We received such shocking news at our school today, that I just need to ask for your prayers for this family. Dave Gerhard was the founding principal at my school, and he is the one who hired me. His daughter, Eryn, works at our school as a special ed teacher. Today Dave's other daughter, Megan, was delivering her second son when she died of a pulmonary embolism! Megan was only 32, and she has an older son who is about 10. The whole family was up at Mission Hospital (where Don worked for 38 years) waiting for the birth, when they received this news. It is just so tragic and devastating. Karen Gerhard, Megan's mother & Dave's wife, who is also a principal in our district, has non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. It is more than we can comprehend. Don happened to be up at the hospital this afternoon visiting and he told me that the whole lab was talking about it. They are all in shock, too. The baby boy is in intensive care.
As stunned as all of us who love them are, we know that God was not taken by surprise. And because God loves Megan and this family so much more than we could imagine, we know that He will lift them up. Please be part of that by praying for them all!
It is the one-year anniversary of the death of my nephew, Justin, who died at age 35 of sudden cardiac arrest. You may remember that he left a beautiful wife, Stephanie, twin five-year old boys, a three-year old boy, and Stephanie was pregnant at the time with their fourth - their girl, Johnna, who was born this past August. The day before Justin died, my sister Jodi, his mother, learned that she had multiple myeloma, a bone cancer. It was more than we could wrap our brains around!
And the sudden death of Megan on the day that should have brought great joy to her family, reminded me of what an enemy death is. It devastates those left behind! It intrudes into our plans and rips out our hearts. As I heard a pastor once say at a funeral, “Death sucks!” As Christians, we know that death ushers us into the presence of the LORD, so for those who have gone through that portal there is great joy - and we would never convince them to return to this place of pain and sorrow. But for us on the other side their is such grief!
Jesus came to destroy that final enemy! His death on the cross guaranteed our eternal life. And that eternal life starts NOW - we don’t have to wait for it. Satan comes seeking to kill and destroy - but Jesus came to give us ABUNDANT life. In Him we find our joy and our hope. May He continue to surround my sister’s family and Stephanie and her sweet babes, and may He cover the Gerhard family with His grace and love in the days, weeks, months, and years ahead.
Thank you to all of you who lift all of these needs up to our Father. And praise to our LORD who has miraculously healed my sister, Jodi, who is completely cancer free!
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