{Five Minute Friday | Enjoy}

It's Five Minute Friday. That means unplanned, unedited, straight-from-the-heart-to-the-paper writing. Yep, you just write whatever comes out based on a word you're given. If you have five minutes, you should give it a try!  Find out how here.

This week the prompt is {ENJOY}.

Ready? GO.

I get super-excited about Fall. Some of my favorite things are wrapped up in this season: colorful leaves, crisp morning air, pumpkin-spice everything, firepits, s'mores, turkey, family, football, boots, flannel shirts, cute scarves. Are you smiling? I mean, what girl doesn't feel like she can conquer the world in her favorite pair of blue jeans, a great flannel shirt, and a perfect pair of boots, pumpkin-spice latte in hand. It's my most favorite time of year, lots of things to enjoy.  

But, wait.

I'm quick to remember a time when there was less to enjoy and more to grieve.  When you suffer an incredible loss, pain tries to hijack everything you love about your favorite time year. Stumbling through the holidays grappling with grief and loss is no fun. But, I suppose you find a way to enjoy bits and pieces. You learn to hold grief and gratitude in a kind of healthy tension -- enjoying the moments right in front of you while at the same time remembering those moments that forever changed you.

And then, there's Jesus. My heart will be forever grateful for His unfailing love and faithfulness. He heals and redeems even the most painful moments, eventually, that is. And then, you find gratitude in the midst of your grieving.

Maybe you're still waiting. Perhaps for you, the pain left in the wake of loss is still quite raw. Don't lose hope.  I'm praying for you today. I'm asking God to remind you of His goodness and His nearness. I'm trusting that He will soothe your aching heart by reminding you of His unfailing love.  He sees you.

STOP.

{Move | Day 15 of 31}

Ready? Go.

I am a few days behind, so I’m playing catch up. Life has been moving at a nearly an unsustainable pace. It seems like there is constant motion — always. It can be hard for a girl to catch her breath, and that’s on a good day. Life moves as if it has a mind of its own. Have you ever had a season where life wanted to move on without you? Maybe something wrecked your “normal,” and you felt stuck while life plowed forward without any consideration of you. That happened to me once, just after I lost my first child. Every day for eight months, he was the focus. He was a charming little fellow, so I didn't mind. Then, he was gone. The days immediately following his death were a whirlwind of activity. The funny thing is, you just keep up, somehow.  It's the days after the funeral and burial that run you over like a freight train. Life gets to pick back up where it left off while you are left to try and find your normal again. I couldn't find mine. I insisted that it needed to look and feel something like before. But, that doesn't work, does it?  Life was moving all around me, and I couldn't get unstuck.  God graciously taught me that I had to make a choice to move in the direction of healing. It took a lot of work and quite a bit of surrender and submission to God, but I was moving in a direction, gaining momentum, finding my new normal. And, God never left me to go it alone.

May I encourage you today? Just keep getting back up and do the next thing. Move one step closer in the direction of the One who's already pursuing you. His love for you is relentless. Yes, keep moving toward Him. Eventually, You'll find He is all you need.

Stop.

{Five Minute Friday | Heal}

It's Five Minute Friday. That means unplanned, unedited, straight-from-the-heart-to-the-paper writing. Yep, you just write whatever comes out based on a word you're given. If you have five minutes, you should give it a try!  Find out how here.

This week the prompt is {HEAL}.

Ready? GO.

When my little guy died at eight months old, I expected healing would take a very long time. After losing the next child (she was four days old),  just fifteen months later, there were moments I didn't believe it possible to heal. Who am I kidding? I could barely get myself out of bed for a long while.

Healing is hard work, you know. It took some time for me to want to do it. It seemed easier to bandage my wounds and wear them as a badge. I believed I had earned the right to be angry and confused and wounded - indefinitely.  And so, I refused to cooperate with God and let Him heal me. It didn't take long for my identity to become wrapped up in and defined by my wounds. Anger and confusion turned to resentment and bitterness. But my scars shouldn't define me. Only God's truth can accurately do that.  

I'm so thankful for a God that pursues us. He heals and redeems.

Painful, difficult, dark moments and the wounds they leave behind can help shape us into something beautiful. But only when we come before God honestly, with our souls laid wide open, exposing all the wounded, broken spaces. Nothing is off limits. Nothing goes untouched. That's the hard part. Being honest and vulnerable, giving God unrestricted access to our broken hearts. But then, in the process, He reveals something to us about His character, about His unfailing love and faithfulness. And, you fall more deeply in love with Him and more convinced of His goodness. When God heals, He does so gently, yet with the strongest of hands, and He loves you lavishly in the process. Resting in His love eases the heavy work of healing. And, eventually, God becomes the only thing worth clinging to ever so tightly. And to do that, you're willing to let go of everything else that you've long held. It's a beautiful exchange.

May I encourage you today, sweet friends? He. Is. Good. And, He loves you so. When He asks you to let go of something, trust Him. He truly does know what He's doing.

STOP.

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{Remember His Faithfulness}

Finally, early spring was peeking through the dreary gray of a long, long winter. B. and I piled into the car and headed in a direction that I hadn't been in a long while. This place. It represented some of the most difficult moments of my life. You know, all of the moments I didn't care to relive. I didn't go often.

Each time I visited this place in the past, the pain and anxiety crept in and gripped my heart and mind the second my car approached the driveway. Images raced through my mind in rapid fire and the deep ache that had become so familiar pressed hard on me. Sometimes, I felt better after a visit because that's what happens after a good, ugly cry. Other times, though, bitterness tightened its fierce grip on my heart, and I would leave feeling more hopeless and helpless. But this time it would be different. I was different.

The car turned into the gravel drive and evidence of time passed was striking. Trees were much larger; and, the sprawling, empty field of grass that I remembered wasn't sprawling and empty. There were rows and rows of gravesites, almost as far as my eye could see. My eyes searched for the beautiful tree that grew just behind the plot chosen for my sweet babies, Tyler and Hailey. It took me a few minutes to get out. But, I did.

It's hard to put into words exactly what happened during that graveside visit. B. stayed in the car because he knew this moment was between a girl and God. See, in the weeks and months prior, the Lord had been healing my heart and my perspective. I had finally released the right to be angry and bitter and allowed Him to work a miracle in me. And, He did just that. So, there I was. My being there was a matter of obedience. The Lord was taking me back to this spot so I could see it with fresh eyes through the lens of a healed heart and mind. We had a sweet moment, the Lord and I. I knelt graveside and prayed, weeping. But these tears were different. I was grateful and in awe of God and His unfailing love and faithfulness. Before I knew what happened, my arms were stretched to the sky and I was singing.

For thou O, Lord are high above all the earth. Thou art exalted far above all Gods. I exalt Thee. I exalt Thee. I exalt Thee, O Lord.

In that moment of worship, there was a beautiful exchange: beauty for ashes, joy for mourning. In that moment, He reignited a passion and a calling for worship leading. In that moment, He reminded me of His lavish, unfailing love.

Fast-forward to January 2016. It's a season of many challenges. I'm talking about the kind of challenges that, in the moment, make you want to run and hide. Quit. Give-up. These are the kinds of challenges that sweep through every inch of your world like a tidal wave and knock you off your feet. It's all I could do to keep my head above water. But God has a beautiful way of reminding us that He's with us.

There I was standing in a room during a night of worship. The evening had already been like a breath of fresh air. Just as I was asking the Lord what He wanted me to do, a new song rang out in the room.

I exalt Thee. I exalt Thee. I exalt Thee, O Lord.

I hit my knees. Once again in awe of God's faithfulness. He was reminding me of where He brought me from. He was reminding me that He lifted me out of a deep pit, healed me and restored me. He was reminding me that He was the same God that held me in His hands when I knelt graveside all those years ago. He told me to get up and do the thing He's called me to do with bold faith. Why? Because He's proven Himself faithful over and over again. He is God. He is always God.

May I encourage you today? On those days that God seems far off, remember WHO He is. On those days that God seems quiet, remember how He's been faithful. I promise you this: God is always there and He's always faithful. Do the next thing simply because God is who He says He is. Then watch Him do what only He can do, proving again that He is faithful beyond measure.

He. Never. Leaves. You. He loves you so.

{Proof Prayer is Working}

Prayer is a privilege. A gift. Sometimes, though,  it seems like prayer is one-sided conversation with an imaginary friend. Or even worse, it seems like you're talking to yourself. We know better - we've been taught otherwise. But, do you ever wish there was one tiny indication that your prayers are working? You know, something that would bolster your faith and confidence. Yeah, me too. We know what Scripture says about prayer. But, there are times when it seems like you pray and nothing happens. Nothing. Crickets.  Might I suggest, though, that one of the functions of prayer is to remind us that He is God and we are not. And perhaps, one of the functions of prayer is to change us even before changing our circumstances or without changing our circumstances at all. Maybe that's our proof, our sign, that it's working. Yeah, what if it's that? 

Meet Hannah. Hannah was wife to Elkanah. (Let's call him E. from now on.) But, Hannah wasn't the only wife in E.'s house. Meet Peninnah, the other woman. (Let's call her P. from now on.)  There were two important distinctions made between these women. First, P. had children and Hannah did not. Hannah was barren. Second, E. loved Hannah; she was his favorite. Maybe the complexity of the situation isn't obvious. First, having children back in the day was a big deal. It was such a big deal that women who were unable to have children were considered failures. So, there's that. Then, add to the mix that the other woman in the house made it her business to provoke and irritate Hannah and the situation seems unbearable.  See, P. treated Hannah as a rival. And poor E., he didn't get it. He didn't understand Hannah's plight and was convinced that his love for her should be enough to soothe Hannah's sad heart.

So, here's what we know about Hannah so far. Hannah was barren, misunderstood, provoked, ridiculed, bitterly angry, wept openly, and wouldn't eat or sleep. Her heart was grieved and her soul was in deep anguish. She was physically ill. Have you ever been in such anguish that it physically hurt? This is the Hannah we find in verse nine. Scripture says she was at the temple of the Lord and guess what she does? She prayed. No, wait. Hannah poured out her soul to the Lord. Poured out her soul. Then, she went on her way and ate and her face was no longer downcast. And, there it is. She poured her heart out honestly to the Lord and was changed. Her circumstance didn't change immediately, but she did. That's what it looks like when we leave our stuff at the feet of Jesus. When Hannah got up, she wasn't carrying the weight of her anguish and grief, and you can see the difference on her face and in her behavior. She wasn't carrying it, because the Lord carried it for her. Early the next morning, Scripture says the family worshiped. Hannah worshiped though everything around her remained unchanged.

The Lord did give Hannah a son, the one she asked for when she poured out her soul. She named him Samuel. What's more remarkable than that is that when Samuel was still young, she took him back to the temple at Shiloh (the same temple where she poured her soul out) to live and serve. Samuel was Israel's greatest judge.

Here's what Hannah teaches us:

1. Prayer and intimacy with God will change you. Pray honestly and specifically. The Lord can handle our deep anguish and grieved hearts. He expects us to be honest with Him. In my life, the most healing comes only when I'm willing to be honest with Him. When we refuse to see our real selves and cooperate with His process, when we refuse to be honest with Him, we are rejecting the work He wants to do to change us. 

2. Even in the midst of difficult circumstances, choose to worship. When presented with the choice, don't choose to wallow in your anguish and trouble. There's a difference between going-through-the-motions worship and honest-straight-from-the-heart worship. Perfunctory prayer often cultivates going-through-the-motions worship. Hannah could worship honestly before the Lord because she prayed honestly to the Lord. And, she chose to worship though her circumstances remained unchanged.

3. Open-handed living is the best way. Hannah recognized the child she was given was given to her by God. Samuel was His before he was her's. Just like everything we've been given. Hannah gives us a beautiful example of open-handed living. What's mine is not mine. What's mine is His. That's why she took him to the temple. God did great things through the life of Samuel.

4. God's timing is impeccable and there is a bigger picture that reaches beyond what you want. Scripture says the Lord closed Hannah's womb. Until just the right time. God had very specific purposes for Samuel, just like with all of us. He places us in a specific space in time -- no sooner, no later -- than exactly when He wants us. There was something bigger going on here, something that would impact an entire nation.  Maybe if God had answered Hannah's prayer a few years earlier, she would have been less likely to bring the child back to the temple. You never know. But, you can be sure God knew. The same holds true for us.

May I encourage you and challenge you today? Are you're sitting in an impossible situation waiting for God to "birth" something of substance? Pray. Pray about it more than you talk about it. And, don't wallow. Let your prayers be honest and let them do the work of changing you while God does the work of changing the circumstances. God will equip you to sit in the same impossible situation and be filled with joy. He will, if you let Him. Be like Hannah. Be brave. Be honest. Be steadfast.

After Hannah left her son Samuel, she prayed again. "My heart rejoices in the Lord. . ." When we land there, we can be sure our prayers are doing exactly what they are designed to do.

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