Now that it has been a few weeks, we decided to try to watch the funeral. Well, Janean did anyway. I am a little slower to venture there again. The slideshow at the beginning of it is still a bit too much to watch, but I came back in during the funeral itself. It’s still amazing to me how everything worked out so perfectly for it to happen, go so well, and yet was so close to the day of her passing. The way in which we were able to have such a well-orchestrated funeral, and such a well-attended funeral was one situation in which we could see that the hand of God had been at work all along.
The growth of the Facebook page began helping us understand that there was more to what was going on with Hannah than just what we could see. As the days passed and as the end drew near, her page was filling up fast with “friends”, but what did that really mean? We weren’t sure. Often “Facebook friends” are stereotyped into us believing that they are almost not real people. They are this nebulous group of fantasy friends who follow things at a whim, but there is no attachment or depth to their “friendship”. That, however, was proven untrue in our situation, when nearly three hundred friends, even some that we had not met yet, came on a rainy Sunday afternoon to honor Hannah’s life and the decision to donate the remnants of that life to others. That honor walk was such an eye opener to us. It demonstrated that definitely something larger than “us” was taking place.
Despite this, the question still remained, “How many people would actually attend the funeral?” God was not phased by our wonder, and He would increase that wonder later, that same week. After things had reached the point at which we had to start preparing for the funeral, I could think of no better person to lead it, than Dr. Anderson, the president of Maranatha, where Hannah was attending college. I doubted if he even did such things, but God says, “You have not because you ask not”. (James 4:2) A friend once pointed out that this can often be said of us asking others for help at times, and that it may not be limited to just our prayer life. So, I asked Dr. Anderson, and he immediately said an enthusiastic YES. I thought that I was just asking him to speak, but instead, he willingly took the burden of planning the funeral off of us. We were able to customize the funeral as much as we wanted, but he had it all taken care of. We just chose songs, reviewed everything in the bulletin, and approved the schedule for the day. As we discussed choosing the day, it was clear that the funeral had to be on Wednesday that week around lunchtime. I wasn’t sure how many people would be able to attend a midday, weekday funeral, but schedule wise, it was the only day we could do it. Calvary Baptist Church allowed us to hold the service there in Watertown and provided both an amazing “venue” and an amazing lunch. Their eager-to-help spirit was very humbling. The question still remained though, “How many would come?” We were extremely surprised by the turnout! Even with those that came from Maranatha, there were many hundreds of others who came from great distances and took off from work to be with us. When we saw the turnout, we were just so amazed. Again, we did not know that many people! Yet, they sacrificed their time to be with us!
The funeral was a culmination of events that we could not have orchestrated for ourselves. Yes, we very much saw God’s hand in all of these events. My morning today began with a brief dream that Hannah was sitting up in her hospital bed, talking to Janean. She was doing better and happy “to get back at it”, but as I gave her a hug, I woke up and, well, here we are. Despite the loss that we have suffered, Hannah is doing better than ever!
We are blessed.
Hannah Helps 