From Riches to Rags, and the Glory I Found There

Grace can be defined as "the love and mercy given to us by God because God desires us to have it, not because of anything we have done to deserve it." As grieving mothers we are gifted with so much grace from others.  We have husbands who hold us while we weep uncontrollably and hold us together when we feel like our lives have fallen apart. We have parents who look at us and our loss is mirrored in their eyes. They remind you that we are strong and that they are proud of you...even when we don't deserve it.  We have sisters who weep with us, who let us rage about how unfair life us, and who remind us that they miss their nephew too. We have friends who commiserate with us, and try their hardest to understand and to be there for us. Friends who think life is unfair too.   We have ushers in our church who hug us as we're suddenly weeping in our seats because the sermon is about motherhood, reminding us that we will be reunited one day. We h...

I have really been struggling with this latest blog post. I've been wanting to write one for a while, but I keep deleting the offending words as soon as they escape my heart.  Because lately it's been so very hard to hope.  Life has been pretty brutal on my soul in the past few weeks... I keep waiting for this glorious revealing of hope and joy from The Lord, but it hasn't come. I've been waiting for direction from Him, some sort of leading to His plan, but it hasn't come.  I so desire to do what The Lord wants of me, but I feel no prompting for the Holy Spirit, no lighting bolt, no sign pointing to my path.  And so I am waiting...waiting in this desert place.  I do not say this to explain that I have lost faith, because I have not. In fact, in this dry and thirsty heart, I remain alive and I have faith. We all have our desert places, our times of complete despair, pain, and longing.  What sustains us, in the times in which common sense would have us waste ...