Adventures in Healing::He speaks

I cried out to God with my voice— To God with my voice; And He gave ear to me. In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord; My hand was stretched out in the night without ceasing; My soul refused to be comforted. I remembered God, and was troubled; I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah You hold my eyelids open; I am so troubled that I cannot speak. I have considered the days of old, The years of ancient times. I call to remembrance my song in the night; I meditate within my heart, And my spirit makes diligent search. Will the Lord cast off forever? And will He be favorable no more? Has His mercy ceased forever? Has His promise failed forevermore? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has He in anger shut up His tender mercies? Selah And I said, “This is my anguish; But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High.” I will remember the works of the Lord; Surely I will remember Your wonders of old. I will also meditate on all Your work, And talk of Your deeds. Your way, O God, is in the sanctuary; Who is so great a God as our God? You are the God who does wonders; You have declared Your strength among the peoples. You have with Your arm redeemed Your people, The sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah The waters saw You, O God; The waters saw You, they were afraid; The depths also trembled. The clouds poured out water; The skies sent out a sound; Your arrows also flashed about. The voice of Your thunder was in the whirlwind; The lightnings lit up the world; The earth trembled and shook. Your way was in the sea, Your path in the great waters, And Your footsteps were not known. You led Your people like a flock By the hand of Moses and Aaron. (Psalms 77:1-20 NKJV)

This is a picture of our monitor. I pleaded with The Lord for a nap time for both boys, at the same time. Although I FEEL as though He hasn’t answered any of my prayers lately, I won’t stop asking or believing. I will choose to acknowledge that He answers…but I have to be honest in my prayer. I’ve asked Him for His will. That’s what He’s doing. Just because my flesh seeks to determine and control His will, doesn’t mean His will is not being done. I love how honest Ps 77 is and how raw it is. Asaph is plagued with doubt-yet he still takes his all to The Lord. Sometimes the pain, physical or emotional, seems too much for us all. But not depending on Him & not trusting Him is so much more painful. In this passage, though…he moves. He doesn’t stay in this place of hopelessness & despair. Verse 11::he remembers. He made a choice to remember & meditate. His will followed. (“A Deeper Kind of Calm-Linda Dillow)

It may seem small. But my pleas with The Lord for a nap time was my desperation for time with Him. I needed a word. I needed quiet. I needed to release. He may not have healed my husband today, but He is healing & redeeming my heart from the disappointment and hurt of watching him hurt. I know if He can do that, He’s still in the business of healing….in all ways. I will continue to believe. So, he was in control of a successful nap time that I committed to Him. I could have been cleaning or on Pinterest or sleeping. But I desperately needed moments with Him. Have you spent moments talking to Him (its okay to be honest with Him, He knows your heart anyway).

If we have difficult conversations with our loved ones, don’t we also love on each other after the fact? The Lord wants that too.

Adventures in Healing pt 2

Today, while we are coping with disappointment, we turned to a bit of creativity and change. He is working through the pain, and trying to deal with no answers. If this is the new normal, the pain, he wants desperately to live in freedom and in a way that allows him to be himself.

This doesn’t mean we give up or stop believing. This means we continue walking, with hope greater than our comprehension, with a God who doesn’t do things the way we want, expect, or THINK we need. We walk with a hope and plea so desperate that we are needy for Him. He is the only healer, provider, and sufficiency. Even when our miracle doesn’t come in a timely way or in a tidy wrapped up packaged testimony that seems perfect & praiseworthy.

Provision. It never comes in expected ways. Sometimes it’s spiritual healing, growth, understanding, etc. Sometimes it’s financial. Sometimes it’s emotional. Sometimes it’s interpersonal. Sometimes it’s all of the above.

Today our provision came in the form of financial blessing & interpersonal. We received a monetary blessing and were poured over with texts and Facebook messages.

The generous soul will be made rich, And he who waters will also be watered himself. (Proverbs 11:25 NKJV)

And just like Solomon, all we ask is for wisdom. Understanding is your greatest gift aside from salvation. Please pour it over us now. 1 Kings 3

I am praying daily, without ceasing, for healing. Whether it be by miracle, through modern medicine, or both. Lord give mercy in healing and grace in the wait.

Adventures in Healing

My first love, before anyone else on this earth, is this man. I have never wanted so badly anything in my life, as much as I wanted to be with him forever. When he asked me to be his wife, he lit a fire deep in my heart to be his greatest source of joy, behind the The Lord. I fail at doing this multiple times a day and actually achieve quite the opposite when I’m a joy stealer. I want more than anything for him to be holy and happy. But sometimes those don’t go together. And sometimes that shatters my heart. I am biased, this I know. But I don’t know anyone who loves people more than he does. He loves to see them through mistakes, through experiences with false teaching, through disappointments from those who say they love….I could go on and on because his ability to love seems boundless. Truly a quality directly from The Lord. I don’t know anyone else who can speak straight the matter with biblical counsel like he does. Without bias or opinion, the Word does the cutting through his speech. And just like that, he is utilized to bring healing. He will be the first to admit fault and that if anything good has come from him, he will credit The Lord. He is anointed. I am beyond blessed to benefit from the character and integrity that are bound up in the heart of this man. He does not waiver in questions of ethics and morals. There are places in our hearts and lives that are “givens” and “absolutes” and we continue to walk. He has not tripped in leading me or leading our boys. He looks for progress and growth. He constantly thinks about, prays for, pushes forward in his job. Oh his “job”. Being in a bed for months at one time, he looked at me, “Melissa, I love my job. I want to be there and I want to be with people”. Given this description, you would expect no other “job” for him than ministry. He is not limited to his title in college ministry, though. That’s not how ministry works. We love students. We love their season. So much opportunity. The independence to make decisions. The new awareness of self and world. The hard theological questions. The challenge to serve and share. The excitement for justice. The love of food! Free food! That’s our motto. But he has this heart for people that takes us beyond college students. Nearly weds. Newlyweds. Hurting marriages. Confused fathers. Those called to the ministry but don’t know where to start. The list could go on and on. Yes, we are flawed. But it’s easy to see flaws. It’s not easy to see the wonder of a man’s honor and nobility when he does his work with grace and does his serving, leading, and admonishing with a gentle and bold approach. He doesn’t do it for grins and approval.

This “leg” of my blog regarding “wife” will speak of my journey in being his wife. Right now, that is wrapped up in serving him however I can at our home and in his ministry. At home, taking care of whatever I can so that he doesn’t have to and he can spend more time at his work–with people. At home–taking care of details that would otherwise cause him more pain. In our ministry–being available to have people in our home, preparing multiple facets in order to have bible studies in our home, making good plans and preparations so that our life is easy in the places where we do have control.

Wife to him in a season of hurting. Hugs and cuddling. An even more intense approach to praying healing over him and for him. Being more stubborn than he is to ensure he doesn’t hurt worse. Spending time pouring myself into Scripture so that I can always have Truth and a word to share with him when we’re discouraged.

We know Truth in this season of no answers and pain. We Trust in this season. We wait now. As we always have, for deliverance & provision.

I hesitate to share what happened this week as we traveled in hopes of answers and help. We received neither, and the experience is hard to describe without using harsh words. I’m not ready to measure that-so for now,know that we are disappointed & displeased with our journey and those who brought us there.

Thank you for praying for us. Thank you for supporting us. Thank you for hurting with us. Thank you for encouraging us.

At this point, we have no evidence that this pain is being caused by anything that is fatal, for that we praise Him. However, this debilitating pain is agony. We will walk by faith, knowing One suffered much more than this to bring us much more. Those are easier words for me as I’m not the one hurting physically.

We pray for healing. We believe Him for healing. However that comes.

Two Hearts, One Flesh week 3 review

 

What a sweet night of discussing our marriages, successes and disasters, and how to seek to better meet the emotional and spiritual needs of our husbands (or soon-to-be husbands). I’m so edified by our time together and very much glean new and purposeful insight into my own marriage husband as I listen to each of your share. We had such great conversation, we didn’t even make it through half of the planned topics!

In review, we mostly discussed the following verses from Proverbs 31 and what they look like in context for us as wives, with our husbands, and for their sake.

¹² She brings him good, not harm,
    all the days of her life.

          **We shared specifically what some specific ways are in which we “harm” our husbands intentionally. What good feedback everyone shared. Sometimes we’re not even being malicious, we just don’t think before we speak or think before we do something at a time that may not be appropriate for him or well-received.

          **Then we also discussed what some ways are in which we could do “good” to our husbands! What a delightful and heart-warming decision it is to resolute that we’re going to seek some ways to be good to him. It takes some intentional effort to make sure we’re doing good to the ones around us.

           **Then we talked about the conviction of “ALL the days of her life”. Not just when we’ve had a good day, feel well, etc. All the days. Praying to keep that one in the forefront of my heart and mind.

²⁶ She speaks with wisdom,
    and faithful instruction is on her tongue.

²⁷ She watches over the affairs of her household
    and does not eat the bread of idleness.
²⁸ Her children arise and call her blessed;
    her husband also, and he praises her:
²⁹ “Many women do noble things,
    but you surpass them all.”

     ***We really walked through these verses and thought through what they mean for us, what they meant in context, and where to go from here in working them out in our own hearts and relationship.

I left our time together feeling refreshed, motivated, and eager to hear my husband arise and call me blessed. I was encouraged to know and remember that my children are already calling me blessed, it just comes in moments and in ways that are specific to my heart’s needs and my children’s abilities to communicate. It comes in ways that are specific to my heart’s needs because it is the Lord sending me those moments and knows exactly how to speak directly to my heart. I want to surpass them all, but mostly I want to surpass myself…..because I always want to grow and move forward. I want to grow, be better, and be changed. Our lives are a marathon. Not a sprint. Let’s move with grace through this marathon and throw away the words “failure” and “disappointment”. Each outcome that isn’t what we expected or prefer, those are outcomes meant for growth and change. They are meant to spur us into a women who “watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.”

I’m praying for you all this week. I’ll miss you so very much next week as we head to the Mayo Clinic. Thank you for praying for us! I know you will have a wonderful time with Kathy & Anne! Same place, same time! Love you ladies!

Two Hearts, One Flesh week 3 preview

 

Whether you are engaged, newly married, or married for 50 years, there are some principles that are not so common in keeping a marriage healthy, goal-oriented, and require a vision.

Tonight, we’ll be discussing (be prepared to talk!) some of these principles and dreaming big in order to take these thoughts, goals, visions, and dreams back to our men. Our prayer tonight will be one of humility and love as we seek to help spark our husband’s heart even more in his relationship with Christ, us, co-workers, and peers. We want to be an agent of growth for our families, which requires some observation and sensitivity at times. Let’s be vulnerable and look into the lives of our men. What are their interests? What are their fears? What excites them? What motivates their spirit? What stirs their affections for Christ? We’ll also incorporate some discussion on the following.

1. As a couple, do something ___________________ than yourself.

2. As a couple, _________________________ together.

3. As a couple, __________________________ peers & _________________ in others.

4. As a couple, _______________________ out to other couples.

 

I’ve been praying steadfastly for you since before this journey began, and have been ever so sensitive to the Spirit as He has led in a different direction sometimes that I would thought would be “just perfect” for us! Come talk with us tonight. By your mere presence, you’ll already be following some of the points we’re discussing! Looking forward to our time together!