My brother Landon wrote this blog and sent this over to me this week. He wanted to share his heart. Sometimes I forget that Theo and I didn’t just lose Archer, but my family lost him too. They had hopes and dreams for him and what our family would look like.

Batman and Robin. Green Hornet and Kato. Snoopy and Woodstock. This might seem a little nerdy, but please bear with me. 

While we were on our family trip to Minnesota over Labor Day weekend, we went shopping at the Mall of America (MOA) and rode rides at Nickelodeon Universe. It was a blast! We took our son, Maxton, on so many fun rides. He kept saying “more” and signing to us that he wanted to keep riding. It was fun to see, but something, or rather someone, was missing – Archer. 

It hit me the most when my sister, Melissa, and I entered Old Navy to go shopping. In the little kid’s section, there were Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman tee shirts with capes. I thought they were so cute, and I wanted to get one for Max. It brought me back to when I was a kid, and my friends and I would wear Batman and Superman capes and run around the yard pretending to be superheroes. I took over the Batman one and showed Melissa and Brittney.

As I went to put the item back, it hit me…this is one thing I dreamed my son and nephew would do one day. I began to well up with tears and emotion as I held the outfit in my hand and returned it to the rack. 

Back to the nerdy, but I’ll be brief. In the 1988 Batman comic series, there was a story arc called “A Death in the Family” written by Jim Starlin. Batman recently replaced Dick Grayson with Jason Todd as Robin because Dick Grayson became Nightwing. During the storyline, Jason Todd dies…and the Dynamic Duo is broken.

That’s how I felt in the store. We all lost Archer, but Max lost his Robin. His future partner in crime.

That’s not the end of the story, though. In 2004, Jason Todd was resurrected as a character to become a new character – Red Hood. Now while the story doesn’t parallel perfectly because Red Hood was an anti-hero, we know through our hope in Jesus that one day Archer’s body will be resurrected and made whole. 

I was driving in the car on one of the hardest days of the week, Thursdays, because that’s when we lost Archer, and reflecting on the weekend that we had together as a family. As this moment came to mind, the song “Don’t You Give Up On Me” by Brandon Lake began to play. Here are some of the lyrics:

I’ll be your way | When there’s no way out | And I’ll be your strength | When your strength runs out | And if you walk into the fire | I’ll be right there in the flames | I wouldn’t have it any other way | 

‘Cause loving you is easy, yeah

Don’t you give up on me | Don’t you give up on me | ‘Cause when the night’s at its darkest | That’s when the light hits the hardest | Don’t you give up on me | Don’t you give up on me | You ain’t seen what I promised | Child, we’re just getting started

Open your heart | Open your hands | Open your eyelids 
I’ve got more dreams | I’ve got more plans | I’ve got more blessings
Don’t lose your hope | Don’t lose your faith | That’s where your fight is
I got more dreams | I got more plans | I got more blessings

I have so much joy knowing that even though our strength runs out some days and we are walking through this fire, we have someone there helping us out of the valley we are in.