One More For Today...

I've been scouring blogs all day. I love them :) I love the natural parenting blogs, I love the birthing blogs, I love the Jesus blogs. I love them all. I decided to check out John Eldredge's blog for the first time. (If you haven't picked up one of his books I SO recommend it. Wild At Heart changed the way I saw my husband and Captivated changed the way I saw myself). I stumbled onto a blog post titled Healing the Past. Aaaahhhh. Clearly I'm in this space of reliving my past (Judah's birth, etc), and I was so moved by his suggestion of praying through your past.

He says this, "I think God actually does this more often than we know. He'll bring up something that will trigger a memory - we might have a dream, or visit an old haunt of ours, we might see an old friend or sometimes all it takes is just a certain smell like cut grass or a donut shop and bam, we are back in some period of our life. In those moments, invite Jesus into it, into that period in your life. And linger there for a bit, allowing his Spirit to show you what to pray."

This is what I'm looking for. I don't need someone to erase what happened. I don't need someone to undo the sadness and loneliness from that time in my life. I need Jesus to come into that space and heal it. I need to surrender my sadness in the expectation that it will be replaced with acceptance. I need to remember that where the Spirit of the Lord is there is FREEDOM. Jesus was in that hospital room with me. Let me tell you. If there was ONE certain and unwavering Presence during those 27 hours it was the Creator and Sustainer. The Life Giver Himself stood watch over me.

Now that I am reliving some of those memories I am sensing His Presence again. Along with the sadness there is the a deep gratitude for who Judah is. He was born at exactly the right time. He is my reminder that Praise comes from knowing that God is good in the struggle. I made a choice to raise my heart in worship even when I felt abandoned by my husband. I found strength exactly where I needed to find it. And that is the gift that follows me here to Daisy's time. She is an accumulation of all of our hard work and sacrifice. She is a testament of my husband's humility and real heart change. Daisy represents new life for all of us.

And THIS time in our lives would not be as significant or powerful without having first experienced THAT time in our lives.

Thank you John Eldredge for the reminder...