Choosing to SEE - Mary Beth Chapman [61]
My best friends were there for me too. Karen, Jan, Terri, and Lori took me into the ladies’ room.
“Sweetie, you need to take off your clothes,” Karen said gently but firmly.
I was in a daze. I didn’t even really know where I was. I didn’t realize that my clothes were completely stained with Maria’s blood and that it would upset people – especially Shaoey and Stevey Joy – to see me this way.
“What?”
Karen told me they had asked Grace and Wendy to go to our house and get clean clothes for me.
“I don’t want to wait,” I said. “I need to see all these people who have come here for us! Can you guys give me your clothes?”
They would have given me anything. I stripped off my shirt as Jan took off her blouse to give to me. But my bra was saturated with blood.
“Take your bra off,” someone said.
“No one will see it,” I said.
“Take it off now,” my friends said. “We are going to throw it away.”
Terri stripped off her own bra and handed it to me. Someone else gave me their pants. It was almost funny.
“Okay,” I said to my friends. “You wait here for Grace and Wendy to bring clothes so you can come out of the bathroom!”
Once I was dressed, I walked outside as Steven’s brother Herbie and his wife Sherri pulled up outside with Shaoey and Stevey Joy. Stevey Joy had changed her clothes; she was wearing a lime green T-shirt I’d never seen before. It read, “Heaven is better.”
Steven and I held our girls tightly and carried them to a grassy area under a tree, which offered a bit of separation from all the people arriving at the church.
We knelt with them on the grass.
“Where is Maria? How bad was she hurt?” Shaoey asked.
“Did they have to put a Band-Aid on her?” Stevey Joy added.
“You know what?” I whispered, my throat raw with pain. “She was hurt really bad. She was hurt so bad that Jesus came and took her to heaven where she will never hurt again.”
“It’s like Maria has gone on a really long trip,” Steven added.
“It’s going to be a long time before we see her again, but we will see her again!”
We held the girls for a while as they sobbed against our chests, Steven and I crying along with them. Finally, we prayed together and walked toward the church. I was carrying Stevey Joy, and Shaoey was holding tightly to my leg. This is not how it should be
“Our God Is In Control”
Words and music by
Steven Curtis Chapman
and Mary Beth Chapman
This is not how it could be
But this is how it is
And our God is in control
This is not how it will be
When we finally will SEE
We’ll SEE with our own eyes
He was always in control
This is not where we planned to be
When we started this journey
But this is where we are
And our God is in control
Though this first taste is bitter
There will be sweetness forever
When we finally taste and SEE
That our God is in control
24
SEE
Right now all I can taste are bitter tears And right now all I can SEE are clouds of sorrow From the other side of all this pain Is that you I hear? Laughing loud and calling out to me? Saying SEE, it’s everything you said that it would be And even better than you would believe And I’m counting down the days until you’re here with me And finally you’ll SEE
“SEE”
Words and music by Steven Curtis Chapman
Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
1 Corinthians 13:12
There were many, many people whispering and milling around in the narthex . . . and many more who had found their way into the sanctuary to pray.
I felt like a ghost, watching a moment that I didn’t belong in, and yet somehow I was one of the main characters. I floated from person to person.
“I’m so sorry!” some would say. Others would just give me a giant hug. Still others knelt on the floor weeping and praying. I felt deep gratitude that so many people had come to offer their support and love, to be sad and broken with