Thank you Jessica Joy!

Perhaps many of you remember  Jessica Joy Rees, the 12 years old daughter of an American pastor suffering from a brain tumor.

Jessica became a "mascot" for our church and an example. I spoke about her in many Sunday messages as well as to friends, posting on Facebook and elsewhere, telling her awesome story of suffering, joy, sorrow, hope,  pain and altruism.

Many of us prayed constantly for her, for a miraculous healing, for something that could contradict the cold statistical data related to the inoperable cancer  she suffered from: 9-month survival since its discovery.

Yesterday evening (it was morning in California) Jessica was welcomed by Jesus into Heaven, leaving her family but also all of us, alone. They told us she fell asleep, without pain, as if  she was going to bed at night. When she  wakes up (this has already happened as I write!), she will not find her family to comfort her from the pain, or her beloved Mr. Moe -the faithful dog that accompanied her in these months of illness - but Jesus himself, her real father, the one who has loved her since before she existed, and that now is taking her to  the room he prepared for her. No more pain, or needles, or headache, or facial paralysis ... only the joy of being with Jesus!

I miss my Jessie. I was accustomed to pray for her every day, to exchange text messages and photos on Facebook. I cannot even imagine how much her family is missing her. She  went to the Father, but her shining example of unselfishness, joy and faith will remain carved in the minds of those who met her, even if only through the pages of Facebook.

As a believer, I know that " for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose (Romans 8:28).

I do not see that my stretch of road, that appears before me along the way, and I do not know what lies beyond the bend  that limits me to the view, while God, flying higher than time and events, sees - as would an eagle- , the entire path. He sees the whole picture, and its intersections, and chooses them according to the good of those who love him. And I know he has chosen the better for the sake of Jessie ... although I cannot see it with my short sight, and I cannot understand it with my limited intellect.

Two comments, however, helped me put into perspective even one small fraction of the plan that God has written through Jessie.

The first is from my wife. As I pondered out loud about the fact that I did not know enough about Jessica, she said: "Jessica wanted to be known by you, as well as by thousands of other people in the world.Through Facebook she searched contact with you, as with the others,  making herself vulnerable to others and choosing to tell you and to others what was inside:  her joys, her fears, the best and the worst of those ten months of pain. "

This comment led me to a first reflection on my life as a believer: how much am I willing to reveal myself to others, making me vulnerable to them?Do I seek the help and support of my  brothers and sisters in Christ, near or far , or do I try to do "everything by myself", thinking of  my challenges as a private affair? Jessica opened herself to the world and to other believers receiving through  prayer the help and the constant encouragement that enabled her to live ten months not in a passive way towards her illness, but attacking it and making it a springboard for action, rather than to a dark room  to hide and weep.

The second, and perhaps most important, came from my son Matteo, thirteen years old , more or less the same age as Jessie: "Well, dad, I'm so sorry for her, but even though he lived only twelve years, that was a great way to live.Without her there would be no Team Negu, nor  Joy Jars, which are now known all over the United States. I hope that here in Italy there will be something like that sooner or later. "

This is the correct perspective, which could only come from a young mind ready to see life not as a sum of the days gone by, but as the book of the future.

Matteo was telling me: this is what a 12 year old girl, in her 10 months of illness, was able to do thanks to her faith in Jesus.
Rather than becoming bitter about the evil she experienced, she deliberately decided to be better, to LOVE those who were in her own conditions. There wouldn't be a Team Negu to help children with cancer and their families without Jessie.
There wouldn't have been JOY JARS to give a smile to a child who is suffering without Jessie. Jessie's life in 10 months has had more impact on thousands of people than I had with my hundreds of sermons I preached in church ... because she decided to LOVE LIVING.

Love is not a feeling but an action .... How many times have I taught this? And how many times have I ignored my own teaching? How many times bitter I was  because I felt pain instead of being better, loving those around me? How many times have I been BITTER LOOKING FOR LOVE, instead of being BETTER living in love?

Jessie Thanks for teaching me a truth that I heard so many times and  I taught so many times: "Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice!" (Philippians 4:4).

I have often only heard or taught this. You lived it!

Marco