When you are in one of the waiting rooms of life, and each and every day of your life has the potential to bring great challenges and hard things, it can be too easy to just keep looking at your issues. The human tendency is to get into a negative loop in the mind, and start thinking that nothing will ever change. That's because your enemy is always at work in your thoughts, and thinking that nothing will get better is exactly what he wants you to believe.
Two years ago, God gave me a vision of our family's future, and it came in pieces. First he showed me that I got into a negative loop myself when I felt overwhelmed by having two boys with special needs and different challenges, and all of our services kept dwindling away. I kept thinking about how unfair it was that I didn't have one other human to help me, since my mom had passed away, my husband was usually at work and got home after we had all gone to bed, and then all the assistance I did have from local agencies dissipated into practically nothing at all. I kept saying in my mind or out loud when anyone was around to listen that I was alone in this or I have to do everything myself. I have no help in this world.
The first thing God did in my heart was to answer me with His word when I declared I have no help.
Once I received this Word of the Lord and had it in my mind, I realized how wrong I had been to keep saying I had to do it all myself without help. From that moment, He gave me another promise, based on more of the truth of the Word. God spoke to my spirit that if I had within me the same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead, the Holy Spirit, I could not only do every single thing required to take care of my two boys but I would help other people in the special needs community too. I could take care of other individuals in different ways and help parents who were feeling the way I was before I got this revelation. But at that time, that was as far as it went and I didn't know where this would even take place, as for the last year we had been researching places which might be good locations to move into with our boys. We wanted somewhere they could feel happy, with warmer weather most of the year, and where all the services had not gone away or decreased in quality, as we felt they had where we live. We looked into may states and different cities, but still didn't know where we were meant to be. We thought we might like to become Floridians!
It wasn't long after God told me the first thing about remaining faithful in my daily care of my kids that he used the words of a few pastors I had been listening to give me the full picture of what I would be able to do, AND at the same time he showed me that I needed to look more closely at Greenville, South Carolina. I had not really had it on my radar but had just seen a YouTube video of one of my favorite vegan guys eating at a restaurant there and touring downtown and Mike and I both commented on how beautiful it was. We did dig in, and so just under two years ago we found out the place had literally everything that we needed and wanted in the lives of our children and for ourselves. God spoke to me again about what would come to pass when we relocated to Greenville, the big picture.....and it was amazing and exciting! I could not wait to get there. A year and a half later, we still live where we are, but decided to go ahead down for a visit and see if we could make some connections. It felt so perfectly natural to be there. So peaceful. Everyone was kind to my kids. Nobody anywhere just started at them like they often do when we are out and about in other locations. But here, if they looked at my sons, they smiled or said hello to them. Some people commented to me on how beautiful my boys were. Liam visited three different playgrounds and even seemed more well received by other kids than he usually is back here. And there was also the fact that I got to meet friends of mine whom with I had only interacted in the online space up until our visit, but when we met in person we were instant family! I rarely get to see people and spend time in person at our current home, and quality time is my love language! I am a people person. (If you have not read the book Love Languages, I think everyone should!) So, when we crossed the state lines to return here, and settled back into normal life for us where we are, I felt what I can only describe as homesickness, for the place we had left behind!
That's the back story, in case anyone wanted to know. And something happens pretty much on the daily around here that makes me just want to think about how much I don't want to live here anymore, and start questioning WHY God, has my husband not been offered a job in the place to which YOU directed us? How long, God? Look what's going on here! Look what happened on the playground last week or at school today. Look how unhappy my high school boy is! Look at how nobody is helping me advance my children to their full potential!
But this week, God was so good and gracious to me, once again. He showed me clearly that I was the one who needed to look at something, and it was not all the problems and timelines my gaze had been fixed upon. It wasn't the issues had hand, real as they may be, where I needed to place my focus. I got this verse in one of my daily readings.
And after reading this, I came across the story of Peter walking on the water to Jesus and then looking away from him at the storm raging around them, not once but twice! OK, God, I understand the reminder. When Peter took his focus off of Jesus, and looked around at what was happening, that was the moment he lost is faith. Jesus has been calling me to keep walking, sometimes in the literal sense, as in my 75 Hard Challenge, that requires 45 minutes of outdoor exercise each day, for a total of 90 minutes of exercise for the day,
Just like in the challenge, where I need to focus on each next step and each small action, and not look at the big picture, I need to apply that to what I am waiting for in faith for my children. Day by day, moment by moment, I can choose to keep my perfect peace by focusing my thoughts on God. And I can remember that I can create our future reality with what I am thinking about now! I don't need to know WHEN. I can just know that He can be trusted, and every word He as spoken to me will be fulfilled.
I don't even need to worry with the questionable things that may happen tomorrow. I just need to believe that God has gone ahead of us, and He will light our path, and if things are not good yet, God hasn't finished. So from now on, when the devil wants to tell me I should be miserable because nothing is ever going to change, I will remember my pastor's message last week when he kept repeating "things change! they really do!" And I will look at Jesus.
God gave me one more confirmation that I needed to seal this and know that I should share this message with others. My beautiful boy Liam, whom I just want the absolute best for as he goes to kindergarten this next school year, showed me how to keep a worshiper's heart, without worry about what is going on around us. Every time we watch a message from Elevation, Liam gets fired up when Pastor Steven is fired up, and he gets excited about the music too. At one point in last week's message, which we kept watching over because it was SO good, there was praise and preaching going on at the same time, and Liam ran up to the screen like this.
This is what he always does! Liam doesn't lack confidence in our love for him, or God's love for him. Some of his favorite words to hear are "God loves Liam," and I think it makes him smile because in his precious heart, he knows it's the truth. He isn't anxious over where he will be on the first day of school, or what he is going to do as he grows up. He just loves Jesus and loves life, and he shows it with the fullest expression he has every single day.
I want to be more like my son. Don't you? Another book suggestion I have is that everyone should read Heaven is For Real by Todd Burpo. In it, his little boy has an out of body experience and when he does get well again and goes home, they find out there is evidence the little boy had been to Heaven. He met people there in his family whom he had never been told about. And he spent a lot of time talking about Jesus and how much Jesus loves children. His father wrote that every time he saw a picture of Jesus, he would critique what wrong with it, explaining why these pictures were not what Jesus really looked like. Then one day, he saw a painting by a young girl named Akiane Kramarik, who said she was given a vision of the Messiah and she painted it. Colton, the little guy in the book, stared at the painting, and his parents asked him what was wrong with this one. He replied that there was nothing wrong with this painting, and in fact, this one had it right. So, if it helps you to visualize as it helps me, I am going to close with their account of what our Lord looks like, because this is the way I picture Him when I really need to fix my eyes on Him and imagine that He is holding me. In the spiritual realm, He always is holding us. He is within us, and closer than the whisper of His name. So whatever you are going though, waiting on, or hoping for, just focus on the One who loves you more than His own life. And don't look away.
