God's love is enough...

"Do not be afraid, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. You are precious in my eyes, because you are honored and I love you...the mountains may depart, the hills may be shaken, but my love for you will never leave you and my covenant of peace with you will never be shaken." Isaiah 43:1, 4; 54:10

Dear Friends,

I don't know who or if anyone stops by and reads this blog, but if you do and you've ever been through a very difficult challenge, or maybe you're going through one right now, I think you'll be blessed by the below quote--I was brought to tears.

One of my dear friends just had their second baby and have found out some very difficult news about the health of their new little one. She may have mental retardation and continued physical challenges. What they once thought their lives would be like has been drastically altered. Though, of course, they love her just the same, the reality of their new lives brings tremendous sadness and burden.

They have set up a blog to keep us updated and welcome encouragement through posts. The below quote is one of the posts. Though it talks about having a baby...it seriously can be applied to any of life's challenges...and let me tell you: life is full of them! :)


Welcome to Holland

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to help people who have not shared this unique experience, to understand it, to imagine how it would feel.

It's like this.

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guidebooks and make wonderful plans. The Coliseum. Michelangelo David. The Gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland." "Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean, Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay. The important thing is they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met. It's just a different place. It's slower paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around. And you begin to notice that Holland has windmills. And Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy. And they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there.

And for the rest of your life, you will say, "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain will never, ever go away. Because the loss of that dream is a very, very significant loss. But if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to go to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things. About Holland.

"When God desires to create more power in your life, He creates more friction. He uses this pressure to generate spiritual power. Some people cannot handle it, and run from the pressure instead of receiving the power and using it to rise above the painful experience that produced it." -Excerpt from Streams in the Desert, April 9.

"And David became more and more powerful, because the Lord Almighty was with him." -1 Chronicles 11:9.

I received this very nice email from a friend of mine yesterday. It made my day...

"I just wanted to let you know that even when you're just arranging files that God is pleased with you...sometimes life is upside down and east is right and up is black but i am happy to say i am very glad to know you!!!"

Yay! Chanda, who came to my very first small group (Bible Study), like 7 years ago is now in Switzerland with her husband, Philip. They emailed me a few days ago to let me know that they are four months pregnant with their first kiddo!

Another friend, Angie, who recently moved to Simi Valley with her husband Josh just sent me a video posted on youtube of their great news. They are pregnant too! You can watch their video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVu7SIhZnOU.

So, just rejoicing in their great news! I can't wait to see their little ones.

I just realized that if I hadn't dropped my spanish class this semester I would not have been able to be a part of my new small group on Wednesday nights! It was a difficult thing to do...drop my class that is, but I felt too "spread thin." Plus, I just was not excited about the class which in the end compelled me to drop it.

About a week later, John D. invited me to be a part of the "Turbo Group." As usual, it took me a couple of weeks to process and pray about it before I made a final decision, but the final verdict was "Yes!"

Now that we're going on our third week of Turbo Group, I am so grateful that I am a part of it. It's challenging on many levels (I'll expand on that another time), but I'm really excited to connect with the people involved in the Young Adult Ministry here at my church. They seem like really great people...all very different, yet we all feel called to serve the Lord in similar ways.

So, I just wanted to recognize the great timing of this and say Thanks, Lord! You know best and I see how You conveyed Your message to me. Woohoo!

This quote really resonated with me today...

"We never completely recover from our greatest griefs and are never exactly the same after having passed through them. Yet sorrow that is endured in the right spirit impacts our growth favorably and brings us a greater sense of compassion for others." -J.R. Miller, excerpt from Streams in the Desert, March 11 entry