Path Forward - 17. The Child Who Wanted Down

The Child Who Wanted Down

By: Brandon J. Haines

I was like a child being held by a parent...
safe, supported, carried...
but too stubborn to stay in their arms.

I kept trying to get down.

Kept insisting I could stand on my own.

Kept wriggling out of His grip
that was actually saving me.

Even after the storm of Jonathan’s death cracked me
open,
even after God held me through the
suddenness of it,
I went right back to passive faith
as soon as my heart felt mended.

Back to independence.

Back to “I’m fine.”

Back to wanting down to play.

But the storm with mom…
that one didn’t break in a moment.

It stretched long and slow...
a storm that didn’t strike once,
but kept raining until the ground beneath
me was drenched and muddy…
beneath my raw knees…
when my strength failed.

Day after day...

month after month...

year after year...

the slow decline wore down the fight in me.

Not all at once...
but drip by drip...

breath by breath...

tear by tear.

It was the kind of storm...
that doesn’t just shake a man...
it empties him.

And somewhere in that long storm,

my stubbornness began to crack.

My independence began to crumble.

My passive faith began to fail me.

I was still trying to get down,

still trying to walk on my own,

still trying to pretend I didn’t need to be
held...
until the moment I finally couldn’t fight
anymore.

Until the moment my strength ran out.

Until the moment I stopped pushing away
the arms...
that had Never let me go.

And like a child who finally gives up the
struggle,
I became content
to be held.

That was the moment
the storm destroyed the last pieces
of my stubborn independence...
the last pieces
of my passive faith.

And that surrender…
that collapse…
that quiet, exhausted letting go…
is what leads directly into the night
my rescue story started.

The Night When My Rescue Story Started

By Brandon J. Haines

I didn’t walk into that night…
I was shoved into it by life.

Heart trembling, Breath broken,
mind spinning like a loose wheel on the
black ice of life.

I wasn’t brave…

I wasn’t strong…

I wasn’t holding it together…

I broke free from the lie I’d been living…
and let the truth free fall out of me like
Shattered Glass:…

“I’m not okay… I’m barely here…”

No mask…

No pride…

Just a man on the floor…
with nothing left to hide behind…

So I whispered in the dark…
voice cracked…
soul scraped raw:…

”If You’re out there still…

I need a favor…”

Not a blessing…

Not a miracle…

Nort a second chance…

I just need held…
and a hand to pull me out of this place…
where my heart is slowly shattering…

I wasn’t bargaining…

I wasn’t promising…

I was begging… because
begging was all I had left…

And that’s when You came…
not with lightning…
not with thunder…
nor a burning bush…
but with arms strong yet gentle… enough
to lift a man who couldn’t lift himself…

You found me folded on the floor of the…
deepest…
darkest…
pit of a valley…
no words left…
just a shattered heart…
and wails of Hosanna…

You didn’t ask me to climb…
You didn’t ask me to try…

You just held me…
and carried me like a Father…
carries His child… through
a storm… that wanted to break him…

That was the night my rescue story started…

I’m not perfect now…
I’m not polished…

I’m not the hero…
of my own story…

I’m just someone who’s been broken…
someone who’s been held…
someone who’s been lifted…
by a strength…
not found on earth…

I’m someone who…
knows what it feels like to be
saved…
when you have nothing…
left to save yourself with…

And now when I speak to Him…
it’s not pretty…
not rehearsed…
not church pretty…

It’s real…

It’s raw:…

It’s the voice of a man who’s been in the
pit…
and knows exactly…

Who’d climbed in after him…

Some folks wait until the end…

Some wait until they’re desperate…

Some wait until they’re out of options…

But me? I talk to God…
because I remember the night…

He talked back…
without saying a word…
He just held… me until the storm passed…

And when I say,,,
I broke free from the lie I’d been living…

I mean the lie that my mom would
make it…

The night my rescue story started was
November 30,2024…
the night that the doctor told us…
even though we’ve tried everything…
tomorrow we will need to switch to
comfort care… for your mom…

That was the moment that the truth hit me…
the moment the floor gave out…
the moment I finally said…

“I’m not okay… I’m barely here…”

So my Hosanna will never end…
because I will always need Saving…
And my shout of Hosanna will always be…
a cry for Salvation.