A heartbreaking story regarding New Jersey worship pastor Jesse Morgan and his family’s loss of their 6-year-old daughter while he was on sabbatical has gone viral.
Jesse Morgan is the pastor of worship and discipleship at Green Pond Bible Chapel, a non-denominational church in Rockaway, New Jersey, and a graduate of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.
Last Saturday (June 1), Morgan, his wife Bethany, and their four children where enjoying the first week of his two month long sabbatical, something he described as a “gift, not a right,” at a lake cottage in Maine when suddenly their last day of relaxing at the cottage turned into tragedy following a “freak accident” involving a badminton racquet.
“This morning was beautiful just like every other morning had been this week,” Morgan wrote in a blog post. “It was a beautiful start to the gift we were given of a sabbatical by our church. We had an amazing lake cottage in Maine and were simply enjoying life together on our last full day here.”
“We were eating a quick lunch by the lake and the kids decided to try badminton in the front yard,” he added. “Bethany and I were relaxing in the back when we heard screaming.”
After rushing to investigate the screaming, the Morgan’s discovered that while the kids were playing the badminton racquet accidentally broke on a downward swing that caused a sharp piece of the racquet to enter their young daughter Lucy’s skull as she was watching on the sideline causing a “catastrophic injury.”
Morgan explains that Lucy was “still breathing but unresponsive as I held her with Bethany crying out to God.”
EMS rushed Lucy to a local children’s hospital and immediately care-flighted her to Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine, where she went directly into surgery to have part of her skull removed to relive pressure that was on her brain.
“She coded, they got her back, and they completed the surgery,” said Morgan. “In the PICU we are being told that there is a very slim chance she recovers. She is currently intubated, has no brain function but occasionally breaths on her own. We are praying for a miracle but our hearts hurt with incomprehensible pain. I have so many scattered thoughts and memories…”
