Just a normal day. Saturday, eating lunch, watching New Zealand beat the French at rugby. My cell rings and tragedy comes through the air waves. Amy Crone, daughter of my good friend and senior team leader David…has had a cardiac arrest and passed away.
Scrambling to the hospital. Theresa and I join with a small group of family and Amy’s friends in the Emergency Room. My daughter Sophie, her friend Kellie who works for me in Brilliant Book House, both come for tearful hugs. We are all shattered. Amy? Funny, creative, life of the party, mother of two Amy…gone?
I stepped into the room where Amy lay. Deborah, her mom, is stretched out over the bed sobbing. David sitting head bowed at his daughter’s feet. Mark and Tammy, good friends giving stellar support. We prayed, touched, stayed connected till the Coroner came and took the lovely girl away.
David and Deborah emerged, shell shocked. They thanked and hugged everyone. I half expected David to say to me, “Is there anything you need? Anything I can help you with?” Typically the way most conversations ended with Dave. Watching the two of them walk across the parking lot holding hands is one of the most gut wrenching things I have ever seen.
Just a little later my cell phone rings. “We want you to stand with us and pray for Amy’s resurrection.” Absolutely, no problem. I’m on it. I can’t remember what I actually said to my friend but I had never wanted a fight more than I wanted this one. Another wonderful friend Bob Book our worship leader at the Mission and our wives Theresa and Barbara met that evening to plan the Sunday morning gathering at the Mission.
The Crone family were gathering too and would do battle at the family home the next morning. Not wanting to be a distraction or a focus for grief and shock they chose their site of battle sensibly. Word went out all over the world. Our great friends at Bethel, Redding, Bill and Benni Johnson, swung everything behind their love for David and Deborah. People from all over the States and many countries united to pray.
That Sunday morning at The Mission will live long in my memory. I have never seen a spirit of unity manifest itself with such hunger and open delight. The worship was astonishing. The truest and best celebration of the wonder of Jesus. We exulted in the Lord our God. In worship we take what we know to be true of God in our experience and we stand in that place to rejoice, praise and offer thanks as an expression of our confidence in the goodness of God.
Lamentation is the highest form of praise that exists on earth. It is unique to earth. Heaven cannot copy it because there are no tears or sorrow in Heaven. Lamentation allows us to do something that Heaven cannot…worship the Lord when we are in a place of utmost distress.
Lamentation carries with it a “though” and a “yet” [Habakkuk 3:17-19; Job 13:15]. “Though” we are in a place of critical distress, where we are burdened and saddened beyond our strength to bear…”yet”, we will exult in the Lord.
To exult means to be delighted, full of elation, in high spirits, jubilant, overjoyed, in celebration. God does not ask us to put aside our grief or our burden. He asks us to make it an offering. To step into the place of His Majesty and Beauty and bring it with us. Use it. There is never a good enough reason not to rejoice. Lamentation allows us to step into a place in the Father’s affection where our tears mingle with adoration and He has first place ahead of our suffering. This is where worship enters the realm of glory.
As a spiritual community we are learning about, living under an Open heaven, being made in His image, doing the things that Jesus did, living from Heaven to Earth. We are learning, growing and developing in the practice of, “on earth as it is in Heaven.” Not experts by any means but in passionate pursuit of real Christianity.
It felt to me that we were under observation by a great cloud of witnesses. At one point we broke through into Heaven. Hundreds of people in delight. One heart, mind, voice and spirit…and our worship massively escalated. We joined in with Heaven. The sound was incredible. Half of our main band was out of town. We had cancelled the band for the day. All we had was Bob on vocals/acoustic, Byron on piano, and Ned playing a djembe! Suddenly, collectively, we were embracing a sound we had never heard before. It lasted for moments and then faded leaving us stunned, astounded and with enlarged hearts.
I shared briefly from John 11 and Mark 5…the stories of Lazarus and Jairus’ daughter. Jesus spoke of death as a form of sleep from which people could be awakened. At the Mission we fully believe in all that God is for us and all that He can do. We rejoice in His goodness and we stand firm in His power and intention. As a people we are learning to stand in the place of devastation, degradation and despair as we bring the Goodness and the Kindness of God to a hurting world. Our desire is to bring Heaven to Earth with miracles, signs and wonders. We want the authority of the Lord of Life; therefore, we are choosing to fight every circumstance…joyfully.
We prayed as one heart, we commanded life to return with one voice. In football terms we left everything out there. Father’s Day, how appropriate. Over the next few days, we gathered in small groups to continue the joyful proclamation of resurrection power.
Amy never came back to us. Dear, sweet, fun loving, zany, irreverent (she disliked organized religion/churchianity), Amy never returned from the place of delight.
The funeral was outrageous. Typical of the Crone family. It was a masterpiece of prophetic pioneering spirit. They set a whole new trend in graveside committals. No memorial church service, Amy would hate that. Instead a small number of family and friends met at the cemetery. We were all instructed to be dressed casually. Lots of jeans, bright colors, no formal wear. Two stretch limos pulled up and out popped the Crone family. A lone piper played Amazing Grace as they pulled two ice chests out of the trunk.
We gathered around Amy’s coffin as David and Deborah spoke movingly of Amy’s life. Lots of laughter and tears as people told story after story of this irrepressible young woman whose passion for God and life could never be dampened no matter how hard life became for her. We hooted with laughter and blinked away tears at the same moment. We were all given pink flowers to hold (thanks Amy) and spread over the coffin in last goodbyes.
Champagne and cider came out of the chests as we toasted the life of a loyal, sassy, individualist, free spirit who no doubt is teaching King David how to really dance before the Lord. Bill Johnson gave a short and moving address on the importance of mourning properly…to let both joy and sadness move in you…to suppress neither because that’s harmful, but always let joy have the last word each day. He exhorted and encouraged us to be true to who God is and to contend always for Life. Amen to that.
The next day, our core leaders, Bob Book, Dan McCollam and myself met with David and Deborah to plan the next Sunday gathering. More laughter, more tears, great cookies.
The Sanctuary was full on Sunday. People came from all over the world to celebrate Amy’s life. Moving, happy, sad, delightful…it was all that. Great rejoicing. Great family. Great community. Great Oneness.
We never got the resurrection that we fought for. Does that means we step back from what we believe? Do we now occupy a lesser place of no risk and maximum safety? Or do we step up, freshly determined to see:
Your Kingdom come, Your will be done?
We are the belief that never goes away. We plan to weary the enemy by being ever present with Jesus. Our ongoing joy and passion for God’s real kingdom will eventually wear the enemy down. God did not take Amy; she was stolen from us and now we will make the enemy pay.
Our faith statement is found in Daniel 3:13-18. It is the story of three friends in Babylon who were ordered to worship a statue of the king or face a grim death. Their answer was an in-your-face declaration:
“Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire, and save us from your hand. But even if He does not, let it be known to you O King, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship your golden image.”
It’s called a pre-determined response. They knew the consequences of their decision before they had an audience with the king. No matter what it costs they were not backing down from what they believed. It was a wholehearted acknowledgement of who they were as Hebrews.
As a community this tragedy has united us and defined who we are going to be. It has called us up to a new place…brought an ascension in the Spirit. We will go after:
Heaven on Earth
Being made in His image
As He is, so are we in this world
Greater things shall we do
We will go after the Glory of God. We will embrace His Nature, His love, Mercy, Grace, Kindness and Joy. We will choose to view our life through the eyes of His Goodness. We will go after Resurrection, Healing, Miracles, Power and Abundance until we see it, we apprehend it, and it becomes a normal occurrence. We want this fight!
We are in the process of making new decisions that define us as a community. We are not going back.
Graham Cooke
