Hello everyone and welcome to this week's episode of Trinity Talks.
My name is Kyla and I'm the Online Engagement Director here at Trinity.
And as you might know, this week at Trinity, or this month actually at Trinity, we've been
looking at the book of Habakkuk and just talking about what do we do in our life when we're
facing struggles?
What happens to our faith in those moments?
And so we've been looking at what that has meant for Habakkuk, but I thought this week
it would be really great if we sat down with some folks who are members here at Trinity
and just talked about, okay, what does this look like for them in their real lives today?
And so I am super excited to have Annie and Laura joining me on the podcast.
Welcome ladies.
Thank you.
So we're going to sort of dive right into it.
And my first question is, can you just describe a moment in your life when you were going
through something that was difficult and how did your faith really help you in that moment?
Maybe we'll start with you, Laura.
Okay, sure.
Well, there have been tons of moments, but I think I'll talk about, it was in March 1998
and actually things were going along pretty well.
I thought it was, I had not been working for about a year and a half, which was great because
it allowed me a chance to do church lady stuff, galore, and yet, and get closer to my kids,
my three daughters.
And so it was kind of a good time.
But then my eldest daughter, Leah, she's 14, she got sick with what seemed like the flu.
And usually she gets better in a few days if she's sick.
But I was told that a lot of people at her school were out down for the count for maybe
as much as a week.
So I thought, oh, well, this is just a really bad flu.
But we took her to the doctor.
The doctor said, oh yeah, I'm not concerned.
It's just a bad flu.
So that's what we thought.
And one morning, my middle daughter, Tori, went downstairs and she said, mom, dad, come
quick.
You know, there's something wrong with Leah.
And she, we came downstairs and she was on the floor having a seizure and she wasn't
responsive.
So we called the ambulance and went to Credit Valley and they did tests and she still wasn't
really responsive.
And I remember them saying, we're going to send her down to SickKids Hospital.
And I also remember a nurse saying to me, is there anyone else you should call?
And I just thought, like, it was just like being put into an alternate, alternate universe
kind of thing.
And so, so basically, yeah, went down to SickKids, didn't know what it was.
They put her on life support, like, and anyway, I was there with her for six weeks and, and
just hoping and praying for the best.
And it didn't, it didn't happen.
She six weeks later, she, she passed away.
Wow.
And so what was your faith like during that time, during those six weeks?
So well, yeah, there were times where I think it was that maybe that I couldn't, sometimes
I just couldn't pray.
I remember the first few days I couldn't pray.
I had to, people visited and they prayed for me because I could not.
And what I did was I think I just, I kept a journal and that was sort of how I was able
to just kind of process things.
And sometimes I would put prayers in my journal.
But that's, I don't know.
Yeah.
It was a, it was a challenging time, but at least I had been introduced to the faith.
Because I didn't really live a faith-filled life up until just a few years prior.
So then I was kind of, you know, drinking it all in.
And so that was, so that, I was just grateful that I had that background and that I had
people supporting me.
It was amazing the support of people from church, from community Bible study, family
and friends.
Like they would come and just sit with me and pray.
And that part, that part was amazing support.
Yeah.
That's great.
What about for you Annie, what's been a difficult moment in your life and what did your faith
look like during that time?
Well, I have had many difficult moments, but perhaps I'll talk about a defining moment
other than the most difficult.
Sure.
Because you know, I lost parents, I lost siblings.
And, but I'm going to talk about one particular area of my life, fear, where I think that
my faith or the Holy Spirit really helped me overcome that fear.
And my mother died when I was quite young at the operating table.
It was a fluke really.
She didn't, she had breast cancer, but it hadn't spread actually.
But you know, just during the time that she was being, she was getting an aesthetic, there
were a group of residents and they made an error and she went into a coma and never recovered.
And I think I didn't realize what impact that had on me until I faced surgery, you know,
having surgery and I was terrified.
And I didn't realize the psychological implications of that, you know, that how much I had been
traumatized and I think buried the emotion, you know, and the more I talk to people, the
worse I got because everybody was looking at it from a philosophical point of view,
telling me how medicine was so much more advanced in Canada and nothing like that could, like
what happened to my mother could happen to me.
And that wasn't helpful.
But came, there came along a woman that I'd known that I'd actually been working with
that I was supposed to visit in a couple of weeks and she happened to be in Toronto.
She lived in Saskatchewan and she said, well, I guess you're getting ready to come to Saskatchewan.
And I said, I can't.
And I said, can I spend an hour with you to talk to you?
And I told, you know, it was the first time I bared my heart and talked about all my insecurities,
you know, cause the other people I felt and were not validating my feelings and it wasn't
deliberate, but you know, that's how it turned out.
And she listened to me and she said to me, you were practically a child when this happened
to you.
So it's only normal that you'd react the way you, you have reacted.
And she said, is that little voice, that little girl in you that's crying for help and you're
suppressing that little girl.
She put it, cause she was a psychologist.
So she put it in psychological terms that made sense to me.
And anyway, I won't get into the things that she suggested I do.
I'll focus on the spiritual part of what she suggested because she was spiritual.
And she said to me, you know, you need to make affirmations and it's up to you what
you choose.
You know, and she said, and I said, a Bible would be good.
And actually at that time I didn't have a Bible.
So I bought one and I chose scripture biblical.
I mean, I chose scripture and I, for she said every 10 minutes recite that scripture.
Yeah.
And I did that for, could have been 10 hours.
Yeah.
Going, oh, you know, and it's interesting because by the time I was ready to have surgery,
I was so calm that a friend of mine who had been talking to me and probably the only one
that was comforting me more than anybody else just listening to me was terrified that because
I was so calm, you know, it was like 360 degrees.
Sure.
You know, and she's, you know, so she, anyway, I was calm and I just kept on with my affirmation.
Yeah.
But, um, 10 years later I face another surgery and for this one, um, it was my thyroid and
I'd had a biopsy and I'd thought the doctor had assured me there was nothing to it.
But when the results came back, I had, it was the biopsy showed it was positive in,
in other words, it could be malignant.
But they had to operate to find out for sure.
So and my reaction was completely the opposite of what I'd gone through 10 years earlier.
And I, when the doctor called me and told me the news and I hung up from the, you know,
from speaking to him, I knelt down and I prayed.
And my prayer was God, two of my friends had died of cancer two months before.
And my prayer was not God cure my cancer if I have it.
But I said, whatever it is, give me peace.
That's all I prayed for.
And did he give me peace?
Little did I know that I was actually invoking the Holy Spirit.
And I had to wait for four months before I had the surgery.
But that entire time, despite being on a contract, I had a contract job.
And if I ended up having cancer, it would mean that I actually would not be able to
have an income.
I wouldn't have an income.
Yeah, maybe I would have an unemployment, but I had a mortgage.
So there were many, many reasons why I should have been really scared.
But each time I thought about any negative thing, it's like it disappeared.
And when I decided that time, I thought, I'm not going to tell a lot of people about this
because they're going to start scaring me and say, Oh my God, you had a positive.
I didn't talk about it.
And I actually didn't need to because the Holy Spirit was holding me up.
So I went for surgery and I came out and the day I went to get my results, they were not
ready.
So I had to go back two weeks later, but I was still very calm.
And then I went to get the results and the person who was talking to me, the person who
was talking to me was giving me the results, didn't even talk about the results first.
He talked about other things and it's after a while I said, so what were the results?
And he said, Oh, sorry.
There was nothing.
Okay.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Yeah.
It was really powerful and defining moment in my spiritual life.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah.
Cause it's something I've looked back on.
And so whenever I face a situation, I remember how the Holy Spirit held me up, but I didn't
realize it was the Holy Spirit.
Sure.
And one day somebody asked me, so have you ever experienced the presence of the Holy
Spirit?
Right.
And he said, no, but I had just been relating this story and he said, so what do you think
that was all about?
Sure.
Yeah.
And for you, Laura, in the midst of that, that challenge of those six weeks of waiting
in the hospital and then obviously the long process afterwards, how did you experience
God's presence in those moments?
Or did you feel like you experienced God's presence?
Well, I did.
There was like in the hospital, there was a, every now and then my words just go, what's
the name of the religious guy at a hospital?
Oh, the chaplain.
Thank you.
Yes.
Michael Marshall, I remember his name was Michael Marshall.
So I could go to him and ask questions.
You know, like I just didn't understand why this was happening.
So I had that and Debbie Dennis was the associate priest here at Trinity and she came and visited
a couple of times and was, you know, and answered some of my questions.
And then I was very fortunate to have friends who were also Stephen ministers, so they did
a very good job at supporting me.
And yeah, I remember like, cause one night, one night I was consumed with guilt that I
hadn't been a good mother to my daughter.
And my, actually my former husband at the time said call Anne and I did.
And although I was in downtown Toronto, she lived in Mississauga.
She had a headache.
It was like nine 30 at night.
She drove all the way downtown to sit with me.
Cause that's what it's all about.
When you're going through something that you just can't cope with, just to have someone
sit with you.
And she just said, you know, you do the best you can with what you have at the time.
And so, and that's what just enabled me to kind of get through that night.
And then an interesting thing about what happened the night, the day that she died wasn't a
good day.
No, it was, it was pretty awful.
And I remember just leaving, leaving the hospital was so hard because I, it was like just leave,
to leave her was so hard.
But then I remember that night I thought, I began to wonder, is there a God?
Like, why did he do this?
Where is she?
I don't know.
And, and I remember I looked at my watch for some reason.
And so this would have been like 10 o'clock at night or something.
But I looked at my watch and it said it was 2 30 and I went to 30.
And then I remembered she died at 2 30.
And I thought, like, cause I don't know, was there some electrical charge when a solo leaves
them?
Like I didn't know.
But then it just, everything kind of came back.
You know, the doctors that actually planned, well, they did, they took her off life support
the day before on a Thursday, but she didn't die that day.
And I thought I was getting a miracle.
But the next day I woke up and I kind of knew, I just knew in my gut that something was going
to happen that day.
But I thought about it when, when my, the whole thing with my watch and I thought, Oh
my goodness, she was born on a Friday at 2 30 and she died on a Friday at 2 30.
And that was just enough to get me through the first night.
Cause it's, you're just going through day by day at that time.
And then, and then just another thing, I don't know why, for some reason, a Toronto Sun reporter
called wanted to do a story.
And then she listened to my story and she said, Oh, for Mother's Day, cause it was coming
up to Mother's Day.
And she said, that is too sad a story for Mother's Day.
And she left.
And so I don't know what happened, but I went upstairs to my computer and I went, I just
started typing and I went, some may say this is too sad a story for Mother's Day, but isn't
it really all what it is to be a mother?
And I just wrote and then I wrote this, I'm just going to read it now.
Cause it's kind of like the Holy Spirit spoke to me.
It's very short.
It won't take up the whole time, but it's called about miracles.
A lot of people have been praying for a miracle that despite all the odds, Leah would, would
survive and we all would have another chance to be better parents, aunts, uncles, cousins,
friends.
But miracles are funny things.
They're not always what we see.
Sort of like praying for one thing and getting another.
We feel like saying, I'm sorry, God, you got that wrong.
I didn't ask for that.
Well God's ways are not our ways.
And I take comfort in believing that the more the ways of the world makes sense to us, the
further away we are from what really makes sense.
I believe that a lot of miracles have occurred over the past several weeks.
I'm certain that despite the physical manifestations of Leah's illness, she felt at peace inside.
Although she could not speak to us, her spirit did hear all the loving words, feel all the
caring touches and gloried in the many heartfelt prayers.
Leah was a gift to us, one we neither deserved nor paid for.
She was never ours to, she was never ours to own, only ours to care for and enjoy.
And then just the ending is just as a mother, my wish is that Leah's legacy would be this,
that all parents ensure that their children know they are cherished beyond any job, material
possession or other distractions so that every night each child can go to bed knowing how
much he or she is loved.
And in spite of any disagreements or harsh words that may have preceded bedtime.
So that if that day were to be their last, that child would be able to say that he or
she felt loved because that's all that really matters.
So anyway, so I think that was just the Holy Spirit giving me that.
Yeah, the thanks.
Instead of being overcome with the loss, just the gratitude that he had given her to us
and that she was special.
And then I wrote about it 10 years later when I got restructured out of a job.
It's just like bad things, seemingly bad things happen.
But then I had the time to kind of process everything and write it all up.
So you've both shared about how in the midst of some really challenging moments, prayer
has been difficult, but it's been present.
People have sometimes been difficult, but they've also been very present.
And so I'm just wondering, what would you say to anyone else who's going through some
sort of a struggle, someone who is asking, you know, where is God in this?
What might you offer to them?
I actually would say pray for peace, but like I said, in my first encounter with, you know,
facing surgery, affirmations played a big role in calming me down.
So that's one of the things I would say.
And the reason I emphasize peace is because sometimes we can't change the outcome of a
situation.
But if God, if we invoke the Holy Spirit to give us strength and give us peace, we can
get through that situation.
Yeah, yeah, for sure.
What about you, Laura?
Okay, so the question is, what would you say to someone who's struggling and asking where
God is?
I think, well, first I would just want to sit and listen.
Sure.
I wouldn't want to give them any pat answers.
Of course.
One of the things I would say is one woman that I know, she once said to me when I was
going through another difficult time, she just said, remember, God is always with you
in all ways.
And I don't know, you just, sometimes you won't even recognize at the time that he's
there because it's such a difficult thing to be going through.
But later on you'll see it.
You know, you'll see that he was there in just the fact that someone is just kind of
almost magically there, like somebody you need to say just the right words to, or that
they will say just the right words to you.
But yeah, just to know that he is always there, that he loves you, and that he doesn't promise
that there won't be pain, but he will give you grace to carry on through it in various
ways.
Yeah.
What I'd like to say, I think what you mentioned is very important that when you start speaking
to a person, say who's just lost a loved one, is probably saying something might make it
worse.
Sure.
That listening as Laura and I as Stephen ministers and listening is a big part of ministering
to somebody who is grieving or going through some hard time.
And I would agree with you about that, that what I said earlier about the fact that I
would prescribe or suggest script, you know, affirmations, it's something that might not
come immediately after.
I mean, when I meet the person, but I think along the grief, the journey of grieving,
that is something that would be helpful.
Yeah.
So I wanted to emphasize that, that you need to gauge and see where the person is at.
Of course.
Yeah.
Of course.
Yeah.
Well, thank you so much, ladies, for sharing just a part of your story with us for being
so open and vulnerable.
And yeah, for hopefully folks who are listening have found some sense of encouragement, some
sense of at least feeling like we're not alone in this, you know, and you can reach
out to God through prayer, we can reach out to each other.
And so for those who are listening, thank you for joining us and tuning in for this
week's episode of Trinity Talks.
And I do hope that you are able to find some comfort and encouragement in your hard times.
And if there is anything that we can do here at Trinity to help support you in that, please
do reach out.
You can send me an email, kyla, k-y-l-a-h at trinitystreetsville.org and I would be happy
to connect with you.
And we'll see you again for next week's episode of Trinity Talks.