Yesterday Pastor Levi Lusko of Fresh Life Church, remembered his daughter Lenya Avery Lusko in a heartwarming post on instagram. She would have turned eleven, and the family participated in a 5k to celebrate her memory and birthday.

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“I so wish we could see her today. Watch her blow out eleven candles and laugh and play with her siblings. I would lift her into the air and shower her with presents. Instead we spent the day thinking of her and looking forward to Heaven….We ran (and walked) a 5k to celebrate her race that she ran & then went to church. I felt close to her and warm as we sang and worshipped Jesus, who she is with even now,” Pastor Levi wrote in his post.

Lenya was the second of three daughters born to Pastor Levi and his wife Jennie. She suffered from asthma, according to an interview Pastor Levi did with Relevant Magazine in 2017.

In December 2012, only five days after Pastor Levi and the rest of the country mourned the deaths 20 kindergartners in the Sandyhook tragedy, he and his family experienced an unimaginable tragedy.  Lenya suffered an asthma attack and was unable to recover.  She was only five years old.

Since Lenya’s passing, the family has grown to a family of six with the arrival of their children Clover and Lennox. Pastor Levi keeps Lenya alive through her siblings. “I blurred my eyes and could imagine her somewhere between Liv and Daisy. I see her in Clover’s spunk and Lennox’s smile.”

In 2015 he wrote Eyes of A Lion, discussing how he faced his grief, and offering help for those facing grief.

 

(image via screengrab)