A Christmas Story – Keep Believing to Have Life

For many years now, December the 14th has brought with it a flood of emotions. I suspect it always will. The following story is told with the blessing of my dear friend, Debbie Fortenberry. I offer you this excerpt from my next book, Seizing the Good Life to be released June 13th, 2023. For though it is Debbie’s story to tell, she gave her approval to my retelling of it as I was writing on the gospel of John. And just this morning, after an early morning conversation with Debbie, I spoke with my publisher and received permission to share this excerpt with you now, months ahead of the book’s launch. (Thank you, Tim Petersen and Salem Books.) It’s very unusual to share such a large selection from a yet to be published book, but we are all hoping, along with Debbie, that it helps others hurting souls discover the hope and healing of Immanuel, God with Us. 

Merry Christmas Hugs,
Shellie

P.S. You should know that each chapter of this next book has three segments: Dear John, Dear Reader, and Dear Jesus. I want you to peek over my shoulder in the Dear John letters as I imagine what it’d be like to discuss the gospel with the apostle who authored it. Please understand these one-sided conversations with John are not intended to be a séance. God’s Word opposes any such thing, and so do I! My goal is for us to use our God-given imaginations to understand what it was like when Jesus broke into John’s world so we might better recognize Him in ours. He is as present here as He was there. 

 

CHAPTER TWENTY of Seizing the Good Life by Shellie Rushing Tomlinson

Dear John,

We’re at Chapter Twenty of the study I’m writing on your gospel, and it’s got me all up in my emotions. I’ve been looking forward to writing on this part of your message for a long time now. I thought I’d be excited to be here, and I am, but I’m also terribly nervous. I really want to get this part right (or as close to it as I can come.) Your closing words in this chapter have spurred me on so many times to believe, and keep believing, in the face of all the questions and doubts that can assail a person in this world. To quote you, John, you said it’s in believing that we find life in Jesus’s name. I understand you to be emphasizing the importance of believing as the present-tense form of the word “believe,” and I couldn’t agree more. Faith built on a past-tense experience has no life to offer us in present-tense turmoil. That’s more of my experience talking. I remember one such time in my life when one of my dearest friends was facing back-to-back tragedies that threatened everything I had ever believed.

To say the Christmas season was proving painfully hard for Debbie’s whole family would be a gross understatement. Seven months earlier her handsome, athletic, teenage son, Wade, had been killed in a car wreck and her family’s lives had changed forever.

But on this particular day, she had shaken out of her grief long enough to venture out of the house for the first time to do some Christmas shopping with her sister-in-law, Laura. I’d been so proud of her that morning when she shared her plans with me over the phone. It had been a long, hard season for her, but it looked like Debbie was finding her way back to us. But now—just a few hours later—I was at Pecanland Mall with other friends and family members, searching for Debbie to break more devastating news none of us could have seen coming.

It’s hard to relive it, and yet every detail is etched in my brain: The mall was loud and overwhelming. Nearby, at the North Pole, a long line of eager children waited for their turn on Santa’s lap. (I’ll explain the Santa thing later, John. It’s not relevant.) Busy shoppers whizzed by toting heavy bags. Over the intercom, a voice repeatedly asked Debbie B. Fortenberry to please come to the information desk. I remember staring blankly at several guards as they asked me for a description of my friend so they could help find her.

I wanted to help, but all I could remember was the grief I’d seen on Debbie’s face for the last seven months. What would she do now? So Phil took over, describing Debbie as five-foot-six or -seven with sandy blond hair and blue eyes. Meanwhile, I frantically scanned the crowd.

Suddenly, I saw her. She was fifty or sixty feet away in a sea of people, but they all faded away. She was coming! We’d found her. But then it hit me: I was going to have to tell her. Up until that very moment, finding Debbie had consumed me, crowding out any realization that once she was found I’d be responsible for breaking the horrible news that would bring her world crashing down around her. Again.

I watched her approach, her face twisted into one large question mark—her eyes demanding to know “What now?” I desperately wanted time to stop while I figured out what to do. Oh, God, I thought, where were You? Where are You?

And then Debbie was standing right in front of me, anxious to know why she’d been paged, panic mounting in her voice. Debbie knew these looks on our faces. I stalled by asking where Laura was, then summoned the strength to tell her there’d been an accident and we needed to go home.

Debbie’s eyes searched my face, and I looked to Phil for help. How do people do this? I wanted to find Laura and get Debbie out of this mall and home to her people before she heard the new horrible truth, but it wasn’t going to happen. She already had both hands on my shoulders and was demanding answers.

“What, Shellie? Tell me!” Debbie pummeled me with questions. Who was it? Was it her husband, David? Was he hurt? She was beginning to cry. I fumbled my answers, putting off the inevitable. No, it wasn’t David. Oh, Debbie, how do I tell you?

“Let’s find Laura,” I pled.

“No! Tell me now, or I’m not moving.”

It’s hard to remember how long we went on that way. Seconds? Minutes? The unavoidable became obvious. I finally found myself telling Debbie that Justin, her oldest child, a freshman at Louisiana State University, had been shot outside his apartment. I told her he’d been taken to the hospital there and we needed to go. I wanted to leave it there until I could get her home. 

I knew Jut Jut, as she called him, had been calling several times a day ever since his little brother had died to check on his mom and tell her he loved her. I knew the strength and comfort his calls had been giving her. God, how could You let this happen to her? Again?

Debbie’s voice trembled. She asked about her husband. I told her David was already headed to Baton Rouge, to Justin, but she had family and friends waiting for her at home. Everything I was saying was true; everything I was not saying was written on my face.

“He’s dead, isn’t he? Tell me, Shellie, I’m not going anywhere until you do! Tell me—Justin’s dead, isn’t he?” Debbie yelled as she pounded on my chest.

This was really happening. I was out of time and forced to nod my head. Phil and I caught Debbie as she slumped to the ground. In between wails, an incredulous look came over her face as her mind struggled to make sense of this fresh nightmare.

“Are you trying to tell me that I don’t have any boys? Is that what you’re saying?”

I was vaguely aware that a huge crowd had gathered. I wanted to scream at them to go away. Out of my peripheral vision I saw my own twelve-year-old son standing to our side, looking forlorn and helpless. I wanted to reach for him, but I knew I couldn’t. Not then. Through her sobs Debbie asked if we’d found Sarah. Oh my God, I thought, Sarah is here?! She’ll have to know, too! I wondered what would happen to the grieving fifteen-year-old when she heard that she had lost another big brother—her last big brother. I knelt with Debbie on the mall floor, rocking her in my arms as she moaned.

The truth is, John, my faith in God wasn’t really tested when Debbie lost her first son. I was ready with my Christian support. I pulled from my knowledge of the Bible and tried to help her heal. I prayed for Debbie and with her. We talked, cried, and grieved together. Wade’s death was tragic, but I understood that bad things happen, and in my heart believed God was still good. But seven months later, when God allowed Justin to be killed in a freak accident at the hands of his best friend, everything I thought I knew about Him was shaken.

The way I saw it, Debbie had just managed to pull herself up and begin dusting the dirt off her knees when God allowed her to be knocked down again. I didn’t know this God. He seemed cruel. This time when Debbie turned to me, any spiritual solace I offered was faked. I said what she needed to hear but it all came from my head, never crossing my cold heart. I thought surely I was losing my mind as I counseled her to cling to the Lord, because I was pushing Him away and I knew it. I continued to go to church with my family, but nothing penetrated the deep freeze in my spirit.

I felt fractured and insecure. I didn’t want my teenagers to be angry with God, and I still wanted them to believe. I just wasn’t sure I still did—at least not in the way I had before. Silently I fumed at God, not sure He was even there to listen. Debbie had been so faithful to testify of His sustaining grace through her first son’s death. Hadn’t she passed? I railed. Hadn’t she done good enough for You?

I’ll never forget the day I asked Debbie if she was angry with God. She looked surprised. Shaking her head adamantly she answered, “Never! It hurts something horrible—but the Lord holds me up. I couldn’t make it without Him. Every day I ask Him to help me make it one more day. The next day, I thank Him for the day before and ask Him for one more. I can’t explain it, but I can’t be angry with Him.” Well, that’s fine, I thought. But I’m furious.

I fell into a morning routine after that awful day in the mall: I’d stand in the shower, letting the steaming water run over me while I cried and went through the motions of something as close to prayer as I could come. When the hot water ran cold, I’d dry my tears and my body and shut my feelings off until the following day and the next shower. One day, with the water beginning to chill and the same questions chasing each other in my head, I said half to myself and half to the ceiling, “I don’t have any peace. I don’t trust You anymore, and I wonder if I ever will.”

Moments later, I felt a warmth begin to thaw my heart. I didn’t hear audible words from Heaven, but I began to understand that I would have peace again—but it wouldn’t come because I got all the answers I thought I needed. Somehow, I was being assured my peace would return—only this time my faith would not be in my supposed ability to understand God, but in God Himself. I couldn’t prove it, John. I still can’t. But I heard God that day. It made me ache to hear Him again, and it made me look for Him in a different, deeper way than I ever had before.

As time passed, I couldn’t deny the supernatural healing taking place in Debbie. She taught me a lot about grieving. When she had a bad day, she grieved. And I mean grieved! She cried and wailed and looked at pictures until she was exhausted and her emotions were spent. Then she’d put a smile on her face and embrace life again, until the grief built up and overflowed again. Debbie taught me to treasure life. I watched her help Sarah move past the tragedies. Instead of smothering her last child, Debbie encouraged her to reach for her dreams. Debbie’s example taught me not to live in fear. Debbie also loves people! She seems to feel for them more than the rest of us do. I’ve watched her reach out to other parents who’ve lost children, using her own experience to help them through their grief. It was impossible to watch Debbie and not see the God who was sustaining her.

I had so wanted to comfort Debbie, to help her heal. Instead, Debbie’s love for people and her reliance on God was healing the rift in my heart. Slowly, steadily, my peace returned. I will always be grateful to my friend. She helped me rediscover the healing, loving God I had once known. During the darkest days of her life, Debbie showed me the way back to God.

That was many years ago. My testimony is that I’ve since found Him faithful to reveal Himself to me time and again. Sometimes it is through prayer, and other times it’s through His people. Most often though, He speaks to me through His Word. Of course, I’ve had plenty of opportunities to keep believing. We all do. It’s hard to let go of all the questions and trust God, isn’t it? You were open enough with your own experience for me to know that you and the other disciples had a hard time with it, too. I can’t begin to imagine what all you know now that you didn’t know then. One day our faith will also become sight, yes? Until then, love on Jesus for me. I’ll talk to you later.

Hugs,
Shellie

P.S: I asked Debbie for permission to share her story. She couldn’t have been more delighted with the idea. Her exact words were, “Why wouldn’t I let you tell the world how God held us up?” And then, in a later text she added, “I’m truly blessed beyond measure.” Isn’t that amazing, John? I saved her message. It captures what only God can do in and through those who believe and keep believing.