When Bob's injury first happened, Lee thought of the two of them and their four children and wanted to shout at God "Why us?" Then, as she details in a story in "Guideposts" magazine, she was amazed by the sight of a friend getting out of her car in Lee's driveway and handing her a goodie bag to take on the plane to Germany where she would go to be at Bob's side until he was ready to travel to the U.S. for further hospitalization and therapy. The goodie bag was full of magazines, candy, aspirin, and a toothbrush.
This friend's proactive kindness was just the beginning of a nationwide tsunami of support the family would receive. A customs agent said to Lee "The nation's thoughts and prayers are with you." And it was true.
In the U.S., Lee would leave her husband occasionally to swim at a YWCA and find herself praying to God. Her prayer was questions: Will I get my husband back? What will happen to me? How are our kids going to cope with this, especially if Bob doesn't get better?
Then she would receive, as if in answer to her prayers, cards and notes and gifts from people around the country. People were praying for Bob, her, and their children in churches, synagogues, and mosques. When her own faith flagged, she could rely on the supportive faith of others, and be lifted up by their love.
Later on, after Bob recuperated and returned to T.V. Journalism, Lee meditated on the experience and what it had taught her and her husband and family:
"No person, no couple, no family, goes through something like that without being changed and learning something about themselves they may never have learned otherwise....The most important thing turned out to be all those prayers that held us close. I found that my faith was deepened by that fact, and that gave me strength, a greater strength than I'd ever known."
Bob's faith was also deeply affected by a spiritual experience he had at the time of his injury.
He says "I found myself enveloped by a pure white light. It was peaceful. My body fell back into the tank, but I floated above it in a place where there was no pain...it felt so good, like soft, welcoming arms. Then it disappeared and I was awake on the floor of the tank.... It's the memory of that white light that's the clearest. I saw what I think must've been heaven. I can still feel its peacefulness. Because of it I have no fear of death now."
Bob recovered, determined to help other Americans who suffer traumatic brain injuries during war. He and Lee have founded the Bob Woodruff Foundation, pouring millions of dollars into support, rehab, and resources, especially for American servicemen and women.
"In the final analysis," said Teilhard de Chardin,"the question of why bad things happen to good people transmutes itself into some very different questions, no longer why something happened, but asking how we will respond, what we intend to do now that it happened."
We may be helpless to prevent the tragedies in our lives. But we are not helpless when it comes to how those tragedies will affect us. We have a choice. We can remain angry, helpless, and drown in bitter isolation. Or we can choose to trust God, face the situation head on, walk through its fire, and walk out transformed, stronger, more resilient, more compassionate, on the other side, as Bob and Lee Woodruff were transformed by the tragedy of his traumatic brain injury.
Because God loves us, God will always remain true to His Word. God will walk beside us all the way, through every good and bad time,strengthening us, guiding us, promising us that good can and will come from anything and everything that life throws at us.
God's actions prove His Word is good. He gave us His Son Jesus to walk with us, teach us, heal us, finally die as we all will die, so we can rise from the dead to live with Him. Who else in our lives has loved us so completely?
"If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but handed him over for us all, how will He not give us everything else along with him? What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?
"No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us." (Romans 8: 31 ff.)