, I realized that that was what I would be doing and I announced it to my family. Some were elated, some gave me the Are You Kidding Me? look and a couple just ignored that I had said anything at all (perhaps hoping I'd forget).
By October I had signed us up and we made it to the tryouts. We slipped tryouts in on a Saturday morning between chores and a State Fair dance performance and no one was in a good mood. James was out of town and if they were grading us on how well our family got along or worked together, we would have been dismissed immediately. It was stressful and chaotic getting there but as they filed us into a room, they asked us to imagine how we would feel if we saw certain scenes (like seeing a child being healed) Despite feeling super awkward, I felt the Spirit overwhelm me. I felt powerful emotion as they asked us to imagine and began to cry.
After the audition, we all went our separate ways. The big kids went home and I went to the State Fair with the littles. That night, Dalton and I fell very, very ill. By the next morning, I couldn't get out of bed and had to have Hailey take Dalton to the urgent care because I couldn't. They immediately transferred him to Phoenix Children's hospital where he stayed for the next 3 days while I was in a feverish delirium at home. It was hard. James flew home and went straight to the hospital to spell off our 17 year old, Hailey who had been caring for Dalton. Our life ground to a halt as we struggled to recover. I layed at home feeling helpless and sick with the mystery illness that had attacked us. I felt the adversary rise up and powerfully protest the move we had just made.
I think it was around December that we found out we had been chosen to participate. We all got our parts and they were perfect for each of us. Hailey was cast as the beautiful Pilot's maid where she didn't have to "perform" but she was a character with a special part. The boys got to carry the lambs and the banners - they felt super important and it was awesome. Everyone was perfectly cast - for them. James and the littles and I were cast in the multitude scenes and in a scene called Jesus and the Children. We assumed that scene was a multitude-everyone-in-it scene as well and were surprised to find only a handful of adults on stage during that scene. And we wondered why we had been chosen for that scene. We assumed it was because we had the 2 littles. But I know now that was not why. God knew where we needed to be. He knew where we needed to stand to see what we needed to see. He knew what we needed to experience and feel. Because, unlike us, He knew what lay ahead.
The first time we did that scene, we watched as the father carries his dead daughter out to the Savior. Her arms were limp and she was gone. I watched and was caught up in that same feeling I had had at the audition. A feeling of intense anguish, sadness and grief overwhelmed me and I cried. I was embarrassed and unsure about the power of what I felt. But Christ takes the girl and blesses her and heals her and immediately my pain turned to relief. I know it was acting but I felt something real. I physically felt pain and relief. I wondered if everyone else had felt like I did.
A few days later, we practiced the scene again, and I felt the same emotion swell in me followed by relief and joy. Very powerful and very real. I asked James if it was normal to cry every time?
Within 2 weeks of that night, 2 of my dear friends both lost their daughters in tragic accidents. One day they were there. The next they were gone.
I had already felt their pain. I had already physically felt the burden of their loss. But what I had also felt was the relief that comes thru our Savior. The love and the healing he brings. The miracle of restoration. I had felt it and it was real. And I could comfort them with an understanding that I didn't have before.
I felt in some way that God had placed me there, right there, so I could see and feel and understand how it is possible to feel the pain and loss and suffering that others feel without going thru it ourselves. I know our Savior, without going thru the pain of losing a child himself, knows exactly how it feels and can comfort us, restore us, give us relief from pain that seems too heavy to bear. He sees our struggles and heals our hearts.
So, looking back to the beginning, I can see God's hand - guiding me, teaching me, showing me, allowing me to feel what I needed to feel to be a good friend. To help me have an increased measure of empathy. To help me comfort those that needed comfort.
As we went thru the last week of the Pageant, mourning with our dear friends and participating in their daughter's memorial and funeral, we felt uplifted and filled up each night. The Pageant meant something different now. Something more. With super sensitive spirits, we watched and sang and wept.
James was asked to speak at the funeral of one of the sweet girls. After he spoke, and maybe even before, we realized that he had been prepared for a month for that moment. He had been placed where he needed to be to see and hear the message of the Resurrected Christ over and over till it burned in him. And he felt humbled to share that message with so many.
Christ lives. God lives and we know how much they love us. As we watch their hands in our lives, leading and guiding us to what we need, we feel grateful. I feel like the Spirit has hardened a shell of testimony around me. One that will protect and insulate me from the doubt and dissension that swirl around me. And one that helps me see how learning about the Savior is how we become like him.
