Finishing Well and Passing Your Faith

Wrestling with God…

I couldn’t understand what was happening.
None of it made sense.
It doesn’t happen this way.

Yet there I was, in less than six months my ability to conceive was stripped from me.
My tubes ruptured my womb empty, my heart grieving, my babies lost.

I had so many questions that didn’t have answers, at least not on this side of eternity.
I had to choose. I had to decide if I would cling to God despite the fact that He could have intervened, that He could have made my babies implant in the right place, He could have kept my tubes from rupturing. I had to choose to believe that either God was good and faithful all the time or He was bad and unfaithful.

So I chose. I chose to cling to my omnipotent, amazingly loving God. Oh, but I didn’t only cling. I wrestled. I brought to God my questions, my pain, my barren body. I asked why. I wrestled over how unfair it was that children were given to mothers and fathers who didn’t care or wouldn’t care or would abuse them. I wrestled with Him over whether fertility treatments were right for our family or not. I clung to Him as I begged for a miracle in my body.

In the wrestling, in the clinging I discovered something. When I wrestled with Him, I was close enough to hear Him speak. He spoke words of comfort, He spoke words of direction, He spoke words of healing. That healing often involved painful cleansings and death to myself, my desires, my way. Oh, but God is bigger than my doubts, bigger than my questions, bigger than my inability to conceive naturally. In the wrestling I grew closer to Him. In the wrestling God blessed me. In the wrestling I have been forever changed.

Are you facing a difficult time in your life? Have you decided to cling to God? If not what are you waiting for?

Are you wrestling with God? As you wrestle are you listening to Him? What is He telling you?

Consider reading Daniel 3:16-18 (Shadrach Meshach and Abednego had to choose whether to cling to God or not. Read their choice).

Then read Genesis 32:22-32 (Jacob wrestles with God and clings to Him until God blesses Him, but he walks away changed forever).

How do these passages shape your ideas of clinging to God and wrestling with Him?

I can’t wait to hear what you think.

Waiting and Strengthening

Her eyes sparkle with awe, wonder, joy. Suddenly her eyes moisten slightly as sadness darkens her countenance. Her eyes betray her inner struggle, but only briefly.

The joy returns as she bends to talk to my little man.

I recognize the emotion in her eyes. I have seen it before – in the mirror.

It is the joy, awe, wonder that a child, a young child exudes. It is the pure joy of watching an image-bearer begin to figure life out. Oh, but then the stab of reality, the pang of truth. I want what I haven’t been able to have. I want a brand-new image-bearer of my own.

It happened to me the other day. While eating at a restaurant with a friend, a precious infant was seated within reach of me. She had chubby rolls, dark hair, and huge bow atop her precious head. She smiled at me, over and over again. Precious, amazing, a gift – one I may never receive again.

My eyes mist. My heart longs, but somehow there is peace. As if God Himself bent low to wrap me in His arms. In His arms the waiting is somehow easier, pressed against His chest, wrapped in His arms, the love of a Father who holds our tears in a bottle, who is the God of all comfort. When I turn my hopes, plans, and dreams over to Him, as I lay my dreams down at His feet again, my mind is renewed, my heart is strengthened, and my soul is at rest.

As I cling to the foundation, the Precious Corner Stone, Jesus, as I wait on Him, I am strengthened. Isaiah 40:31 says, “Yet those who wait for the LORD Will gain new strength…” It is in the clinging and waiting that I am strengthened.

God asks us to wait to strengthen us for what is next, for what is now, and for what may never be. Isn’t He good to strengthen us?

What are you waiting on God for? Please share so we call be praying for each other!

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