I felt spiritual uplift from all the messages that morning, but when Elder Donald L. Hallstrom began talking about a man who had miraculously survived an accidental fall from Mount Shasta while hiking, I was just about to silently make a statement that some people don't survive whatever accident they incur.
Before I could let that thought settle on my mind, however, I heard Brother Hallstrom continue..."But what about those who do not receive the expected miracles that are prayed for?"
Then he gave this definition: Miracle. A beneficial event brought about through divine power.
I thought of Jeremy's death and the way I have often described that event as a "positive negative". Indeed, if Jeremy had to die there were so many positive aspects about that negative occurrence that those positives were blessings in themselves to comfort us. Each a tiny miracle which, I am convinced, were brought about through divine power. They spoke of a heavenly long-view with details that were orchestrated long before that fateful morning in July 1987
Jeremy's death was an accident. No one to blame. No one to forgive.
Jeremy wasn't kidnapped, tortured, or left to suffer somewhere.
Jeremy's death wasn't self-inflicted, so there was no guilt to deal with, no wondering why....
Ross had just returned from a business trip and I was at home with my Visiting Teachers who had made an appointment to visit me that morning.
Jeremy wasn't alone when he fell from the tree. He was with friends and his sister Burgandy. They enlisted the help of a worker from the Church Ditch Company who gave Jeremy CPR.
That first responder act bought Jeremy a few hours so he didn't die at the tree but at the hospital the following afternoon.
We had about 24 last hours to spend with Jeremy to say the "I love yous." The "I'm sorries." The "goodbyes." There were sad moments but funny ones, too, like when Britty insisted to Karen Frei that it was okay for her to have Pepsi because diet drinks were against her religion!
Families from our ward were with us throughout the night and the next day providing food for those waiting with us in the hospital, giving loving care for our children by staying with them at our home or taking them to their home to sleep.
The sudden spiritual understanding I had in the car on McIntyre Street when the whole family was preparing to pick which cemetery we wanted for Jeremy's final resting place. A comment Harold made which his Seminary teacher had said was the catalyst for that understanding. Jeremy wasn't just a statistic like I had initially thought--at the wrong place at the right time. His time in mortality was over for whatever reason, and I could accept that and move forward or be bitter and rage against God. I chose to move forward.
Someone anonymously gifted us with brand new temple clothes in which Jeremy was buried.
The funeral director belonged to the Church and provided a loving atmosphere as we planned Jeremy's funeral service. (I had dreaded that part because it was such a garish experience when Grandma Nichols died and we had to choose her casket etc.) But this was a blessing.
Ross was adamant that the kids be involved with every aspect of Jeremy's funeral, where he was buried, and then design the headstone which became the permanent marker of his grave.
The Golden Cemetery personnel who were also caring and compassionate. They even made arrangements for Ross and Harold and Brice and Schuyler to fill Jeremy's grave by shoveling the dirt themselves after the dedication of the grave...one last service for his turn on earth.
The impact on our non-member friends and neighbors was phenomenal. They silently witnessed all the loving concern and service bestowed on us from the first minutes after Jeremy fell from the tree until well after this cataclysmic event was nothing but ripples for everyone else. Most attended the funeral, which in itself was enlightening because of its intimate focus on Jeremy as a person.
- One family was so impressed, they called me and said because they had watched how our church took care of us, they wanted to know more. They began taking the missionary discussions and subsequently joined the Church.
- When school began again, Schuyler's 2nd grade teacher had all the kids in the class meet a day early. She told them about the sad thing that had happened to the Nichols family that summer so the kids would know and not find out in whispers from kids in other classes. A thoughtful and loving gesture for Schuyler who was apprehensive about returning to school.
The first thing I noticed about Ross' Patriarchal Blessing was the part that said his ancestors had rejoiced when he joined the Church, as he would be their means of obtaining salvation. After Jeremy's death I came to know that part of his mission is to preach the gospel to those many, many Nichols family members who have gone on before. Who better to do that than a member of your own family! That possibility of Jeremy's role in uniting a family has been a source of comfort to me many times over the years when I have missed him with the bone-deep ache of separation until we are reunited.
All of these "beneficial events" flashed through my mind as Elder Hallstom was speaking. When he closed his remarks by saying spiritual miracles are available to all of God's children and those miracles should be our supreme focus, I silently testified that I have been the recipient of a multitude of spiritual miracles. Jeremy's death was just one MAJOR time when I have benefitted from that divine power.
Our lives are full of "warm tones and tiny miracles". Focus on them as you give daily thanks for the divine intervention that is omnipresent in everything we do.
But I am grateful which become personal friends over the next six months as I listen to them in the car.
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