I grew up in the Jesus Freak era.
You know the one?
Jesus t-shirts, WWJD bracelets piled on my wrists, debating evolution on the school bus, boldly declaring to any who would listen (or who wouldn’t, for that matter!) “Jesus loves you!”
Gosh, I love that girl. She was so young, so on-fire, so innocent.
Back then, God was a lover; passionate and intimate.
That girl had a song she cherished – perhaps you remember it too?
“You don’t know the cost of the oil –
You don’t know the cost of my praise –
You don’t know the cost of the oil in my alabaster box.”
(Janice Sjostrand, but most of us probably know the CeCe Winans version)
Little Sara thought she knew. Bless her young, naive heart.
One day, she found an alabaster box at a garage sale, no more than two dollars. She treasured that little box. Kept it safe upon her shelf.
“I’ll keep something really precious in it someday.”
But nothing seemed to fit.
Momentos from church camp? No.
Grandma’s ring? Not quite.
Reminders from marriage? From birthing?
No, that little alabaster box remained empty. Eventually, it ended up in a box of trinkets, stored in the shed.
“Someday… I’ll store something really precious in it!”
Fast forward to this spring.
I’m pregnant with a boy destined to die, and I can’t help but hope.
So, I prepare for the miracle I pray for.
I buy clothes.
I buy swaddles.
I buy shoes.
I buy a crib.
A box to hold something precious, even if only for a hospice situation.
My mama’s heart needed to be prepared; a tangible hope – no matter the outcome…
…the outcome…
…probably death.
I needed to be prepared for that too, huh?
I dearly hope you’ve never had the need to research baby urns, but if you have, you know,
…they’re devastatingly small.
Just how many ashes could we actually expect?
Tablespoons at best.
Without good bones, likely just teaspoons.
And something in me cataclysmically broke.
All this life, this potential, this future, this whole person wriggling around inside my womb – reduced to a few teaspoons of ash.
I just couldn’t look at those tiny urns anymore.
I begged God to fill the crib instead. “Please, Lord, don’t make me buy an urn to hold the precious ashes of my son.”
Something precious… OH!
The realization hit me like the lovely burst of cold wind before a savage summer storm.
My alabaster box!
It took some digging among the boxes of storage in the shed, but I found it.
And I wept.
Did my good God know back then, when I was but a little older than my oldest child, that someday I would need a very special box to hold the dearly precious ashes of my son, and so provided for the broken-hearted woman who that energetic, Jesus-freak of a girl would one day become?
He’s absolutely that good, my friends.
Undoubtedly, that good.
The ol’ alabaster box is on the shelf again. It got a really good clean after years in storage. Found it’s way before the Table of the Lord during one of the most beautiful and devastating funeral services I’ve ever sat front row for. That alabaster box was honored – front, center, and carefully draped with a lovely embroidered urn pall.
It held something terribly precious. It still does.
We couldn’t bring ourselves to intern his ashes. Our priest offered a place in the church columbarium – such a lovely place of honor – an answer to the prayer I couldn’t pray.
But the canister seemed soo large, soo cold, soo frightfully lonesome. So very far away. We wanted him closer; wanted him near all the chaos and contentment of our home.
He is to be buried with Caleb and I someday. Like the uncle I never met lies beside my grandparents. With no legacy of lineage, he can rest within the arms of the only family he’s known.
And I know these ashes only tell a part of the story. Like the caterpillar sheds his chubby, crawly skin to put on the delicate wings of the wind, so too our boy has put off his broken earthy flesh and taken on heaven made tangible.
But humans are a unique mix of heaven and earth – spirit and flesh.
It is right to treasure these ashes;
the worldly ashes of my son,
the broken ashes of hopes and dreams.
Grief made tangible.
You know, the older I get, the less I see God as a lover, but more so as a wonderfully good Father.
Looking forward – planning ahead.
Remembering what I forget – preparing for seasons I haven’t come to yet.
Caring deeply for my life, the life of my family, the life of my son…
for all our deaths, realized and forthcoming…
After all, this our Good Father provided a beautiful box to hold these precious few ashes of our Benedict, and prompted that crazy kid of my yesteryears to keep it and keep it empty for 20+ years, in preparation to bear this precious something.
And if God so treasures these ashes,
I’d be remiss not to treasure them too.
8/1/26
G&P,
-SF
Cotton Ribbons 