Does God Really Love Me?

5 years ago today, We began a journey with the Father that I was not prepared for. We were 2 weeks away from meeting our second son, a little boy that already had so much personality in the womb, but our excitement turned to sorrow as we had to make the phone calls that his heart had stopped beating and he was no longer with us. As I sat in the hospital bed, I remember looking at the two choices that were in front of me: to trust Jesus and allow Him to guide me through this or to turn around and run from Him as fast as I could, because after all, He couldn't possibly really love me if he was allowing this to happen to me. We had prayed so hard for this baby and when we discovered something wasn't right, we prayed harder than we had ever prayed before. We knew that He had the power to make everything right again. But He didn't. As much as my head told me that I should just give up this faith thing, my heart knew different. When I decided to put my faith in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, my soul was sealed by the Holy Spirit. (Ephesians 1:13-14) And I know that nothing is able to separate me from that Love that saved me for all eternity from my own evil heart. (Romans 8:36-39) So no matter how much I hurt and how much it's not fair, I know without a shadow of a doubt that God's love for me is real. He weeps when I weep and He laughs when I laugh. My feelings are no farther from His own heart than the skin on my bones. He breathed his final breath on the cross for me. He knows pain. He understands suffering. He knows better than anyone, especially me, the agony of sacrifice.

5 years ago, I wasn't sure that I could take one more step in this life. The pain was too overwhelming. But He was there right beside me as I tried to sleep through the sounds of newborns crying down the hallway that night in the hospital. He was beside me as I walked out of the hospital with flowers in my arms, but no baby. He was there with me through every moment when I was laying in the shower floor weeping or when I didn't want to get out of bed. He was there as I desperately tried to guide my then 3 year old through the stages of grief, even though I had no idea what the answers were myself. And that day was just the beginning of the story God was using to show me more about who He is and just how much He cares, not just about me, but about the world.

My life will never be the same. Yes, I still grieve. I'm sitting here watching my two boys fighting and I grieve the fact that there should be one more in the pile on the floor. I often think about how different my life could be, should be. But then I am reminded of who I was then and who I am now, what God has done in my life since then, and the beautiful relationship that I now have with my Savior that has bloomed out of sorrow, and I am thankful. So today, just like every August 1 for the last 5 years, we celebrate the gift of our Kristopher Noble and we choose to be grateful, because after all, He does love me more than I could ever ask or imagine. And we have SO much to be grateful for. If we never saw the bitter winter, spring would not be nearly as beautiful. I want to encourage you today, if you are hurting and doubting and you are debating giving up on your faith, please don't. If you are at a crossroads of whether to believe in God in the first place, say yes! If you have never really thought about it before, please think about it! Press in to Him harder than you ever have and I promise you that He is faithful to show you a far deeper and more meaningful life if you allow Him to use this circumstance in your life for His glory. I promise you have so much more to gain, and even more to lose if you choose the other way.

We live in a place where 99% of the people that we meet have no understanding of this Love. Most of them have never even heard His name before. They have the same hurts we do. They grieve and they have sorrow. They have tragedies and disasters too. They struggle to provide for their families, their marriages are broken, they don't know how to raise perfect children, and the only hope that they have is the hope that if they follow the rules and make sure to please whatever gods or ancestors they worship, then maybe something good will happen in their afterlife, if there even is an afterlife. Please think of these people and ask Father to reveal Himself to them and show them what true hope is. And as you bear the burden of your own struggles, remember that you live in a place where you have a choice. You have heard this story about the King of kings who left His throne to come to Earth to live a life just like us, and in His love for us, was despised and rejected and chose to die to make things right in our lives. All of this to give us the hope of a better future, a life with Him for all eternity. This world is not as good as it gets. You know that there are millions of people who have testimony of what Christ as done in their lives. And if you didn't know all of that, now you do. You know there is an option.  What will you choose?