In the acknowledgments of Ten Lies Satan Loves to Tell, I thank a handful of particular people who prayed for me during the time of my writing. One of them, Betty Fraga, died a few months ago. Her funeral/memorial service was just a few days ago.
I met Betty in the summer of 2020. My congregation was meeting outside for worship. We painted squares on the front lawn. People brought their lawn chairs and sat with their families in one of the squares. It’s in this season that Betty showed up at my congregation. She sat with old friends who had invited her.
There are some people who when you meet them, they are just instantly delightful. Betty was one such person. She was a candy-coated version of the fruit of joy. And over the next few years, the conversations I had with Betty before and after church were some of my favorites. She was so encouraging. So interesting. So loving of God and neighbor. So faithful and joyful. She was what every pastor hopes to find in their parishioners. She and her husband joined the congregation a few months later and were there every Sunday.
Fast-forward a couple of years and I hid a major bump in the road of life after I had three rather eventful and draining months.
In November of 2022 my first book, Ten Questions to Ask Every Time You Read the Bible, was released to the world.
In December 2022, I got COVID-19 for the first time.
In January 2023, I started writing my second book, Ten Lies.
These three things became a tipping point for my mental, emotional, and spiritual health. I was not in a good place. I spent 2023 going to therapy to try to unravel the mess.
All three things played their part in the problem. I thought releasing my first book would be this enduring accomplishment. It was something I had been dreaming of and working toward for years. And when it arrived, it felt muted and underwhelming. I had put expectations on it to be the greatest thing in the world. And it was fun and exciting, but it was also fleeting. The joy of it did not last.
Then, I got Covid. And after lying in bed for ten days, I didn’t want to get back to life. I wanted to stay in bed for another week or two. In part that was the fatigue and brain fog of Covid. In part it was depression. And in part it was the reality that I was about to start writing a new book exposing Satan’s lies.
Reflecting on the process of The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis said of the book that he had never written with less enjoyment.
As I started the process of writing Ten Lies, I knew I was probably in for a similar reality.
And so, I asked a handful of people to pray for me during my writing time. 6-8am Tuesday to Saturday. Betty was the first person I asked. Wouldn’t you know it, she was already praying for me every morning at the exact time I asked her to. Every morning at 6am she would be up and exercising and praying. She focused some of her prayer time on my writing and my protection from Satan.
I wrote half of ten lies from January to May of 2023. And it was spiritually challenging. I doubt I would have made it at all without the prayers of those people in the acknowledgments. Once I reached 25,000 words and sent in my proposal, I needed to rest and recover. I returned to finish the task, several months later.
As Ten Lies was finishing up, Betty got some devastating health news. She was a cancer survivor from years ago, and her cancer was back. And after a few months of treatment, the outcome of this cancer became clear.
Betty was at the release party for Ten Lies on January 19. She was celebrating and cheering me on. And on March 3, I was at the hospital, commending her to the Lord, and she passed away. Her husband passed away a few weeks later. They were buried, and we held a double memorial service for them last weekend.
As I sit here now, my plan had been to be writing my third book throughout the summer. It’s a book about prayer. But I am missing the prayers of Betty. And for whatever reason, it’s really hard to move on to the next piece of the series without her.
I don’t think we realize how often this happens in life, the loss of prayers. When our grandparents, godparents, friends, pastors, or that delightful lady at church pass away…there are fewer prayers rising up to God’s throne for us. And I can’t speak to this with any certainty, but I will say that I feel those missing prayers. There’s an emptiness at 6:15am when I’m at the computer trying to write.
It’s probably goes by the simple, familiar name of grief.
My suggestion is simply that perhaps grief is more than an emotional reality. Perhaps there is a spiritual component to the emptiness that we feel. Perhaps those missing prayers are part of what our souls feel as we grieve.
Thanks for the prayers, Betty. See you on the other side.
Andy