"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble."
Once again I cried myself to sleep a few nights ago during this time of grieving with my parents and brothers and family. I was crying out to the Lord for relief and peace and for Him to come and finally take us home. I had an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness and anger when I fell asleep.
I woke up later in the night my whole body was tingling with love and peace.
The room was filled with a heavy thickness of love and all my senses were heightened.
I could smell and taste this amazing sweet aroma. It smelled like orange blossoms and tasted in my mouth something like honey.
I was so encouraged and uplifted in that moment. I was full of love and joy. I knew that our Jakers was emersed in this feeling too as he is standing before our Lord continually in Heaven.
It was such a beautiful and wonderful experience.
I closed my eyes, my body tingling with the physical weight of God's love revealed to me in that moment and I knew God was ministering to me, to my broken heart in the spirit. I'm thankful He allowed me to actually feel it and know it without having to use blind faith to get through that sad night.
What is striking to me about this experience is that without the sadness of trials on earth we would never experience God in those ways that He reaches out and comforts us. I know that He doesn't always show us Himself and His tenderness physically. Mostly we have to simply believe He is with us and helping us through and in that faith we see the truth. We will see some amazing truth that we are ready to know because of the hardship we were going through, we will see that God was with us the whole way through. That is where I wonder if the most reward comes to us. When we have to have faith without the sight and the physical "feeling" of His nearness.
It's been a few day's since that wonderful time with the Lord and I've noticed a major difference in my day. God replaced my hopelessness and my faithlessness with His hope and His faith. He replaced my desperate longing for His return with His patience and His longsuffering. At least for now the day's are not so miserable. My hope is in the Lord and in Him I can sing praises that He knows what He is doing.
I keep thinking about Jake at 7 years old. So excited about life and adventure and danger.
But even this unbelievably brave Jake that wasn't afraid of anything even at the age of 3, had a really cute fear.
He used to crawl into bed with me (I was in highschool) and I would tell him that at night my old dolls came to life. I wasn't trying to scare him I thought it would be a neat thought that they lived at night but it freaked him out so bad he never got over the idea that dolls might come to life and haunt us all in our sleep.
I think he was afraid of dolls up to his 17 years.
I think about that and I want to call him really quick to laugh with him about it. So as it really hurts to realize I can't call I pray, "Lord, hug Jakers for me and tell him I cannot wait to spend every second I can with him as soon as I'm there, tell him I love him and miss him too much to live without him much longer"
I'm thankful to experience God in a way I would not intimately know Him without the pain this world brings us. But I am looking forward to eternal life with Jesus and my family and friends without all the drama.
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