Finding Faith When Prayers Don’t unfold the Way We Expected
“That’s not protection.”
Those were some of my first words after hearing my uncle had passed away in a motorcycle accident.
My uncle, yet only four and a half years older than me, was always more like an older brother. The ornery type. The one who loved so deeply you knew there was no end. The kind of guy who would never let anyone hurt you, and if they ever did, he would take care of it.
He was always a little wild. The kind who liked to test every boundary. He wanted to live out loud, and there was no one who was going to tell him how he should do that.
He taught me to be brave on the three-wheeler, to try jumps on my bike, to live on the edge enough to feel the excitement, but careful enough not to get hurt. He didn’t want me to get hurt, but I think that part was mostly because he didn’t want to get in trouble from Dad for letting me get hurt.
I looked up to him so much. He was so much cooler than me. He could get on anything—a skateboard, a snowboard, a BMX bike, a dirt bike—and hit jumps like they weren’t a threat at all.
He built a half-pipe in our backyard when he was fifteen. A full half-pipe, standing over nine feet tall, just so he could practice one-hand holds on the top rail and feel the rush of jumping at the next level.
He is loved so deeply by our family. The baby of five. The littlest brother. An uncle to four. A great-uncle to many.
My girls would always say, “When Uncle Travis hugs you, you just know he loves you. And you know that if anything ever happened, he would be there.”
Those words are so true.
When Tylie was diagnosed, it hurt him. Deeply hurt him. To be honest, I don’t think I realized the depth of the love in my family until that day.
When it’s your kid, you know your pain is deeper than you can imagine. But seeing that pain reflected in the eyes of your uncle, your mom, your aunts, cousins, mother-in-law, father-in-law, sisters, and brothers—seeing how much they love your child just by looking into their eyes—hits a little different.
He was mad at God. The kind of mad I felt when I said, “That’s not protection.”
I pray day in and day out for protection over my family. Aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters, moms, dads, cousins, nieces, nephews, all our children. Please Lord, protect them and keep them safe.
The truth is, I don’t know why God allows bad things to happen. I don’t have the whole picture.
I know He uses pain for a purpose, but I don’t know why we sometimes have to endure such great loss. I don’t know why prayers for protection don’t always unfold the way I intended them to. We live in a broken world. The Bible speaks of free will, sin, obedience, suffering, and trials. I know those things are real. But some questions still hurt.
What I am grateful for is that Travis wasn’t angry with God over Tylie when he unexpectedly passed, because he had seen God show up for us. He was grateful for the healing and knew only God could have led us to where we are today.
I am grateful Travis knew God, and loved God. I am grateful I know he prayed and asked God for help. He wasn’t the church-on-Sunday kind of guy. He was the talk-to-God-wherever-he-was and show-up-to-love-people-the-way-Jesus-loved kind of guy.
I would change the day he passed if I could. I would go back and tell him not to ride that day. I would prevent this accident in every way possible.
But I find a little comfort in knowing he was doing what he loved. Riding his bike—the one we all hated and begged him not to ride—on a beautiful summer day, with the sun shining and a friend by his side.
He leaves behind three sons and two grandsons. His boys were his whole world. He loved them from the depths of his soul. He leaves behind family who would give anything to have him here.
He entered Heaven before his own mom, which I feel should never be allowed.
But I pray he walked straight into a hug from my father, who loved him so very much, and whom Travis loved just as deeply. I pray Dad greeted him with open arms and said, “They have streets of gold up here. You can ride all you want.”
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
— John 16:33
To love a verse and hate it all at once.
I hate the troubles. The pain. The heartbreak we face in this world.
But I love that this world is not our home, and Heaven is going to be far better than anything we could ever imagine.
Revelation 21:4 says, “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain.”
I’ll be honest—Revelation usually makes me a little nervous about what is to come. But that verse? That sounds wonderful.
No more funerals.
No more phone calls that change everything.
No more tears.
No more goodbyes.
Just Jesus.
And for those of us left here missing Travis, that promise brings a little comfort to a hurting heart.
Grief is hard. It’s a roller coaster of feeling like you can breathe one moment and feeling like you’re going to drown the next. Everyone carries it differently, but no matter how it looks, it is a pain that can feel immeasurable.
I truly don’t believe we were created for this kind of loss. When sin entered the world, everything changed. Death, heartbreak, and separation were never part of God’s original design. This depth of pain was not the plan.
Yet here we are, learning to carry loss while holding tightly to the hope that one day God will make all things new.
Travis Shane Bell, you will be missed more than I can say. The strength and depth of your love for us will never be forgotten and will always be cherished.