One Big Truth

I was reading Kelly's blog the other day and found this link-up that I want to participate in - and you can read the details of it here, if you'd like.

Most of you who read this have been lurking around my blog for a while and you know the story. You know where I was and how I hurt and how God has wildly redeemed the pain and loss.

Last week I got an email from a reader I've never met...and her story moved me to tears, because as she shared her life with me in that email, I read my own story, with slightly different details. I nodded over and over as I read - because she's walking down the very path I took not all that long ago, and she said reading through the archives of this blog is giving her hope that God is good and He can redeem.

She's not the first person to say those words to me, but each time I hear them from one of you, my mind is absolutely blown...because...

...when I was in the throes of that hurt, I didn't particularly want to read about other people's happiness. With all due respect, it kind of got on my nerves. I'd read and think, "Well, yippee for you that you have everything all patched up and happy in life. Meanwhile, I still hurt. My heart is still broken. I'm not seeing any hope at the end of this thing."

It amazes me how many people are able to read our story - all of it - and find hope in it.

When I was in the hottest, most painful part of the desert, I remember crying out to the Lord, asking Him to find me faithful in the journey - and to make the pain worthwhile. To not waste it. I firmly believed that if He trusted me with such incredible pain, He had a reason. And if I could help someone - anyone - in his/her pain, then it was worth it to me to walk the path.

It was in that season that God directed me to these verses in Deuteronomy 6:

And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you - with great and good cities that you did not build, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant - and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. (vv.10-12)

And I asked Him never to let me forget.

I can look back on that season now without searing pain gripping my heart - and that is something I wasn't sure I could ever say. My heart isn't tugged and ripped with each memory. God has healed my heart and my mind, and I'm grateful.

But I have not forgotten. I've not forgotten how it DID hurt. How it DID cripple me. God's COMPLETE faithfulness. And His unmistakable, undeniable deliverance from that dry, dusty desert.

It's why I'm compelled to share my story...our story...every chance I get. God is good and faithful and I praise Him for bringing me into the promised land.