Last time, she took her “Shero” doll, hand crocheted by her Great Aunt Maureen, the whole way with her when they rolled her away from us and into the operating room to saw open her sternum and get to her one brave heart. 

So a few weeks ago, as she sat on her bedroom floor, pulling on her shoes in the early morning dark, before the long drive back to Sick Kids Hospital in the city and her appointment under the bright lights of the heart catheter lab, I grabbed her worn and ragged blanket, the one I brought with me to China to give her the first day I met her, the one she’s slept with every single night for the 8 years since – and I reached for “Shero,” the masked hero girl doll with all the spiral curls. 

Roads that feel unfair,

can only be walked unalone. 

“No….” She mumbled, shaking her sleepy head. 

I wasn’t quite sure I heard her right?

“No…?” 

“I don’t need Shero this time.” Her voice is soft, still waking, so I only raise my eyebrows, not asking her why she doesn’t need the hero doll with flapping cape.

I mean, the kid’s facing a day of pre-op, with ECGs and echocardiograms and x-rays and bloodwork, and then another day in the heart cath lab, with anaesthetic and an incision, and a 6 hour procedure with a medical team working on her heart, while we all pray that that one wee blood clot that’s lodged in a corner of her artery doesn’t stir but just keeps sleeping on.

I weep for the hard roads such a little human being has to walk but I’m bound and determined she will never face one of them on her own. 

“Hard roads don’t need us to be a hero; hard roads need us to trust the Shepherd. Hard roads don’t need us to find a cape, hard roads need us to gaze into the true Savior’s face. “

It’s a sure way through this one life: Roads that feel unfair, can only be walked unalone. 

When you know life is an uneven playing field, and in all the universe, the only level ground for any and all of us is at the foot of the Cross, then you pick up your Cross and carry it to, so more people feel carried and unalone as they cross all their uneven ground. 

She stands up, shoes on, ready now to go, and leans over to scoop up the stuffed little lamb laying there at the end of her bed.

“No Shero  – I just want my sheep.” 

My eyes don’t leave our little girl’s face, her clutching the stuffed little sheep – and I drop Shero back into her basket. 

We aren’t the heros of any of our stories – we are simply sheep in our story. Because: 

Hard roads don’t need us to be a hero; hard roads need us to trust the Shepherd. Hard roads don’t need us to find a cape, hard roads need us to gaze into the true Savior’s face. 

None of us are the heroes in our own stories but sheep who can trust the Shepherd with our story. 

She reaches to take her worn blanket out of my hand, tucks her little stuffed lamb into the blanket, then tucks blanket and lamb into the crook of her one arm, while slipping the fingers of her other hand through mine. I smile, gently squeeze her hand, bend down to kiss her forehead, and we will go forward like this:

Surrender to being a sheep. 

“Faith never knows the way through, the way out, or the way forward. It simply knows the Way Himself. “

Find deep comfort in being a creature. 

Exhale with the relief and take the next step like this: love simply being a lamb. You do not have to know the way, make the way, find the way, clear the way, or be the way. 

Faith never knows the way through, the way out, or the way forward. It simply knows the Way Himself. 

The way through is not your work, it is the work of your Shepherd. 

The problems are not yours to solve, this is the work of your Shepherd. 

The dangers and challenges and valleys are not yours to navigate – this is all the work of the Shepherd. 

And the Shepherd does not sleep or slumber, the Shepherd keeps watch, the Shepherd keeps working night and day, the Shepherd lays Himself down as the door of the fold, so nothing touches His sheep unless it passes by His watch. 

“The work of the Shepherd is to take care of the sheep, and the work of the sheep is to take care to follow the Shepherd. “

The work of the Shepherd is to take care of the sheep, and the work of the sheep is to take care to follow the Shepherd. 

The work of the sheep is simply to keep eyes on the Shepherd, to keep company with the Shepherd, to keep close to the Shepherd.  

All through our day of pre-op in the hospital, when she lays down her bare arm for the needle of bloodwork, when she’s handed a medical gown for her X-ray, when she lays on a hospital bed for the ultrasound wand of the echocardiogram, for the electrode leads of the EKG, she’s got her wee sheep in hand. Come the 5:30 am start on the day she’s booked for the heart cath lab, I reach to turn off the alarm, and she reaches for the lamb. 

In the moments before her medical team comes to administer a sedative, the nasal spray of  dexmedetomidine, to ease anxiety before they roll her through those swinging doors, she clings to my arm and a little life riddled with all kinds of trauma knows all these wounds under skin that ache and bleed in ways that are hard to see. 

“The Shepherd lays Himself down as the door of the fold, so nothing touches His sheep unless it passes by His watch… “

She finds my eyes, and hers read begging fear, and I gather her up and try to whisper comfort as her panic-tears stream and she white-knuckle grips  my neck.  

In all the aching world, what words can possibly soothe all the  looming fears? What lines can untangle a knotted ball of tightening terror? What do you say when you’re desperate to soothe and somehow offer real comfort? What words can possibly do that?

In the end, this is at base, this Brave Song is all I know. I tuck strands of her tear-damp hair behind her ear and I sing low and quiet, gently rocking her in arms:

Jesus loves you, 

Makes you strong, 

In Him you’re brave, 

And you belong… 

As the medical team tries to administer the spray, as she sob-fights against the sedative, as she desperately seeks some safe in a world of invasive pain, I hold her close and keep singing it brave, over and over, through my own brimming ache, gently wrapping her in the only thing that matters in the end, loaning her courage from the Lion of Judah Himself: 

“Whatever comes to us 

Comes through the Love who is God.“

Jesus loves you….  the Shepherd loves you, 

Makes you strong… the Shepherd protects you, 

In Him you’re brave… the Shepherd gives you Himself, 

And you belong… the Shepherd takes you as His Beloved. 

Nothing else matters more, nothing else can I give her that will mean more, and I sing it on repeat as she weeps and her lamb lays there with her blanket on the bed and I feel the burn of all this heartbusted world and all this love: 

Your Shepherd lets nothing touch your identity as His beloved, your Shepherd lets nothing harm the safety of your soul for all eternity, your Shepherd will guide you through every valley, your Shepherd will protect you as pass through all the shadows, your Shepherd will lead you through every  wilderness – this is the unending work of your undaunted Shepherd. 

“Your Shepherd will lead you through every  wilderness – this is the unending work of your undaunted Shepherd.“

Time and seasons, these are not in the hands of us who are lambs – these are under the care of the Shepherd King of the Cosmos who holds all the world in His hands, and makes His own heart the door of our sheepfold. 

Whatever comes to us 

Comes through the Love who is God.

When she finally gives way to a deep sleep there on my shoulder, I lay her gently down on the hospital bed, so they can roll her away into the heart cath lab — and I kiss her forehead one more time, tuck her blanket around her, tuck the little lamb in beside her. 

And the true Hero of the story, the Shepherd, His eyes and heart never leave his flock, the ones He saw straight through everything and gave His own heart for.

The bright lights in the heart cath, all down the hospital halls, all hum, my heart and hers reverberating in brave song too, part of the flock learning to trust the Shepherd.

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