The sonogram on Tuesday showed 0 babies. God loved them so much that he didn’t even make them walk this Earth like you and I have to do. He just took them straight to be with Him in heaven! Praise God for his grace and mercy on them! A painful aura of love filled the room in the moments following the empty sac on the screen, selfless hearts mourning loss together. God sends pain, pain grows us.
I love pain. I think it’s God’s greatest gift to us. The first thing God taught me from this situation is that physical pain is not the best teacher. Jesus’ biggest struggle on the road to the cross was not the beatings, the crown, the nails, and the struggle for breath. The real pain came from Peter denying he ever knew him, THREE TIMES, Judas’ betrayal, knowing his mom was seeing him suffer so greatly, knowing the people who shouted “CRUCIFY HIM!” had no idea what they were saying. The real pain had to have been the emotional turmoil knowing how much Jesus loved each face he saw, and knowing the only way he could get them (me, you) to understand how deeply the Father loves us was to do it. His prayer in the garden was not a plea to escape the physical pain, but a plea to escape the emotional pain that came with the absolute loneliness he was about to face.
Think about it. None of the most vivid, intense, incredible pains in your life came from something physical. Mine came from here:
1. A phone call in 7th grade saying my friend who I’d been with the night before died in a car crash with his mom, grandmother, and sister.
2. Waking up after fibula repair surgery knowing my athletic career had come to an end.
3. Ending a toxic relationship because God had much better plans for both parties.
4. Seeing an empty hole where a heartbeat should be.
The minutes, hours, weeks, and months that followed each of those occasions were/are excruciatingly painful. And they are supposed to be. They are also 4 times in my life when I died again to myself and Jesus’ light could be seen through me most clearly. This is the first one I get to experience with a complete soul, as Loren is now one with my Spirit, and it’s already hurt the most and taught me the most. I can’t wait to see how this deepens our love for God and brightens our light for His Kingdom.
In Jesus’ name we will consider this trial pure joy (James 1:2-4) and embrace the soreness from spiritual growth. Praise God for this pain because he’s being made strong in our weakness (II Corinthians 12). Some of God’s mightiest warriors came from mom’s like my beautiful bride who had issues bearing children:
In this pain, we will not give credit to Satan. He’s too smart to have children come in to the world through such struggle. He knows the pain they’ve already gone through and will fight to make them lukewarm so they don’t burn so bright against the darkness.
I challenge you to do the same thing. Embrace some pain in your life. Praise Jesus for it. Don’t pray for comfort, for an easy path, for relief. Pray that you are continually made weak, so God’s strength can show through. We’re only here for a little while anyway, we might as well enjoy the suffering while we’re here!
Thank you for your unending prayers on our behalf. Continue to pray, but not that we be comfortable or our pain eased. Pray that God speaks clearly through our pain to bring your hearts closer to his love. We will be parents when he’s ready for us to be. And we couldn’t be more blessed to have such a selfless family to help nurture the next generation of slaves for Christ!
