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When Sarah prayed for people, she wrote their name down and what she asked God to give them.” He handed a journal to me, and I opened it to see the bubbles of her handwriting. Again and again, leafing through it, I saw my name. “Sarah prayed for you every day,” he said. “Every single day, she put your name down.” Even now, I burst into tears. I had grown up so lonely. Not always alone, but always lonely. And that whole time, Sarah had thought of me with love every day, possibly at the very moments when I felt the most lost. That realization—that I was never truly alone all that time—changed how I thought about heaven, it wasn’t some place in the sky. It was with Sarah, and Sarah was with me. What had seemed like blind faith when we lost Sarah, the naive thought that we were protected, was real. I was never alone, and everything was going to be okay. I stayed up late to read through the journals, seeing for myself how Sarah was always thinking of ways to help people and be of service. As I read, I began to feel an overwhelming sense of purpose, and I realized that I had inherited Sarah’s. I would keep her work alive through my life. Those are pretty big shoes to fill, I remember thinking. Just as quickly, I pushed away my fears: Well, they’re the only ones you’ve got.
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