Alicia and Jeff Lee
CBF field personnel, North Macedonia
Just over a year into our marriage and well into our graduate programs, we were ecstatic to learn we were expecting our first child. That joy turned quickly to concern as Alicia was very sick, in and out of the hospital. We desperately hoped to make it through the second trimester. When that hope was crushed and our world devastated, the Logsdon Seminary faculty enveloped us with love.
Each one of the Logsdon professors spent time with us in our hospital room, praying over us. They entered the worst moment in our lives and stepped into our grief. In a generous act of compassion, they organized a beautiful memorial service for our son—for us, really. However, it was more than that. They created space for our grief, honored our grief and shared in our grief.
We had no idea how our grief would break us, how the loss of our son would nearly destroy our faith and our marriage. While we know God saved our faith and marriage, we can testify that it was God through Logsdon Seminary professors. Their faith provided the scaffolding for our own while we examined the holes our experience had created in our faith. Rather than crumbling altogether, we were sustained by their faith while we reconstructed our own. They acted as our spiritual guides, showing us who God is when we were not sure anymore. They spoke truth into our lives and marriage when we could not see a way forward. They offered us a safe place to question, doubt, reconnect and rebuild.
Now, 17 years after the loss of our son and nearly 11 years in overseas missions, STILL Logsdon professors minister to our hearts, encourage us in our faith and marriage, walk with us through our grief, and partner with us and champion God’s work in North Macedonia. As our spiritual guides, they taught us how to minister to people in their grief through their ministry to us all those years ago. They taught us what it is to embody a ministry of long-term presence because of their faithful ministry to us. And we are forever grateful.
Pray. . .Give. . .Go.