It’s June 20th, 2016. I’m 21 and I’m on tour in Zierenburg, Hesse, Germany. First day of workshop. We’re on a break and my company, business, and stage manager say “Grab the 13’s and older. Grab anybody who knew Rachel Foster.” About ten of us gather behind the curtain and they tell us that Rachel, new kid 2012, my class, has passed away in a car accident. My heart sinks and I’m shocked. Tears start falling immediately. Rachel. Sweet Rachel. Passionate. Talented. Smart. Giving. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Every single one of us has responsibilities for our cast that we need to uphold. Every one of us has something we need to teach or someone we need to talk to, so we band together, pushing through the next few hours together. Nobody pauses. Nobody gives into the rolling waves of grief that are crashing over us. We all stick it out together.
I remember that time so clearly. The strange way my grief would intermingle with my “Young American” persona. The strange way the grief would mix my core personality that always wants to at the very least LOOK like I’m okay, even when I’m not. At that time my homestay mama ended up being the one to hold me while I cried, grieving. I was staying alone, so I didn’t feel like I needed to put on a front or be strong for anybody. I deflated like a balloon into her as she rocked me gently and showered me in comfort and love.
My friends tried to rally around me, one in particular saw me going through it and tried to draw near. Anytime he came close to try and comfort me I would puff up and bat him away. I didn’t want to need comforting. I didn’t want to need help. I didn’t want to admit that I was weak and struggling. I didn’t want him to have to bear my pain, along with his own, but at my core I was unraveling at an alarming rate. My exterior was mostly okay, but my insides were a disaster. He could see that, but I didn’t want him to know.
I ended up hurting him after both emotionally and physically pushing him away. It was a wake up call to me that even though I was doing what I thought was right, kind, selfless, I was actually hurting people. My desire to be independent, my desire not to be a burden wasn’t working the way it was supposed to. In fact, it was doing the exact opposite of what I wanted. It started shuffling my heart around again about my way of doing things, my way of dealing with pain.
With Rachel lots of thoughts would flutter around. I would recall the time we spent together, her bold personality and all the laughter I shared with her. The times she opened up about herself, and the times she was vulnerable with me. I was honored to have been her friend, honored to have known her. Over and over and over why why why would swirl around. I would think about her family, her closest friends, and the beautiful little daughter she’d just given birth to a month before she passed, and my heart would break over and over again for them. They lost their Rachel. Their precious daughter, their sister, our friend, Savi lost her mama before she could ever even really know her. I prayed, I cried, I celebrated her life, I wrote, drew, painted, danced, and eventually talked about it with people. With time came peace in the not understanding. But her and her family would still pop into my mind, and I would pray again, cry again, smile at the thought of her.
It’s February 20th, 2019, I’m 24 years old and sitting in my team’s dining room in Aodi, Taiwan and working on some documents for my team. My best friend messages me, sending me an article. Savi’s been killed by her papa. Her own father has lain hands to his daughter and murdered her. I went numb. My stomach flipped, ripped, and rolled. I shot up from the table, nauseous and feeling the room tilt this way and that. I dart into the bedroom I’m sharing with Heidi and Leah, relieved to see nobody’s there. I fall to my knees beside my bed and pray and pray and pray. Heartbroken, crying out. I picture Rachel’s family, reeling from the loss. I see Rachel’s closest friends devastated and aching. I see Geo, the baby’s dad, deranged. Tormented. This will never leave him. His life will be marked forever by that act. This will torture him daily until he dies. I think of his family. His mom. How she must feel. Her son killed her granddaughter. I can start to picture the pain, the guilt, shame, fear, disgust, shock, grieving she must be going through. For this whole family they must feel they lost two that day. They lost two precious people, not just one. And I find myself praying for them. I’m praying for Rachel and Savi’s reunion, praying that they both get to be with Jesus where he is, enjoying love, joy, family, peace. I’m praying for Rachel’s family, that they’re coated in peace, that any despair, depression, fear, blame, shame would be knocked back and that they would somehow, miraculously find healing from this one day, on God’s timing, as their hearts are ready. That they would be protected from further grief than what they must already have on their own. And I’m praying for Geo, and Geo’s family. I’m praying for a mental recovery from whatever state of mind you have to be in to do something like that. I’m praying for the voids to be filled by the One Who is Worthy. That he would be washed clean by The Living Water, that he would run to Jesus, Jesus who saves, who restores, who has grace for murderers, who reconciles, I pray that. And I’m praying for this mans mama. I’m praying for his family, his aunties and his uncles and his papa and his friends and siblings in love and law and blood and every last person who’s wondering what’s happened. Who’s wondering how things went so far into the pitch black darkness.
Jesus, you’re the light of the world, you are IT. You hold the world in your hands, and you have a better way for us than our own. You help us to be who you designed, and you help us to fight against the constant chatter of evil that’s trying to pull us off course. This is chemical, it’s psychological, it’s a battle, and evil is very much real. Very, very much real. But as we see with all things, good is also very much real. Just as real as evil. Just as touchable, breathable, observable. There is a balance, and there is Hope. I believe deep down in my soul “that the arc of the moral history is long, but it bends towards justice ” I see the thread and truth and mighty hand of God there. I see Him changing us, shaping our History, bringing us further and further into truth, and life, the power of love and understanding. Teaching us His ways and washing out our own.
He wants life for us, it’s us that murder. He wants peace for us, it’s us that hate. BUT WHY? HOW? The answer must be that there is something more alluring, perhaps something that’s easier, something that knows where our weak spots are and persuades us to do the opposite of what we want to do. To do the opposite of what God wants for us. The power to change lies in the hands of God. And He is good. He is still good. He is waiting, a loving, and very good Father, with His arms spread wide to receive us. To clean off our cuts and breaks and bumps and bruises, to revive and restore us and bring us back to life. He resurrected so that I could resurrect. He died so that I could live in the light and be freed from the power of evil that tries to grip our lives. He’s changing me so that all I do is done in love.
So that I will grieve with my brothers and sisters who are grieving, so that I will put on sack cloth and cover my face in ashes and wail with them, unashamed to share in their grief. And there He lifts me up into His arms and holds me, comforts me, lifts my chin, fills my heart with compassion, and not hate, and tells me to love my enemies as He has loved me. Thank you Jesus. Thank you God. I will abide in you, I will lean on you, and I will call out your name when I’m in the shadow of the valley of death. You give me a spirit of power, and love, and a sound mind.
My team has been beautiful in loving me through this grief. They’ve gathered and prayed and been patient and kind. They’ve given me space where I’ve needed it, but haven’t left me there for long. And it’s another place where I get to praise God for the ways He’s changed me. Two and a half years ago I pushed, ran, and hid. God has given me the strength to lean on the people around me more, and to love them, and to LET THEM LOVE ME IN MY STRUGGLE. Praise God from whom all blessings flow. He’s so much bigger and better than anything else.
Rachel, Savi, you will be missed here more than words or art or music or dance could ever possibly express. Our hearts are broken for you both.
Jesus, I pray you would call all of this death out from the grave and show us how powerful and capable you are of conquering the dark.
There is absolutely nothing that You see as hopeless God, so I pray you would make a move here and that our eyes would be fixed on your work of redemption, restoration, and miracles. I beg you God. And when victory comes, when healing comes, I will lift up my banner in the name of the Lord and shout for victory.
J•E•S•U•S S•A•V•E•S
