I squinted against the hot Oklahoma sun in the doorway of the ambulance as the tow truck driver hooked our 7.3L diesel Excursion which we had fondly named "Max" to the tow line. The gear wined as it pulled Max off his side back onto all 4 wheels.
I was so nauseated at the site of it, I nearly threw up. You see, while the truck was on its side, you couldn't really tell the damage that had been done to the driver's corner of the truck. But with Max back on all fours...well. Off-roading Garling style had turned our truck into a convertible. And Vern had clearly gotten the worst of it as we had barrel rolled through that ditch.
I leaned against
the doorway of the ambulance and squeezed my eyes shut knowing that the
scene before me would be burned in my memory forever.
One of the Guthrie firefighters stood in front of the truck, his hands on his hips staring at the damage. I took his picture because it was easier to focus on what he might be thinking than to deal with the thoughts racing through my head. Thoughts of how I could be cradling our hurt or dead kiddos in my arms. Thoughts of how we could be rushing to the ER. Thoughts of how I could be planning funerals for one or all of them. Thoughts of how I could have been spending the rest of my life on Earth without Vern or the kids.
"Is everybody buckled in?" I croaked as I took my seat in the ambulance. The kids were, but the EMT had forgotten to strap Vern into the gurney. So he got Vern buckled in as the ambulance slowly merged with traffic heading to the hospital. I sat there, drinking in what each of my guys looked like and the sound of their voices. We were hot and exhausted with tears making clean streaks through all that red Oklahoma dirt on our faces. But the lot of them had never looked so sweet to me and I thanked The Lord that we did not need those ambulance sirens on.
They put Vern in one room, and sat me down at the check-in desk. The kids sat on the floor at my feet, their unspoken need to be near a parent being met as best I could at that moment. The clerk kept passing me papers to sign. One for Vern. One for me. One for Matt. One for Grace. One for Isaac. And each time I signed my name on those forms, my hands trembled with the overwhelming and sobering realization that I was signing them all in because we were all alive.
Perhaps a better person would be dancing in the triage room with that realization. Or at least smiling. Instead, I was perfectly still, tears welling to the surface that had come from somewhere so deep that I just didn't have the strength to deal with them. So I buried those tears back in the depths where they had risen and walked wearily with the kids back to our room in the ER.
I sat on the bed, and the kids piled on with me. Isaac in my lap, softly crying. Grace's head buried in my shoulder as she sobbed. Matt sitting behind me, holding my hand. And all the while I was whispering to them tenderly about the deep and wide love that Jesus had shown us that day.
Because we should all be dead. Irretrievably gone. No last meaningful "I love you"'s. No final hugs or kisses. Just our North Dakota and Texas parents planning funerals for their babies and their babies' babies.
"You kids need something to drink? There are sodas and juice boxes in the fridge, why don't you go help yourself and I'll get you some cups with ice?" The nurse shuffled them off to the fridge, and I snuck out to go see Vern who was two doors down from us.
It was the first time we had been alone just the two of us since the wreck. We had no words for each other. Only waves of tears as we held each other in deep relief. I closed my eyes, and buried my face into his chest, breathing in deep the familiar smell of my man and marveling at how thankful I was to even be hearing his heart beat. The doctor came in and told us that the CT scan looked fine. They would now work on Vern's wounds. Dirt and grass had been ground
into Vern's head wound that was over six inches long, and the nurses would work to get it cleaned out
with liters of saline while the doctor stitched up Vern's filleted
finger. For the next two hours, I wore a small path in the tile floor between those two rooms. The kids were desperate to see their dad, but settled for a quick peak at him through the glass door.
Then they were sitting in our ER room huddled together watching TV and laughing while they drank their sodas and juice. I drank in the scene as if I had never seen them having a good time before and promised myself to never take another moment with them for granted.
"We are yours, Lord." I whispered.
"You ARE mine, Nancy." That voice of the Holy Spirit was familiar to me, and I shut my eyes savoring the moment and opening my heart to the new understanding of what that meant. I belonged to The Lord even in a storm of hot Oklahoma red dirt while buckled into a truck that was barrel rolling through a ditch. My life was His. My family's lives were His. And I realized that I had only scratched the surface of what that really means to belong to THE ONE TRUE GOD whose love for His children is deeper, higher, longer and wider than anything we can possibly understand.
Vern's wounds were the worst, but Grace had a seat belt burn at her waist that was worrisome because it could have damaged her internal organs. Two belly checks and an X-ray later, she was discharged. I signed her papers in complete disbelief that she had been released. Matt had a swollen right eye that he was quite fascinated with, but was also discharged. The ER doc checked out Isaac, but he didn't have a scratch on him and so I was signing discharge papers for him as well. I had a black-purple bruise that covered my entire right shoulder, glass in my feet and a swollen left jaw. My hands trembled when the nurse gave me the clipboard to sign for my discharge instructions. Then the ER doc came in and said Vern was ready to be discharged as well.
We had been snatched from the jaws of death by our Jesus. Our rescue had been perfectly orchestrated without us lifting even one finger. And as Vern gathered us all into his arms there in that waiting room as the warm sun streamed in from the sky light above, we were grinning. Because our Jesus had excelled that day beyond all earthly expectations and we had front row seats to the whole thing.
And He wasn't even done.
Only three hours had passed since the wreck.
And I pray that you and
all God’s holy people will have the power to understand the greatness of
Christ’s love—how wide, how long, how high, and how deep that love is. Ephesians 3:18
