Sucker punch

"A quick punch delivered without warning; an unexpected blow."

Yesterday the sun came up, as usual, sunshine springing across the back lawn and into the bedroom window. Darkness, as usual, crept away, banished to the shadows for yet another day.

A dad, his two young sons, left the house to go fishing. Maybe goodbyes were said to mom and little sister. Maybe hugs, a "see you in a few hours." Maybe mom turned over in bed for a few more minutes of sleep; maybe not.

Then the sucker punch. An unwise traffic move. Two vehicles collide. One much bigger. The 10-year-old dead at the scene. Dad dies in one hospital. The 5-year-old hours later in another.

Word spreads quickly in this little Valley. If one were listening, they could hear a gasp, a sob from house to house, from neighborhood to neighborhood, from town to town.

The phone rang.

"Mom," she says through her own tears, her own struggle to speak through the sorrow a 16-year-old should never have to feel. "Jen's husband and oldest son were killed this morning. And the little one is critical."

Jen, her swim coach. Cody, who posed at 9 in last year's yearbook as the team's manager, just because, she said, he wanted to be in the picture. Tanner, who borrowed her swim fins at practice Tuesday, an exuberant 5-year-old flopping the fins around on the pool deck while mom coached. And Wes, their husband and dad.

How does a mother walk past the bikes strewn on the front lawn, past the little lawn chairs, past the evidence of the three men in her life? How does she step into her home, knowing the two sons she gave birth to and the man who helped her raise them will never again step in there with her? That little sister won't have two big brothers to help keep her safe?

How does a driver, who was in the right, overcome the knowledge his bigger vehicle took the lives of two little boys and their dad out to catch fish that morning? How does one ever erase that vision?

If it hurts this much to see a fresh-faced fifth-grader in a ball cap and think of another little boy who never again will be playing ball, or drive past the little home and not have to slow down for boys on their bikes, how much more Jen's pain?

Scripture says for those who love Jesus, "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord." We know when we step from this life we step into another far beyond our wildest dreams. We know this isn't all there is. That's small comfort to those still denying Christ's existence, but maybe, just maybe, they'll see Him because of this. Maybe not.

God be with you Jen and Haley. Jaan and David. George and Rita. Siblings, grandparents, neighbors, friends. All in the periphery of Wes', Cody's and Tanner's lives, God be with us too.