Some things just can’t be captured in words.  Sometimes it’s beauty.  Sometimes it’s pain.  Sometimes it’s an experience.  Sometime’s it’s the people you meet.  Today all of those things happened to me in one setting, and I have yet to come up with even one word that adequately describes any of it.

I went with my friend Mary Kay to Craig Hospital to sing for the patients there in a chapel service.  It’s a hospital and rehabilitation center for people with spinal cord and brain injuries. I knew I would see sad things, but I wasn’t prepared for the impact these people would have on my heart.

The first couple I met were probably  in their late 20’s.  He (Tim) was quadriplegic and appeared to have “locked in” syndrome where no part of his body could move, including his mouth and vocal cords and all that he could communicate with was his eyes.  His wife, Stephanie, attended to him so tenderly, uncurling his muscle-locked fingers and straightening them out to rest on his wheelchair handles.  Then she sweetly held his hand throughout the service.  They have been at this facility since May. She has not been home since his accident happened.  Along with his therapy and care, she has been trained in her new role of a 24/7 caregiver.  Overnight, both of their lives changed forever, and even if he recovers, neither one of them will ever be the same.

The next family that I met were a brain injured son, Logan,  and his mother and father.  He is a married father of three young boys.  As I talked with them, Logan said, “You’re so pretty.”  I thanked him and continued with the conversation.  I told him he was handsome, too, and that I was proud of all the hard work that he was doing in his recovery.  He told me, “I look just like my dad.”  As his dad was sitting right next to him and the resemblance was remarkable, I agreed with him.  We talked about how God must have a very special plan for his life.  “You’re so pretty,” he said again.  Again I thanked him.  He repeated it several more times.  I laughed and said, “You can keep saying that all day long and I will never get tired of hearing it!”  It was obvious that in the brain injury, he had lost any sense of inhibition. His short term memory has disappeared.  It was sweet and child-like and warmed my heart.  But I could only imagine the heartache of his family seeing this young man they so loved be so affected by a freak accident.

Mary Kay and I sang four songs and asked them to sing along.  They sang.  They cried.  They smiled and raised their hands (those that could) and voices heavenward.  The words of those songs took on new meaning in the presence of these people so broken, both the patients and their families.   Hope and trust beyond circumstance is what they are clinging to.  Hope and trust in the doctors and healthcare professionals and therapists.  Hope and trust in the unconditional love of each other through the hardest of circumstances.  And hope and trust in the God who has promised to walk this frightening new path right alongside them.

I got to spend time after the service with a mom of one of the patients.  A mom who desperately loves her son and whose love will never change no matter what his progress or recovery.  A love so fierce that it shows in the passion with which she fights this battle with her boy.  But she also knows from where to draw her strength.  Her hand and heart are firmly pressed into the hand and heart of God who somehow loves her son even more than she does.  And she trusts that loving hand and heart to do the very best thing, no matter what that looks like.

I guess I did find some words for the day.  But they still don’t come close to describing what I had the amazing privilege of watching and experiencing today.  Makes me want to live and love every single moment of every single day I am allowed on this planet.  To take nothing for granted.  To waste no opportunity.

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