Restoration

It's been one year today. One year since I drove across town to pick up by broken husband. One year since circumstances and situations overwhelmed him to the point of no longer wanting to deal with them. Wanting to be done. For good. I'm so grateful he called me. Grateful for a doctor that understood. Grateful for friends and family that surrounded us that day, prayed for us, and held us together when we were falling apart.

It's been one year. And today is the first time he enters a school again as a teacher, a substitute teacher, but none the less, a teacher. The intentional design of it is not lost on me.  Oh, how His ways are above my own.

It's hard not to feel extra raw today. So much more easily brought to tears, but as I sit at our kitchen table, letting myself leak tears, I begin praying and thinking back over this last year, where we were last year and where we are now.

So I started a list. I believe putting it down in black and white is exceptionally powerful. It allows me to see things more clearly than in my muddled mind. Here's my list:

God's Restoration

·         from almost losing a life to anticipating a new life

I truly wondered about God's timing when He laid it on our hearts to have another baby. From a worldly perspective, we're crazy if not irresponsible and in no position to have another baby. Our finances are rocky at best, and as my husband is self-employed, we are without insurance. But God has provided a way, and we are so very excited to meet our little boy, Grant. Maybe it's my love of words, but the meaning of a name has always been very important to me. Elizabeth means My God is a vow, He is our promise. Elizabeth has not only been a fulfillment of God's promise to us, but she has gone through a time with us in which we can testify to God's faithfulness in keeping His promises.

I look at the name Grant from two different ways. First of all there is the actual word, grant, meaning " to allow the fulfillment of", "to permit as a right, privilege or favor". There is no doubt in my mind that this little boy is a fulfillment of God's favor. He is a gift so beyond what we could have asked for.  Also, the name Grant means great. A word so often used, but with depth. To be great is to be "remarkable in magnitude, degree, or effectiveness", " full of emotion", "markedly superior in character or quality". Again, I chuckle at how fitting his name is for the time in which he is born. Grant is our gift or remarkable magnitude, a gift far superior than anything we could have crafted on our own.

·         from fear to faith

Last year and for most of my life, I have lived in fear, always trying to push it aside. What God has taught me in this year is that it's not about pushing the fear aside, but focusing the eyes of my heart and mind on God, letting Him push the fear aside and fill it's place with faith. When I do that, there is no room for fear to exist.

There was a point in this last year when I was becoming increasingly fearful about our finances, job situations, and the future. It was then I made another list.  A post-it note list. I began writing down all of the ways in which God has been faithful in the past to remind me that He will be faithful in the future. If you come to my house, you will see these stuck to walls in rooms, the refrigerator, pantry and my bathroom mirror. Some are even held up with extra tape because the sticky has worn off. These notes are my own stones stacked to remind me of what God has done and will do. I certainly still have times in which I forget these notes, take my eyes off the faithfulness of God and look to fear again, but I come back faster now to faith because no matter how hard faith is, fear is absolutely paralyzing.

·         from security in what will fail us to security in the One who never will

This has been an on-going process. For so long, I found security in stable circumstances. A good job with a regular paycheck. A budget. A schedule. Anything to decrease the "unknown" of tomorrow. But one year ago, I found myself in the middle of "unknown" with all security stripped away. All but God. It was certainly not because of my great faith or spirituality that I began to find security in God alone, but simply because there was no other option. In this last year, with no other option but to find my everything in God, I've become comfortable there. I was ok not knowing how the next bill was going to get paid. God had provided miraculously before; He would certainly do it again.

Our latest experience with this was in just the last couple of weeks. We had a house payment due on Dec. 1, and we could not see a way that it would get paid without having to ask for help. We're not huge fans of asking for financial help. We'd much prefer to earn it, but we have learned the humility of need and it's a valuable lesson that I would not exchange. So there we were. We had a tenth of our house payment as of November 5. So in working to put my eyes back on God's faithfulness and not the impossibility of the situation, I began an envelope. I put what we had inside, believing against all rational thinking that God would fill the rest. That night, we were blessed beyond words as we received a check from a source I never would have expected. And it was enough. Reminding me again that God is all I need.

So now as we've reached a year of living in the unknown, and I've learned dependence on God, I wondered if I would be able to have that same dependence on Him when circumstances are good. When jobs are good. When paychecks are regular. When an emergency fund is full. Will I still find my security in God? So that has been my new quest: When there is an option of placing my security in something else, to always place it in God. It requires intention, but I'm determined to not let go of what I have been given.

·         from brokenness to being rebuilt in God's design

Over the last year, I've experienced a breaking, breaking of my will, breaking of my pride, breaking of my self-reliance. There's nothing easy about being broken. It hurts. It really hurts. But I now have the benefit of hindsight and can see how I had been trying to control my own life, designing myself, instead of allowing God to be THE God of my life. I had become my own god, looking to myself for strength, answers and ability. God broke my self idolatry and with much mercy and grace, allowed me to bring the pieces of myself to Him so He could begin His grand design in my life.

·         from hopelessness and despair to hoping in God and the journey He walks with us

One year ago, my husband was hopeless and after making sure he was "out of the woods", I fell into despair. Really, I fell apart. After holding our family together and getting us through major obstacles, me and my self-reliance crumbled to the most basic form of functioning. Survival. It was here that I learned how to live one day at a time, to know that enough really is all we need, and that God is good...always. I had learned how to live in faith and dependence on God. How to love His presence and delight in Him. What I still kept at arms length was hope. The loss of hope had been crushing, and I was uncertain that I could let myself feel hope again without the fear of hopelessness.

So for a time, I denied hope. I had learned contentment; I did not need to hope for anymore than I had because what I had was enough. But God had a season of change coming, and I would need to learn how to hope again without the fear of a crushing hopelessness.

It was one morning while my husband and I were discussing his job as an independent financial agent, where his next presentation will be. He was having trouble getting one set up and there is no opportunity for income without a presentation. It's then that he tells me he has been feeling for a couple of weeks a desire to be a school counselor. I was stunned. He had his certification, but after his experiences before, we had decided he would never work in a school system again. He was currently working to become a licensed practicing counselor where he could work in counseling outside of a school. This news that he was feeling a desire to be back in a school as a counselor astounded me. I gave him my support, and he began filling out application, making calls with and putting himself out there. It was then he decided he could substitute teach to help provide for his family. I found myself afraid to hope. Afraid to hope that God would give my husband a counseling job or something better. A salaried job with benefits seemed too good to be for me. I struggled with the emotions for a while until I shared them with my hubby. I was afraid to hope because there is always a chance that God has something else for me, and I don't want to hope for something that God doesn't want for me. I'd done that, and it was crushing. I knew I did not want to go through that again. My sweet husband, suggested that I hope in God instead of an outcome. So that was it. The lesson I needed to learn so that God could restore hope in my life. Hope in Him and in the truth that He will walk with me, carry me, and hold my hand through every step of our journey. It is ok to feel disappointment in outcomes and circumstances; that's only human, but it no longer has to crush me because my hope is in God. There it is. Wholeness. Living in faith, contentment and hope through God.

So here I am. One year later. And as I think of this last year, I cannot help but believe that it has been a year of the Lord's favor in my life (Isaiah 61). I kept thinking that passage was for this upcoming year, but I actually believe this last year was "The Year of the Lord's Favor Part I", and now I'm claiming this next year will be "The Year of the Lord's Favor Part II" because it is not our circumstances or the outcome of our circumstances that determine the Lord's favor. For me, it is about living in His presence, depending on His faithfulness and goodness and learning truth in a world of lies and half-truths. If you look at the structure of the well-known verses in Isaiah 61 ( verse 3) "and provide for those who grieve in Zion-- to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair." (verse 7) "Instead of their shame my people will receive a double portion, and instead of disgrace they will rejoice in their inheritance; and so they will inherit a double portion in their land, and everlasting joy will be theirs."

 There are two parts to these scriptures, and I know I've gone through one of them, but I believe that even the ashes, the mourning, the despair, the shame and disgrace can be a part of God's favor because He is still with me when my life is in ashes, when I mourn loss and when I despair at the future, but He doesn't leave me there. He gives me beauty in my daily life, gladness in His perfect and timely provision and praise for His faithfulness, security, contentment and hope.

He restores me.

One year later, he has restored me.

He will continue to restore me.

And for that, I am deeply thankful.