Tuesday, February 26, 2013

One Year Ago

This morning before I got Josiah up I had a few minutes to spend with the Lord.

Honestly, this is extremely rare. I kid you not that ever since Josiah was born, any time I've tried to get up early to spend time with the Lord, without fail he wakes up. I.Kid.You.Not.

Anyway, this is beside the point. I was reading through my journal entry from this time a year ago, and I melted into tears at the Lord's faithfulness, and I just need to share this with you all. Those of you closest to us know the depth of the struggles we were in. You know our story, and our pain, and you see where we are now. I look at these blessings different these days, knowing how quickly and easily money and earthly things can be taken away. I don't hold them so tightly anymore. I know there will be struggles in the future. But I hope and pray that things are never as dire and desperate as they were a year ago. Here is what I wrote at the beginning of March one year ago:

Earlier this week a friend of ours out of the blue sent us $80. Obviously, we were quite blessed! Then yesterday we went out to Teen Mania for alumni reunion weekend. During one of the services we went up for prayer and this man had a very powerful word for us, that God's favor was on us and He was about to really bless us. After the service this man slipped Rob a note. We looked later and rolled up in this note was $100. We were blown away that twice this week people blessed us with money! But it wasn't until later that I noticed the significance. The total we'd be given that week was $180. If you think about it, a 180 degree turn takes you in the complete opposite direction of where you're headed. We have been on a path of discouragement, joblessness, financial struggle, emotional struggle, uncertainty, lack of faith, etc. But this week God is saying "I am changing the course of your path. I'm doing a 180 degree change of where you've been. You are going to experience encouragement, a job, financial blessing, vision for the future, your faith will grow leaps and bounds. Change is about to happen." .....This is stuff that we would never experience if we didn't go through the fire and trials beforehand. We wouldn't see these kinds of miracles if it weren't for the trials - I feel so blessed that God chose us to go through these things.
Despite my bitterness, lack of faith, frustration, even anger, God's love never fails, it never gives up, never runs out on me. Our lives are going to be a great testimony to others!

Really, this speaks for itself and I don't need to add anything else. I am completely and utterly blown away at God's faithfulness.

2 comments:

King Huckleberry said...

this story is beautiful. totally experience things like this. God is so gracious

- Kailene said...

What a sweet, sweet reminder of the Lord's faithfulness! Thank you for sharing, Steph, I love this!