By Denise Wynn
Life with a seizure disorder is unpredictable at best and traumatic at worst. I am convinced I suffer a form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) caused by some of the seizures we have experienced. Any sign of a twitch, a strange groan, a stumble, or a quick movement can send me into panic mode. My son has had seizures everywhere you can imagine: in the car, in the bathtub, at school, at church, on the bus, while walking, sitting, standing, sleeping, and swimming. There have been cuts, sprains, broken bones, black eyes, bruises, and even a second-degree burn.
There is no way I can adequately describe the bumps and bruises my boy has endured, or the pain and injury he has handled with the courage of a ninja warrior. There were many moments where the seeming injustice of his injuries angered me. The seizure disorder sickens me completely, but I know he has a brain malformation which causes the epilepsy so I accept the occurrence of seizures. The injuries, however, seem senseless. Spiritually and emotionally, in my mommy mind, I don’t understand why an innocent child has to suffer.
One night I was feeling quite pitiful. It was almost midnight. I was recounting a horrible week of seizure activity when I felt the Lord prompt my spirit to watch a DVD, The Passion of the Christ. I didn’t want to watch it. It was late. The video is long, and watching it once was difficult enough. I couldn’t bear to watch the whipping scene. I tried to ignore the prompting as I made my way to bed. Yet again, I felt prompted to watch it. More specifically, the Lord impressed on me to watch that dreaded whipping scene.
“OK, I know God is serious about this,” I said to myself. I found the DVD, and as it began to play, I fast-forwarded through most of it, stopping at a scene with Mary. I heard God say, “Watch this from a mother’s perspective.” So I did. I watched Mary’s son as He was dragged into the courtyard, taunted, teased, smacked, whipped, and beaten beyond recognition. I saw Mary’s innocent boy’s flesh torn apart as His blood spilled on the ground, and I thought, God forgive me! There is absolutely nothing in my life this messy, this painful, or this unjust!
As Mary knelt in the courtyard and began to wipe His blood from the ground, I felt her anguish. I knew her thoughts: Why have they done this to You, my innocent boy? Not understanding why and not knowing whether her son was dead or alive, Mary continued to wipe His blood from the stone pavement, knowing His blood was too precious to lie on the ground, too sacred for one drop to be wasted.
I realize this DVD does not depict an actual biblical account, but my emotional understanding of what was depicted in this scene was this: I don’t know why they have beaten You, why You have been taken
away, or why Your blood has been spilled, but I will not allow any of it to be wasted!
Mary amazed me. How did she not run through the streets, screaming like a mad woman? How did she sit at His feet as He hung on the cross and not act like a crazy mom? I would have been stomping around at the foot of the cross, hollering up at Jesus to get down from there! I would have demanded He speak one word and change it all, like He had done so many times before. I would have asked Him to summon a thousand angel army to rush in and tear up that city! But Mary did none of that. She just sat there weeping and waiting for what would come, trusting God completely.
Mary’s type of trust was different than my type of trust. I just knew God would do it my way and make it all better for me. Mary trusted Him unconditionally, no matter how, what, or why.
As I watched from a mother’s perspective, I pleaded with God to forgive me. Then my prayers shifted to a place of surrender. I asked God to show me how to trust Him completely with my son, Sean. I asked Him to help me not to waste the anguish, the pain, and the suffering but to somehow give it purpose, power, and meaning.
The above article, “Bumps, Bruises, and Broken Bones,” is written by Denise Wynn. The article was excerpted from Reflections Magazine.
The material is most likely copyrighted and should not be reprinted under any other name or author. However, this material may be freely used for personal study or research purposes.
