Opening Remarks

Greetings Friends,

My name is Wes Smedley; I am an Episcopal priest in Virginia. But more importantly for today I am a friend of Lydia and James. And I had the great privilege of being a friend to their son Benjamin.

We are here for really just one reason today: to grieve the loss of a beautiful little boy, our Benjamin. We are here to be angry that he is not with us; we are here to miss him like we miss a piece of our body that has been cut off from us and taken away. We are here to cry out to God, we are here to cry out to each other--because we will need each other to walk through this valley of death.

So no need to hold back your tears here, let them flow. This is not the time to be strong; this is the time to be weak. Don’t hold back your rage, because there is nothing about Benjamin’s death that is right or good. It is wrong, and it is bad. But don’t hold back your love either, because it was love that brought Benj into this world, love that nourished him, and love that he gave so freely to every person he touched.

Please pray with me:

Prayer

O God, whose beloved Son took children into his arms and blessed them: Give us grace to entrust Benjamin to your never-failing care and love, and bring us all to your heavenly kingdom; for your love’s sake. Amen.

I invite you to join me in reading this portion of Psalm 69:

Psalm 69

Save me, O God, for the waters have risen up to my neck. I am sinking in deep mire, and there is no firm ground for my feet. I have come into deep waters, and the torrent washes over me. I have grown weary with my crying; my throat is inflamed; my eyes have failed from looking for my God.

Homily

I wish my friends Lydia and James did not have to go through this--now or ever. I wish Benjamin was with us, with his shining blue eyes, his soft mane of hair like a crown on his head, his big generous smile.

To remember this beautiful boy is to honor his whole person, full of love and strength and potential. Talking with Lydia and James, these three words came up as the most descriptive parts of their Benj: love, strength, and potential.

Benjamin fed on love. In the midst of all his physical struggles, his six surgeries and his complicated recoveries, what nourished him most was not any food, not even his mother’s milk as good as it was, but was the love that was poured into him. And if you know Lydia and James, if you know their families, if you know the doctors and nurses in the NICU at Georgetown Hospital, if you know Pam, Julie and Carla--Benjamin’s therapists, if you know Iris--Benjamin’s beloved caretaker, you know that love overflowed with abundance. Lydia is certain that when Benjamin reached out from his high chair he was reaching out for what he knew would sustain him more than anything else in the world. Love was Benj’s favorite food.

And if you ever held Benjamin, even just looked at him, you know that the love that was so generously poured into him he so freely would pour into you. Hugs, kisses, joy, affection. It is not always the case that a child will know how to express love so clearly, but this is just who Benj was. And there was nobody he loved more to pour love into than Lydia. Benj loved his mom. Now he loved his dad too, no doubt about it, but let’s not mince words she was number one. He knew he had one special fan in mom. She just hung the moon. That’s the love part.

The strength part of Benjamin is in his remarkable ability to defy so many odds, to go through the surgeries and setbacks, and come out on the other side ready for more life, ready for more love. He was twenty-one pounds of sheer will to live. This strength came partially from the love he knew he could count on, but it was also just an extraordinary part of who he was. Many of us didn’t know whether Benjamin would make it in his first months--but our doubts were erased over the course of his first year. He was so strong, so smart, so capable. And that is one of the things that makes this so difficult, nearly impossible. We all believed that the worst was behind us.

The third part, and not the least, is Benjamin’s potential. Let us not think for one moment that his physical challenges diminished his potential. For all the challenges Lydia and James and Benjamin faced, the worst was over. Lydia and James were finally beginning to be able to see what Benjamin would become--a strong young man. They found out that he would have no social or cognitive disabilities. They found out he would walk. For the first time, they were told what his potential was, rather than his limitations. And it felt good.

The Monday before Benjamin died was as close to a perfect day as it gets. He had beaten the virus that he had the week before, he had a great session with his physical therapist, he was on the verge of a huge language breakthrough. For some reason, everyone who saw him remarked that he was just shining with life. He wouldn’t go to sleep that night, and even got James to break the bedtime rule and bring him downstairs for more play time with mom and dad. It was as though he didn’t want to let the day end--life was too good, too full, too rich with love to go to sleep.

I would like to take us through this valley of darkness to a place of hope, but I don’t think we’re going to get there. Not today. Today we are still in shock, our grief is too raw, our hearts are too broken. But I want to leave you with two final thoughts--and I would say them as much as a friend as I would as a minister.

When Benjamin’s heart stopped beating early this past Wednesday morning, God’s heart was the first of all our hearts to break. The God who I know is acquainted with grief--a God who weeps with us when we weep. That’s just who God is.

But it doesn’t end with that. The psalm we read somehow ends in hope. I don’t know how or when we’ll get there--nothing is clear right now, and the way forward looks dark.

But from one friend who speaks in all humility and love, I believe that around the corner for the two of you, Lydia and James, there will be a glimmer of light. I don’t know what it will look like or when it will come, but all of us here are willing to walk through this present darkness with you. All of us are willing to walk through this present darkness with you. We love you.