The Lord God said, āIt is not good for man to be alone. I will make a helper(ezer) suitable (kenegdo) for him.ā Genesis 2:18
March 3, 2000, 9AM
When Bonnie and I arrive at the hospital, we are still exhausted from the long night before, but propping each other up. The nurse I spoke with at 6AM told me that Ron had had a quiet night. My own sleep was punctuated by the cacophony of crashing metal and squealing brakes, an auditory reminder of my husbandās serious car accident. Later, Iād called various schools and reported absences, receiving murmurs of sympathy. We havenāt brought Allen with us this time; I want to be able to prepare him for the condition of his father. Last night in the trauma recovery room, Ron had been as still and gray as a waxed image.
My daughter and I hold hands and paste smiles onto our faces as walk down the halls of a hospital that is already too familiar, too overwhelming. We enter the ICU on tiptoe, loathe to disturb the silence broken only by the whirr of medical machines. Ron lies on a raised bed behind a blue curtain, his arms tied down with tubes and straps. The ventilator makes his chest rise and fall and emits the sound of wooshing air. I touch his hand. He stirs. Eyelids flicker. On the other side of the bed, Bonnie rests her hand on her fatherās shoulder. He shudders, as he does sometimes in a bad dream.
We wait. We have been told by the surgeon who pieced together Ronās broken body last night that his condition is serious, but his chances of recovery are good. Four weeks, Dr Huffman estimated, until he would be well enough to leave.
We believed her.
The word āhelpmeetā in the Book of Genesis is frequently read as āhelpmateā, but both words in modern times have a demeaning connotation, implying that the WomanāEveāformed from the rib of ManāAdamāwas less than he, a sort of second-class human being.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
In Genesis 2:18, Eve is described in Hebrew as āezer kenegdoā, difficult to translate because itās two words. āKenegdoā is pretty simple. It means āopposite, or alongsideā; woman is equal to man, just different. āEzerā is a bit harder. It is used 21 times in the Old Testament and according to Strongās Concordance, means āto rescue, to save.āĀ EzerĀ denotes strength.
Rather than being a mere āhelperā to man, woman is to be his strength and his rescuer.
But I didnāt know this as a 21-year old bride, my handsome husband beside me, our lives before us. I didnāt know that the years after our marriage would cause me to grow in both strength and endurance, that the four weeks predicted by Dr. Huffman would become ten months, and then seep into nineteen years of continued rescuing from both physical and mental issues. I didnāt know the power that would become mine as I became both mother and father to my children, financial supporter of our family, and caregiver to Ron.
I grew into the role ofĀ ezer kenegdo. I pray that I did it well.
And on this, the anniversary of those long-ago vows we made to one another, I want to tell my dear Ron that, given the choice, I would gladly do it all again.
Despite the difficulty of so many years, I would still be caring for Ron if he was here. What is something that you would still be doing if given the choice?
