Two Inches Tall

Over the past couple of days, I have truly had to eat some of the words I said in my last post. It's not that those things aren't true as we have really had a rough season that began last June and intensified in October with Taylor's rather significant injury. 

It has been rough, I'm not going to lie. And I was feeling really bad about things earlier this week but you know what?

For the first time in our relationship, Dave and I haven't been at each other's throats constantly while enduring a trial. It's been two years since we had that type of dynamic going on in our house. The trials we've been through in the past six months have not splintered our marriage. They've actually brought us closer together.

We've worked things out together.

We've continued faithfully going to church together.

We stressed and cried together the weekend that Tay was in the hospital undergoing surgery.

Together, we wished we could take this burden from her.

We've struggled through Tay's therapy together.

And we've even just simply been together.

Those are things I prayed for and fought for through some times that were more rough than most people realize. Most of our good friends didn't even realize just how desperate things became before we finally decided to put our big kid pants on and deal with what was going on.

So I can sit here and lament the fact that Taylor's arm won't ever be the same, which it won't, or I can be thankful that my daughter still has a functioning arm. Even if it's not perfect. I can be sad that, because of choices we made before we were ever married, the size of our family will not grow until we have grandchildren. Or I can choose to enjoy the child who was given to me.

Because, in all honesty, the precious Haitian people would give anything in this world right now to have the problems I have. Or you have. As I look at this widespread destruction through photographs, it occurs to me that my life looked like that before I allowed Him to work in it. 

Good did come from what I like to call The Dark Period and good will come from what we've endured during this difficult season. This, too, will pass. My prayer is that unexplainable good will also come from the disaster in Haiti. That hundreds of thousands will come to know Jesus as their savior. That we will be shaken from our comfortable lives. Spurred into action.

Recently I found a journal entry of Taylor's. It went something like this:

Dear God and Jesus,

Please help me with my arm. I also hope lots more people will come to know Jesus as their Lord and Savior.

Amen.

When I read that, tears streamed down my face and I immediately told my husband, "Look - she's so worried about her arm that she includes it in all of her prayers. A 10-year-old should not have to make this their top priority."

He looked at me in utter disbelief. Understandably, right?

Because what I should have seen is that, even in a time of despair (we're talking about a 10-year-old; everything has much despair) when she has struggled immensely, cried lakes full of tears, faced fears that were way more grown up than she should have to be, my daughter was not consumed with her problems.

She was still able to look outside of herself. Praying that others would come to know the salvation she does because she knew that her faith was what was getting her through. She knew the Rock on which she stood and, while she wasn't afraid to ask for help for herself, she realized that wasn't even the most pressing issue of the moment.

And that's when I felt about two inches tall.

Thankfully, I have the opportunity to rectify that situation. I have a chance to do better. Be less selfish. Love more deeply. Strengthen relationships. Stop sweating the small stuff. Not all have that chance. 

I pray for the families of those lost in Haiti, for those left behind and are suffering through untold destruction and despair right now. Lord, be near and have mercy on us all.

"He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives, and release from darkness for the prisoners to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn..."

Isaiah 61:1-2