Loss and Life and Redeeming Love

Yes, time heals. As memories and moments fill the chasm of time that passes minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, month by month, year by year we realize we are changed. We are no longer the same person that we were. And that is the gift of time. That is the gift from the Giver and Holder of time.

I have heard from many of you who have loved and lost little babies and big babies, who have loved and lost, the loss felt deep because it matched the depth of love given. Thank you for opening your treasured memories, for being willing to love, and for allowing time to heal you too.

But here is the great thing...the greater thing:

Time, if we let it, can also be redeeming. 

Your story may be different from mine, but the Giver and Holder and Healer of time remains the same. From the very beginning of time, He set out to redeem the broken, heal the hurting, and restore the wounded. Pain and hurt and separation and death were not what He intended, but they are what He has come to redeem, to make whole, to make new again.

God's redeeming love came to me in the form of another baby. Today we celebrate Mitchell's 10th birthday. If you are tracking with me, that is exactly one year and one day after the deep loss of yesterday. Did I know this would happen? No. Did I plan for this to happen? No. But He did.

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In His perfect time, He gave us another baby. And when that tickle of truth became a reality, and due dates were declared, I was sure God was going to redeem the despair of yesterday for me, that November 16 would no longer be a day of death, but of life. Wouldn't that just be great?! But no, that was not His plan. He made it very clear to me that both of these babies were to have their special days; they were not to share the day. So one year and one day later we welcomed Mitch into our family and hearts and lives, and we have never been the same.


Not everyone's story ends up like this, I know. This is how God chose to redeem my story. Because God also had another purpose and plan for Mitch. One that we never could have guessed or assumed or even imagined. God used Mitchell for my life too. How was I to know that three months after Mitch was born I would be fighting for my life in a hospital bed? After my body was attacked by Invasive Group A Strep, and Jesus carried me right through the Valley of the Shadow of Death where I had to choose to give in to God, believing that everything He had planned and purposed for my life and my family were perfect in His plan, or choose to give up on God, taking everything back, holding it tight, declaring my strength was greater than His...I came face to face with Jesus. I knew that giving in to God at that point would go one of two ways: Heaven or Earth. I had to let go completely, trust Him completely, and choose life in Him completely.

So, Earth it was. And I spent the rest of the next number of months getting better. It was a fight. It was hard. It was frustrating. It was a battle with PTSD and life and weakness and kids and renovations (yeah, that happened) and a husband whose health was declining. Through this battle, Mitch became my reason to get out of bed every morning. He became my motivation, my "raison d'être". Not that my other three kids weren't important or loved, but my little baby became my purpose to live. I knew enough to know that he needed me, and that alone was what pushed me through each day. God knew that I was going to need Mitchell, that he would save my very heart and family and life.

My heart is forever grateful for loss and life and love.

He gives and takes away,

He gives and takes away.

My heart will choose to say

Blessed be Your Name.

My heart is forever grateful for loss and life and redeeming love.

Time heals, yes it does. It allows us to celebrate both loss and pain, and joy and life. We grieve and we love. We cry and we laugh. We give and we get. We change and we grow. We are...our life is...redeemed.

Redeeming love. That is the gift given to us by the Giver and Holder of time.

For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:8

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So today we celebrate Mitch! We are so very thankful for the gift he is to our family, and to our community. Mitch is full of life and chatter and fun and chatter and compassion and chatter and love...and did I say chatter? (He is his father's son...😁).

Happy Birthday Mitch! You are loved!