I think there is probably a part in all of us that longs to know what the future holds so we can feel prepared for what life has in store for us, and possibly even alter that reality. It’s most likely fear and the desire for control that drives this longing. Sometimes I wonder how life would actually play out if God gave us a glimpse into our would-be futures. Would we embrace all that lies ahead? Even the hard parts? Or would we make whatever decisions necessary to avoid our trials and suffering?
If God had told me that our life would be up-ended by disability, would I have chosen to have a third child? Or would my husband and I have stopped with our two healthy, neurotypical children, choosing the easier path in life? Admittedly, I’m inclined to think I would have played the coward and opted out of hardship—bowing down to the idols of ease and comfort.
How gracious of God to not give me that choice. I would have missed out on so, so much. For it is in my trials and suffering that God has brought about more growth, refinement of my faith, eternal perspective, and true joy than any of the “easy” parts of my life.
What a mercy it is that God does not reveal all that life will hold for us, but instead calls us to trust Him fully as He walks with us through it all. If allowed glimpses into our futures, our aversion to pain and suffering would likely cause us to dodge the most formative experiences in our lives. We would bypass the very circumstances that transform us more into Christ’s image and draw us ever closer to His heart.
As we reflect today on Good Friday, I am reminded that unlike us, Jesus did know fully of the suffering that was in store for Him. John 18:4 begins with, “Jesus, knowing all that was going to happen to Him, went…”
This excerpt from the gospel of John is taken from the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus had retreated to the garden with His closest friends in His darkest hour to cry out to His Father, knowing the time had come for Him to die. This quote is immediately followed by Jesus bravely approaching His friend, Judas, who had come to betray Him and the guards who had come to arrest Him. Jesus knew exactly what would happen to Him—betrayal, mockery, false accusations, beating, crucifixion, and most painfully, separation for the first and last time from God the Father. He knew all this would happen. And He went anyway.
Why would He do that? Why would a man knowingly choose to embrace suffering when He could’ve easily avoided it? The Bible tells us in Hebrews 12:2, “For the joy that was set before Him He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” And in Isaiah 53:5, “But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed.”
Jesus embraced suffering for us. We were the joy set before Him. Jesus chose to endure physical pain, the ache of betrayal, humiliation, and the sting of death all to make peace between us and God and heal us from the devastating effects of our own sin. Jesus could have opted out of suffering. But He didn’t. To think of what we would’ve missed out on if He had.
This knowledge leaves me humbled and full of gratitude for a savior who loves me so deeply that He willingly took my place upon the cross. It also makes me thankful that suffering never gets the last word because we serve a God who redeems it all. No matter what light and momentary affliction I face here on earth, God will use it for my good and His glory. Friends, we can look to our futures with nothing to fear.
Our family grew! About a month ago, we added a second dog to our home— a little pug. We named her Mercy. The meaning behind her name is three-fold. 1) When my kids were a bit younger, they loved Kate DiCamillo’s sweet book series about a quirky couple with a pet pig named Mercy Watson. Pugs are pretty pig-like, so it just worked. 2) Psalm 23 says, “surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life” and boy, does Mercy follow us around everywhere! And, 3) Lord, have mercy! This pup is something else!
This might seem like a funny, inconsequential post, simply announcing something as run-of-the-mill as getting a new dog. But to me, the last month has been the sweetest reminder of God’s kindness toward us and His care for the tiniest details of our lives. Stay with me ‘til the end— I will tie this into how God is working in our lives!
Daniel and I both grew up with dogs as a big part of our childhood, and from the time we started dating, we knew we would want to have dogs in our future home. Less than a year after we got married, we adopted Pippin the pug and he truly was our first baby. He was a central figure in our newlywed phase and we loved and doted upon him, as our phones’ camera rolls can attest. Pippin ushered us from the newlywed phase into the new parent stage as we welcomed our human babies into the world. He was there as we brought each of our three children home and he is woven through some of their earliest memories. Pippin brought so much joy into our lives and to me, he will always symbolize one of the sweetest seasons of our life.
After Shep was born, life started to spiral for us. We had three kids, 3 years old and under, that depended on us for just about everything. We were in the throes of genetic testing, lab work, and assessments to gain an explanation for Shep’s developmental delays. Not long after Shep’s first birthday, we got his diagnosis and we began the grieving process all over again. Sleep-deprived, grieving, and overwhelmed, I was in the trenches of depression and felt like there was simply too much on my plate.
Pippin, the dog we’d adored for 8 years, began to feel like more of a burden than a blessing in that season. With three young children to care for, we did not have the ability to care for Pip like we once had. We made the painful, but necessary decision to re-home him. Graciously, my brother and his partner offered to take Pippin for us and we couldn’t be more grateful that he got to stay in the family. Pippin lived out his remaining few years being loved and cared for by family that had known him all along. We were so, so thankful.
We grieved saying goodbye to Pippin. Not just because he was a dog we loved, but also because we felt that we were saying goodbye to a whole chapter of our life–a sweet, joyful, easy season that we look back on so fondly. After Pip, Daniel and I weren’t sure we’d ever get another dog. While in the trenches, we could not imagine being in a space where we would have the capacity to care for an “extra” living being beyond our kids.
Less than two years ago, when Shep was 4, we began entertaining the idea of getting another dog. The dust had settled a bit and we desperately wanted to give our kids the sweet childhood experience of owning a dog, even if it meant making life more complicated for us. We took the plunge and adopted our labrador puppy, Indie. We love our Indie dearly, but I will say that the first year of puppyhood with her was ROUGH. Her energy, size, and destructive tendencies had me questioning on multiple occasions if we had done the right thing in bringing a puppy home.
By the grace of God, we made it through the toughest patch and I can thankfully say that Indie has turned a big corner and we love having her in our family. She is the biggest scaredy-cat, odd duck of a dog I’ve ever met, and is probably the only lab who’s terrified of water—but we love our goofy girl. She has brought out a tenderness in Harrison we’d never seen before and she is such a playful companion for our energetic boy.
We haven’t even made it to the 2 year mark of having a dog again, but for some reason we got the hair-brained idea to add another one to the mix. We were really hoping to find a dog that would be a special buddy for Poppy, who is honestly more interested in having someone to snuggle with than play with.
We were really hesitant to start over with a puppy, so we hoped to find a dog that was a little bit older. We began scouring Craigslist, adoption websites, and humane societies. Unfortunately, none of the dogs available were what we were looking for in terms of breed, size, age, etc. But one morning, I refreshed my Craigslist search for the hundredth time, and up popped a post for an 8-month-old, female pug who was being rehomed because her owners worked full-time and she was home alone too much. By the time I had copied the phone number and sent it to Daniel, the post had been flagged and removed.
We called immediately and were told that we were already second in line. Daniel told the owners that we were extremely interested, explained how we are a home-schooling family that is home a lot, and that we are former pug owners with a major soft spot for the breed. The owners called Daniel back within a couple of hours, told him the pup was ours if we wanted her, and said we could come get her that afternoon.
Daniel and I are not typically parents of the spontaneous variety, so I never thought we’d have the opportunity to surprise our kids with a dog—but that’s exactly what we did, and man, was it fun! I’ll never forget the look on my kids’ faces when Daniel walked in with a new dog in his arms.
Mercy has been the sweetest addition to our family. Little Miss Personality took our home by storm and acts like she’s always lived here. She is sweet, sassy, smart, and snuggly. Mercy is an extreme extrovert and likes to spend every second of her day cuddled up with the closest living being she can find. Poppy simply can’t get enough of her and carries her around like she’s her own little baby. Mercy has been sweet and gentle with Shep, and she makes Harrison laugh every day with her quirky personality. We all adore her!
It has been so fun to watch Indie and Mercy together as well. It took about 12 hours for Mercy to establish herself as the alpha dog and it is pure comedy to watch her run the show and boss around a dog about 6 times her size. The girls act like sisters as they alternate between wrestling, playing tug of war, and snuggling together. Mercy does not give Indie an inch of personal space and is often found sneaking into Indie’s kennel with her and curling up right against her. They are polar opposites in looks, size, and personality, and they couldn’t make a funnier pair. They have been so much fun!
The icing on the cake is that Mercy came to us crate-trained and mostly potty-trained. Thank you, Lord! She hasn’t shown destructive tendencies and really only chews on her toys, not furniture. We feel so spoiled that we got her with the hardest part of the puppy phase being largely behind her, and feel grateful that of our three dogs, bringing Mercy home has been the easiest transition. I’m telling you, getting an 8-month-old puppy rather than an 8-week-old puppy is where it’s at!
All that rambling about our dog stories is to lead me to the point of: God has been kind to us. God hears our prayers even for “silly things” like wanting a new dog. It was clear to us that God orchestrated the details of us finding Mercy–through the unlikelihood of us seeing a post that was live for less than 45 minutes, to us finding a breed that we love that is simply not as common in Idaho as it was in California. These weren’t prayers for essentials like our daily bread or mortgage payment–this was an extra. And still, God blessed us with a “yes”.
To me, the tale of the Miller dogs has a beautiful redemptive arc to it. There has been loss and goodbyes, but there has also been restoration. God restored our ability to own dogs again. He’s brought us into a stable enough place where we could say “yes” to our kids for a request that seems so normal for most families. This is something we never take for granted as our family’s limitations often lead to more “no’s” than yes’s.” God has also restored to me the joy of dog ownership, which was something I lost completely in my darkest season. Owning a dog, for a time, simply felt like a burden too big to bear, and graciously God has allowed me, not just my kids, to experience the joy of having dogs in our home again.
I’ve just felt very thankful over the last month and I thought I would share that joy with those of you who have been following along with our family’s journey. I try to be candid and open about our trials and losses, but I also want to publicly give God the praise He deserves for His abundant kindness as well. We may have long seasons of loss in life, but our God also has been known to restore the years that the locusts have eaten (see Joel 2:25 and Job 42). This season has been a taste of restoration for our family, and we are resting with gratitude in that place.
Of all the spiritual disciplines, I would without hesitation admit that prayer is my weakest. Prayer has often felt more abstract and difficult to grasp for me than a more concrete discipline such as reading my Bible regularly. Reading the Word has a definitive start and stop to it. You can track quantifiable progress. You can check it off your mental to-do list for the day. I’m a list person, so that’s really appealing to me.
But with prayer, it’s so much more open-ended. We are called to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17), which simply means to always have an open line of communication with God. It would be like in the “old days” when people called their friends instead of texting, but after you got them on the line, you simply never hung up. God has given us the privilege of having that kind of access to Him—where we could literally talk to Him at any moment of any day and He leans in to hear us. I’m blown away by this reality and the gift God has given us through this kind of access. Yet, I still struggle with it. Perhaps it’s because I’m too mentally distracted with a million thoughts and to-do lists running through my brain at any given second that I can’t mentally attend long enough to have an actual conversation with God. Or perhaps it’s because I’m a go-getter, “I’ll-solve-the-problem-myself” kind of person who only feels the need to bring my concerns to God when I’ve failed to come up with a proper solution myself. And if I’m being completely honest, some element of my struggle with prayer is the fear of feeling let down if God doesn’t answer my prayers the way I want Him to.
These are issues I’ve wrestled with for years, and God is gradually helping me work through them. In the face of a few very stressful situations recently, my husband and I have been reflecting on a couple of my favorite verses: “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7).
In these verses, we are invited to surrender our anxiety and trade it for peace. Sign me up! At first glance, it seems to indicate that this sweet exchange is simply a result of making our requests known to the Lord. Seems easy enough… but, if you’ve been walking with the Lord any length of time you will know that God is not a genie and prayer is not as trivial as rubbing a magic lamp and asking for what we want. Spoiler alert: God does not always give us what we ask for.
So there has to be more to this anxiety-for-peace trade-off. Making our requests known to the Lord is just one part of a healthy prayer life. God does want us to share our hearts with Him. He beckons us to ask that we might receive (Matthew 7:7). But that’s not all. If you zoom in on the Lord’s Prayer in the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus provides an example of how to pray, we do see an example of supplication, or a request being made in the line “give us this day our daily bread” (Matthew 6:11). However, this supplication is following what I deem to be a much more challenging aspect of prayer—submission. It reads: “Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). True submission means surrendering your will to God’s. We can still make our requests known and share what our hearts desire. But ultimately, we are called to trust that God’s will—what He has for us—is always the best.
Jesus is such a rockstar that He not only modeled this for us in His “sample prayer,” but He lived it out in practice in the Garden of Gethsemane during his final hours. Deeply anguished by the suffering He knew lay ahead of Him, Jesus “fell on His face, and prayed, saying, ‘O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will’” (Matthew 26:39). Being fully God but also fully human, Jesus knew the reality of pain, torment, and fear. Crucifixion was known to be one of the most brutal forms of execution. Understandably, Jesus asked to be spared its anguish as He candidly made His requests known to God. YET, He completely surrendered and submitted to the Father’s will, recognizing that God would not subject Him to anything that would not be worked for our good and His glory. I love that Jesus gave us such a beautiful example of how prayer is the place where supplication and submission meet.
Spiraling back to our Philippians verses about prayer, I notice yet another means of trading in our anxiety and ushering in peace—thanksgiving. When we take time to begin our prayers by giving thanks to the Lord for who He is and what He has done for us, we are shifting the focus from our present trials to a reflection of God’s past faithfulness. When you choose to not rush the thanksgiving part, but really take the time to dwell there for a bit, something shifts in our hearts and minds. God allows us to revisit all the times that He has been there for us and walked us through the valleys of life. This remembrance is evidence that if God was faithful then, He will be faithful today and tomorrow as well. Reminding ourselves us this gives us the confidence we need to submit to His will above our own. He may not remove all our difficult circumstances, but He will get us through them. God is absolutely worthy of our praise and thanksgiving, but I’m willing to bet that He wants us to pray this way for our good.
So, I invite you to join me in the beautiful, challenging, mysterious practice of prayer. Let’s work through the tension of supplication and submission. Let us give God the thanks He deserves and trust Him with what lies ahead. Let us trade in our anxiety for peace. God is listening and He eager to hear from us.
If you too have struggled with prayer, I highly recommend Paul Miller’s The Praying Life. I’ve revisited this book a couple times and found it both challenging and encouraging. I don’t receive commissions or anything—I’m just a friend recommending a good book.
“You’ve only got 18 Christmases with your kids. Make ‘em magical, Mama!”
Parents, no doubt you’ve also come across chipper little guilt trips like this (conveniently linked to a Pinterest board with about a hundred ideas for Christmas crafts, activities, baking projects, and clever traditions guaranteed to make the holidays magical and memorable) while you’ve been absent-mindedly scrolling through social media.
While I’ve worked hard to free myself from the burden of unrealistic expectations through limiting my social media use and choosing not to let comparison to others rob me of my joy, occasionally I’ll feel that all-familiar mom-guilt creep in and I’ll start questioning if I’m doing enough for my kids. Then I’ll jump right on the bandwagon of planning out a “magical” Christmas season full of wondrous activities that my kids may or may not even enjoy.
Well, with Christmas just days away, I can officially say that none of my plans have come to fruition, and the Christmas season in the Miller household has been anything but “magical.” For the last week and a half, ALL FIVE of us Millers have been fighting the virus to end all viruses. We’ve fared fevers, chills, bodyaches, and debilitating exhaustion. Only to roll into phase two consisting of sore throats, coughs, and never-ending congestion. With young kids, our home is no stranger to sickness, but this has got to be the sickest our family has ever been. All at the same time. Earlier in the week, Daniel and I alternated spending half the day in bed while the other had the excruciating task of caring for three sick kids. When you barely have the energy to lift your hair dryer, lifting and caring for your disabled 5 year old son is nearly impossible. It’s been rough over here to put it mildly.
Over the last 10+ days, my kids have missed their class Christmas parties and ice-skating field trip. We’ve baked exactly zero gingerbread cookies and cut out zero paper snowflakes. We haven’t made treats for our neighbors or walked through Winter Wonderland Christmas Light displays. We haven’t made salt dough ornaments or decorated sugar cookies. We’ve been too busy just trying to survive.
I’ve found myself bemoaning the lost time and moping about how this Christmas season has not gone to plan. Yet, in the midst of my pity party, God showed up. He worked through the hearts and generosity of His people to show our family love and provision in incredible ways.
This week, we have had multiple friends show up with homemade chicken soup, breakfast burritos, and full dinners. Bags have been delivered to our front porch full of boxes of tea, popsicles, crackers, orange slices and countless easy snacks for the kids. There have been bags of puzzles and coloring books meant to quietly entertain our kids. Friends have grocery shopped for us and walked our dog when we could barely get off the couch.
With each unexpected front porch delivery, I found myself crying at the realization of my very own “George Bailey” moment. If you’ve somehow made it this far in life without watching It’s A Wonderful Life, the final scene displays George Bailey, completely down on his luck on his very own Christmas that had not gone to plan. There are unwarranted charges of fraud against him and there is a warrant out for his arrest. Without any explanation apart from “George is in trouble,” Bailey’s entire community rallies around him to raise funds and show their support for their friend— no questions asked.
Still from It’s a Wonderful Life (1946). | Paramount Pictures
I felt so humbled to be the recipient of that kind of love this week. To have friends pause their busy lives to show up for you in practical ways, expecting nothing in return—this is a true gift that reflects the heart of God. I’m convinced that there is a special reward in heaven for those who don’t simply ask “do you need anything?” but train their eyes to see the needs, and then jump in to fill them.
In addition to showing me His care and provision this week, God has also forced me to slow down long enough to think about another Christmas that certainly did not go to plan—the very first Christmas. Granted, young Mary was not strapped with the burden of creating a “magical Christmas” for a housefull of kids—she was merely tasked with bringing her firstborn child, God incarnate, into the world. No big deal.
An unwed pregnant teenager, no doubt dealing with the scrutiny and judgment of others, Mary’s “Christmas season” was already off to a rocky start. Factor in over a weeklong roadtrip from Nazareth to Bethlehem either on foot or on a donkey for an untimely census. Imagine arriving in town, 9 months pregnant and exhausted, only to have door after door shut in your face when you inquired after a place to sleep. With no other options, Mary and Joseph settled into a filthy barn to rest for the night. I imagine Joseph desperately making a makeshift “bed” out of a pile of hay for his betrothed. Mary—miles from home, her mother, her friends, or any familiar female companions, would prepare to deliver her very first baby into the world with only the help of her young, inexperienced fiance. I can’t begin to wrap my mind around the fear Mary must have felt in this most life-altering moment of her life. When her baby boy entered the world, Mary did not lay him down in the hand-crafted cradle that surely awaited him at home, but instead gently placed the King of Kings in a humble feeding trough.
I’m guessing almost every detail of the first Christmas story we’ve all become so accustomed to did not go according to Mary’s plan. What kind of birth plan involves being exhausted, far from home, and surrounded by animals for anyone’s baby, let alone God’s son?
Yet, even when all did not go according to Mary’s and Joseph’s plans, God still showed up. He still accomplished what He set out to do. God came to gift us. He came to bless us. To provide for us. Not the other way around. All we do is show up. He does the rest. Even the wise men’s generous, well-meaning gifts for the King paled in comparison to the gift He was bringing to them—Himself.
So as I think on the Christmas season we are currently having, and I recognize just how empty-handed I am in what I’ve had to offer my kids and my God—it’s as if God has invited me to sit back, relax, put my slippered feet up and rest in the truth that it’s not about me and what I bring to the table anyway. This year, He’s invited me to slow down and marvel at His provision, love, and care for me and my family that He’s showing just as much today as He did 2000 years ago.
Christmas has never been about ice skating or how many cookies we bake. It’s not about how much “magic” I can pump into the month of December. It’s only ever been about God’s great love for us. This year, we haven’t done many of the traditional Christmas things we typically do. We’ve had to let a lot go. But we have sat around our kitchen table over bowls of chicken soup, discussing the names and attributes of the God we are celebrating this season. Jehovah Jireh—The Lord Provides— felt especially personal this year.
For the last five years, we have used Shepherd’s birthday as an opportunity to reflect on the past year and remember all the ways God has blessed us, answered prayers, and shown His faithfulness to our family. Each year, we come up with hundreds of examples, both big and small, that are evidence of how God is with us and for us. We write our blessings on birthday-themed “confetti” and decorate our walls.
The more time I spend in God’s Word, the more I notice the call to remembrance. It is a steady theme throughout scripture, but I’d like to highlight a few examples that have stood out to me.
The book Deuteronomy largely acts as Moses’s last big send-off speech to the Israelites as he was about to pass the baton of leadership to Joshua before they headed into the Promised Land. In reading through Moses’s parting words, I was struck by how many times he called for the Israelites to simply REMEMBER God. He urged them to:
Remember how God freed you from slavery.
Remember how He delivered you from your enemies.
Remember how He led you day and night through the wilderness.
Remember how He provided manna and water and met your every need.
Remember how He never left or abandoned you.
Remember how He was faithful and kept His every word.
God even established annual feasts and holidays, rich with tangible symbolism, for the Israelites to commemorate these momentous events in their lives and to help them remember Him. God knew they were a forgetful bunch so He graciously gave them yearly parties to help them in this department.
Following in Moses’s footsteps, Joshua led the Israelites faithfully into the Promised Land and witnessed the power and provision of God countless times. From miraculous military feats with unlikely battle tactics to stopping the flow of the Jordan River to allow the Israelites to pass through on dry ground—these people witnessed the impossible and knew God alone deserved the credit for their victories. If you want to have your mind blown, read through the book of Joshua—who but God brings military defeat through marching, trumpets, shouting, giant hailstones, and making the sun stand still? There is far too much to detail here, but the takeaway is that God is all-powerful and when His people look to Him for their help, victory is certain.
The miracle of God holding back the waters of the Jordan River for the Israelites to walk through it was reminiscent of how He’d parted the Red Sea when His people fled Egypt forty years prior. Since the latter miracle was displayed for the previous generation of people, it is likely that God was reminding this new generation of what He was capable of. God did not want his people to forget that He was their all-powerful provider, protector, and way-maker, so He instructed Joshua to have a man from each of the twelve tribes gather a large stone from the center of the Jordan. They would bring these twelve stones into their camp and set them up as a memorial— a tangible reminder of God’s hand at work. The intention behind the memorial stones was that one day their children would see them and ask what they meant, giving the Israelites the opportunity to not only reflect on God’s faithfulness themselves, but also to teach their children about all God had done for them.
Fast forwarding many years in the biblical narrative, we see the idea of tangible reminders yet again in the book of 1 Samuel. After the Israelites turned from their idols and repented of their wayward living, God granted them victory over their enemies, the Philistines, in a supernatural way (1 Samuel 7). Their leader and prophet, Samuel, set up an Ebenezer as a stone of remembrance saying, “Thus far the Lord has helped us” (1 Samuel 7:12). Samuel wanted the “stone of help” to be a physical, visible reminder of how God had acted on His people’s behalf every time the Israelites saw it.
Throughout scripture, God’s call to remembrance is not only for the Israelites, but for us as well and it serves more than one purpose. God desires for us to have humble hearts of gratitude and acknowledge that the blessings in our lives are not due to our own striving, but due to His abundant mercy (Deut. 6:10-12). He also wants us to recognize the consistency of His faithfulness so we can face all future circumstances without fear, knowing that God will always be with us just as He’s always been (Deut. 7:18-19).
Corrie Ten Boom, one of my favorite pillars of faith once said, “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.” This type of fearless faith is only possible when you choose to REMEMBER who God is and what He has done for you.
Our family has found the practice of remembering God’s faithfulness to be critical for us in combating our fears and cultivating humble, grateful hearts as well. Shep’s birthdays have a way of unearthing our grief over what has been lost and our fear over what the future holds for him and our family. We’ve learned the best way to fight grief is with gratitude. The best way to fight fear is clinging to faith in our faithful God. Our gratitude and faith are increased when we take the time to look back and remember who God is and what He has already done. We can trust God because He’s proven Himself trustworthy.
Our annual reflections have not only been a spiritually healthy practice for us, but they have been an amazing opportunity to teach our kids about God’s faithfulness in a way that is personal and applicable to them as well. Writing our blessings out on tangible pieces of “confetti” is powerful as it gives us a visible display of the abundance of God’s goodness— plus, it’s super festive! Win win!
This is my encouragement to you to adopt a habit of remembrance as well. Whether you opt for ebenezers, memorial stones, or blessing confetti— find a tangible way to represent God’s faithfulness and remember just how good He’s been to you. Watch your gratitude and faith increase as you fix your eyes on who He is and what He’s done for you.
I’d be lying if I said this birthday wasn’t hitting me hard. For starters, you’re my last baby and 5 is just. so. old. Having my youngest child turn 5 graduates me from a young mom to just a plain old mom. How did we get here??
Birthdays are always bittersweet with you, my sweet boy, but 5 feels especially hard. Five is the year many kids are learning to read, taking the training wheels off their bikes, starting Kindergarten, making first friends at school. But for you, five won’t be any of those things. And even after all this time of getting used to that realization, it still hurts.
Each year, you are growing and changing so much physically—you’ve already lost your first couple teeth and gained two adult ones and I am NOT okay with it. You’re bigger and stronger than you were a year ago and it’s getting harder to carry you around. Your body keeps aging, but your mind and soul are still so, so young. My little Peter Pan, it feels like you’ll never fully grow up. How is it possible for this very thing to feel like a gift and grief? Maybe one day we will celebrate a birthday without it feeling like ripping off a scab. But maybe we won’t. And that would be okay too. Because scabs are a sign of healing—which has already begun, but won’t be complete until Jesus calls us home. Until then, sadness and joy can both have a place in our home.
I don’t know all that five holds for you, Shep. Maybe this is the year you learn to sit all by yourself. Or walk around the house in your gait trainer. Maybe you’ll sign or speak your first word. Or maybe you won’t do any of those things.
But I do know that this year, you will smile ‘til your whole face squints. You’ll hold my finger tightly in your hand. You will laugh hysterically at leaf blowers, lawn mowers, trash bags being opened, and at absolutely nothing at all. You will blow raspberries at dinnertime and fling food on the floor. You will squawk loudly in quiet places and never feel ashamed of a fart. You will listen to your favorite songs and start rocking back and forth when a real banger comes on (Wheels on the Bus, I’m looking at you!). This year, you will be tickled by your brother, smothered with kisses by your sister, and snuggled by your mama and daddy. You will bring joy to everyone who has the privilege of knowing you. Because that is just who you are.
Coming up on half a decade with you, it’s hard not to reflect on just how much life has happened for our family over the last 5 years. I remember holding you in the hospital the night you were born. You were swaddled in a brown muslin blanket and adorned with a little pixie bonnet I’d crocheted. Your daddy and I looked into your sleepy face and adored your long fingers and toes, and we wondered aloud what you’d be like as you grew.
You are nothing like we expected you to be. You have been our greatest surprise in life.
And if I’m being honest, for someone as Type A as me, surprises can be a challenge.
I remember early on in our journey, I was so determined that if I worked hard enough and did everything right, we’d help you catch up and close your developmental gaps. Each day, I was playing the roles of physical therapist, speech therapist, feeding therapist, and occupational therapist in addition to carting you around to see all the real professionals we’d lined up to help you succeed. Every moment of the day was a chance to be working on developing skills. I wouldn’t allow myself to just sit and snuggle you. I’d prop you up away from me so you could be working on your head and neck control. I wouldn’t allow myself to just play with you—I had to turn every minute into a teachable, skill-building moment. I was trying so hard to wear all the hats that I forgot how to rest in my most important role—mom.
By His grace, God has helped me to trust that He alone is sovereign over your progress. We still do all the therapies, but I’ve learned to stop putting all my hope in them. I’ve learned to slow down and actually enjoy you where you are at and stop striving so hard for more. Today, we snuggle, we read, we go for long walks, we listen to music, we blow bubbles. I’m no longer trying to “fix” you. I’m learning to embrace you fully. Because you don’t need another therapist. You need a mom. If all you ever learn from me is that you’re loved, it will have been enough.
God has been so good to us, Shep. He’s proven Himself faithful. Proven Himself near. He is working all of our hard things for good. He has given so much peace and joy in the midst of hardship. I never thought we’d be where we are today. But I should’ve expected God to exceed my expectations. That’s just what He does.
Shepherd, as we celebrate your 5th birthday, I am reminded of the gift you are to me. You love unconditionally. You rejoice at the simplest things in life. You smile with your whole being. You laugh with abandon. You are a daily reminder to me that the value we ascribe to trivial things and worldly successes is so often misplaced. You remind me of simple truths. You show me God’s heart for the least of these and paint a vivid picture of how God’s upside down kingdom works. Shep, God giving me you was the best thing that could’ve ever happened to me. You woke me up. God has used your life to refine my faith and transform who I am as a person more than anything else in my life. I am so thankful for you.
I don’t know what the rest of our life’s journey will look like, but I’m so grateful I get to do it with you. I love you more than you’ll ever know.
“Mom, I wish I had a brother to wrestle with. I love Shep, I just wish he could wrestle with me,” Harrison timidly confessed.
“I know, buddy. I understand,” I replied.
This was not the first time my 8 year old son shared this sentiment with me. I was simultaneously pierced by his words and proud of him for telling me how he really felt. I was struck by the irony that the very thing Harrison was pining after was exactly what he was doing—wrestling. He wasn’t wrestling with his brother. He was wrestling with God.
My husband and I have had numerous conversations about how having a disabled son is not only going to impact us, but our other children as well. Just as we have had to process a reality that is far from our expectations and grieve losses, we will need to give Harrison and Poppy the space to process and grieve in their own ways. I shared in a post several months ago that our daughter Poppy is somewhat of an anomaly, in that she appears largely unphased by the setbacks of disability and has not skipped a beat since Shep entered our lives (thus far).
With Harrison, however, we’ve watched him work through his own struggles with having an atypical life due to the confines of disability. Harrison has had to surrender his expectations for what having a little brother would look like. Harrison won’t be teaching his brother to play catch or taking him for bike rides. They won’t love the same books or stay up late talking from a shared bunkbed. They won’t wrestle. Shep naturally slows down our pace of life, which is hard to swallow for my go-getter, extroverted, do-all-the-things son, Harrison. These are undeniable daily losses for him to grieve and he is learning to wrestle through these at a young age.
While it can be easy to look at Poppy’s ability to take life’s setbacks in stride with great admiration, I’m humbled when I think about how much my journey with Shep mirrors Harrison’s. I too, have wrestled with God and continue to do so.
At times, within the Christian community, there is the temptation to race through our trials and feign “okayness” to try to prove to the world that our faith in God is solid and we cannot be shaken. Yet, in reality, taking time to wrestle with God in the midst of our hurt can actually prove to sharpen our faith and draw us nearer to God.
The theme of wrestling appears repeatedly throughout scripture. Job was counted a righteous man and clung to God in the midst of losing every single thing he had— his family, his wealth, his health, his friends. We read his story and are inspired by Job’s initial response “‘Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord’” (Job 1:21). Yet, this same man goes on to say to God, “‘Show me why you contend with me. Does it seem good to You that You should oppress, that You should despise the work of Your hands’” (Job 10:2-3) and “‘Your hands have made me and fashioned me, an intricate unity; Yet you would destroy me’” (vs. 8).
Job is asking the question we’ve all asked at one point or another in the face of hardship— “Why, God?” He is hurting and is not quite ready to take his undesirable circumstances lying down. While Job recognizes God’s sovereignty, he is still wrestling with God over why He would allow such terrible afflictions into His life if God truly made and loved him. This pendulum we see with Job swaying between “blessed be the name of the Lord” and “why me, God?” is oh, so human. Job was not unshakable. He had questions and doubts, and he brought them straight to God himself. Yet, he was still counted a righteous man.
God meets Job where he is at, in the midst of his questioning, and in a somewhat frustrating turn of events, He does not answer all of Job’s questions. He, instead, reminds Job who He is. He is the all-knowing, all-powerful, omnipotent, sovereign God. Our understanding of the world and our own lives pales in comparison to His. This humbling encounter with God leads Job to repent of his pride, and confess that he “uttered what he did not understand” (Job 42:3).Their exchange ends with Job stating, “‘I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You’” (Job 42:5). This back and forth wrestling match draws Job nearer to God and allows him to experience God more intimately than he ever had before.
Another well-known man to wrestle with God in this manner was David, who authored many of the psalms. There are countless examples of David taking his authentic expressions of grief, doubt, fear, and anger directly to God. He wrestles through his own “why God?” questions when he is struggling with feeling abandoned and forsaken. The beauty of these psalms is that David’s unfiltered emotions are spilled out before God right alongside his expression of faith and trust in God, creating a tension—a push and pull—much like wrestling. This is evidence that our relationship with God is never one dimensional. It has depth, just like our other human relationships do. If you’re curious to read some of David’s wrestling for yourself, check out Psalm 13, 22, and 44 for starters.
Finally, I would be remiss to not mention the strangest account of wrestling in the Bible. Jacob, a man who had been promised so much by God, still struggled with fear, insecurity, and doubt. The day before he was about to be reunited with the vengeful twin brother he’d cheated and stolen from, Jacob was afraid and cried out to God for deliverance (Genesis 32:11). Jacob spent a sleepless night alone in the wilderness until a “stranger” showed up. Jacob proceeded to physically wrestle with God all night. God touched Jacob’s hip socket, putting his hip out of joint, and Jacob stubbornly declared, “‘I will not let go unless you bless me!’” (Genesis 32:26).
This odd story that occurred very much in the physical realm is a picture of the spiritual reality at play. Jacob was after God’s deliverance, His blessing, His peace. Those things could only be attained by drawing near to God and wrestling with Him through his fears and doubts. This wrestling match with God led Jacob to declare, “‘I have seen God face to face’” (Genesis 32:30) — an intimacy you cannot claim until you’ve gone toe to toe with God. My favorite detail of this story is that Jacob was left with a limp—a tangible reminder of his encounter with God. This mark of weakness that Jacob would carry with him daily would serve as a reminder of God’s strength, his own frailty, and the time that God drew intimately near.
When I reflect on these three varied accounts, I see how God not only allows our wrestling, but invites us into it and uses it to refine our faith. It is normal to question “why?” when life does not go according to our plan. But so much hinges on where we go with our questions. God wants us to take our doubts, fears, questions and raw emotions to Him, not away from Him. We may not get all the answers we seek, but we just might get a closer glimpse of God Himself.
You have to be close to someone to wrestle with them, and God is constantly beckoning us to come closer. Throughout scripture, God extends invitations for us to draw near to Him in verses such as these: “Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28) and “Cast your anxiety on him because he cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7). These are not empty words from a distant God. These are promises to meet our wrestling with a loving embrace. God promises to draw near to us as we draw near to Him (James 4:8).
I want to add that true wrestling entails bringing your questions to God with the intent of actually seeking to find God in the midst of your mess. The New Testament is full of Pharisees who questioned Jesus with the motive of trapping and disproving Him. Their questions were not sincere—they had already made their minds up about who Jesus was. This kind of questioning is not going to refine your faith. But questions asked from a heart that is sincerely trying to find God in the valley, will do so.
This is my prayer for my Harrison, and for myself—that we would have the courage to wrestle with God in our darkest moments and in doing so, we would see Him face to face. I pray we would not be left unchanged in our wrestling, but be granted the gift of a limp as a daily reminder of a loving God who draws near.
And what about you, friend? With the heaviness in your own heart– are you wrestling with God or running from Him?
We received Shepherd’s diagnosis when he was almost 16 months old. We had recently celebrated his 1st birthday which was a wildly different experience than the 1st birthdays of our older two children. The first year of Shep’s life was full of so many unknowns, so much fear, and sadness at the growing realization that Shep’s life was on a completely different trajectory than what we would have expected. We chose to celebrate intimately, with just the 5 of us. We decorated and had cupcakes that Shep could not partake of himself. It was a bittersweet day.
Upon receiving Shep’s diagnosis just a few months later, our searching had finally come to an end as we now had a concrete explanation for Shep’s lack of developmental progress. While having an answer brought some peace, our grief scab was ripped wide open and we began mourning losses yet again. What we had suspected, we now knew with certainty—Shep wasn’t just delayed, he was disabled. Life as we knew it would never be the same.
The months that followed were some of the darkest times of my life. Shep entered a long season of sleep disturbance that kept us awake all hours of the night for months. Grief coupled with sleep deprivation launched me into a spiral of depression that I had never known before. In addition to tending to Shep’s demanding needs and therapies, I had two other children under age 4 who still depended on me for just about everything. I was a shell of a person and was hardly coping.
I knew that in my weakness I should be looking to God for my strength. I should be praying more and seeking Him. But I honestly did not have the words to say to God. I was shell-shocked by how my life had been completely upended and I didn’t have the capacity to talk to God about it.
It was in this season that my husband, Daniel, sent me a text one day with a link to a spotify playlist that he had created. The playlist was entitled “Hope” and next to the title was a picture of Shep from his 1st birthday. He was sitting in his high chair behind the candlelit cupcake. His tiny hands were clasped together, a smile spread across his glowing face, and he was looking straight up. Somehow I had missed this picture when I had gone through his birthday photos. What I had chosen to remember from that day was how sad I felt. However, while looking at this photo, I felt joy. And Hope.
Shep’s upward gaze is the simplest gesture that really appears like he is looking upward toward God. It felt like a reminder to me to do the same. To this day, I see this photo as a divinely orchestrated gift from God especially to me and I can’t help but smile when I see it.
When I opened the playlist, I saw that Daniel had added several worship songs that brought him hope in this dark and heavy season. He invited me to add to the list, and together we would compile a list of hopeful anthems.
This playlist became a lifeline for me in the valley I was in. It gave me the words to cry out to God when I could not articulate my own. The songs on this list are songs of questioning, weeping, grieving. Songs of surrender. Songs of joyful rebellion and refusal to let the enemy win. Somehow all the feelings of emotional turmoil I felt alone in, had been felt by other people in other situations who were inspired to write about it. A collection of inspired artists put words to the groanings in my heart and it was a complete gift to me. I realized that while my situation might feel unique, pain is a universally shared experience and we all, at some point, are left kneeling before God holding the shattered pieces of our lives and wondering where we go from there. I was able to benefit from this universal human condition by singing the words others had penned when I could not formulate my own.
I have learned that there is great power in praising God in the face of hardship. It is not denying the pain of your situation or making perfect sense of it all, but merely laying it down at the feet of Jesus and telling Him, “I trust you.” Praise is putting God back on His throne and taking myself off of it. It takes great courage to worship from the valleys, but I’ve found that it’s also the best way to pull you out of them. Worshipping God may not change our circumstances in the slightest, but it has the power to change us as we actively choose to align our hearts with His and trust in God’s character, even when it’s hard. Taking our eyes off our trials and fixing them on Jesus instead has a way of putting our problems in perspective. Praise is quite possibly the most powerful weapon we have to fight against depression, fear, and grief. Why wouldn’t we wield it boldly?
I’d love to share our personal Hope Playlist with you if you find yourself in a discouraging season. I encourage you to make your own as well that speaks to you in your specific situation. A dear friend of mine once told me that God often hijacks her Spotify account to have her hear exactly the words she needed that day—maybe He will do the same for you.
Feel free to click the link and add this playlist to your account or listen below: Hope Playlist
I’ll close with lyrics from one of my favorite songwriters, Benjamin William Hastings:
So I will praise You on the mountain And I will praise You when the mountain’s in my way You’re the summit where my feet are So I will praise You in the valleys all the same No less God within the shadows No less faithful when the night leads me astray You’re the heaven where my heart is In the highlands and the heartache all the same
I sat across the table from a few mom friends I hadn’t seen in a while, sipping coffee and eating banana bread, while nearly a dozen kids ran chaotically through my house at what the extroverts call a “playdate” and we introverts refer to as lowgrade torture. I jest…community is important. Even when it is utter chaos.
My friends and I caught up on how the last several months had been and talked about childrearing, homeschooling, health and all the classic conversation topics on a mother’s list. The other women began commiserating on the woes of potty training and the frustration of trying to teach one of their children to read but how it just wasn’t clicking. Everyone was nodding in agreement at the hardships of these scenarios when one of the women said, “yes, well we need to remember that it’s only for a season. Your daughter isn’t going to start kindergarten in diapers. And your son will get the hang of reading eventually.”
It’s only for a season. It’s only for a season. I silently withdrew from the conversation, feeling isolated and well aware that this sentiment meant to encourage and provide hope did not apply to me and my motherhood experience. My son would start kindergarten in diapers. He would likely never learn to read. Or speak. Or walk.
It’s only for a season. Where does that expression leave those of us to whom this phrase no longer applies? For some of us, these words leave us feeling anything but encouraged and hopeful. These words only heighten the realization that some “seasons” are really a lifetime and there is no end in sight for our struggles.
I have felt trapped by the thought of being a caregiver to a disabled son until the day I die. I have felt robbed of the future I hoped for one day. I will be changing diapers, spoon-feeding, and lifting my son in and out of the bathtub until the Lord calls me home.
While this reality is sobering and hard to swallow, it is actually evidence that my friend’s words “it’s only for a season” are, in fact, true. Lifelong struggle is still for a season, albeit a long one. Although it doesn’t always feel like it, this life we live on earth is a blip on the timeline of eternity. James 4:14 describes my life as “a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.” In Psalm 39, David cries out to God and asks Him to remind him of this truth when he says, “O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath” Psalm 39: 4-5
While the thought of mortality and the idea of my life being a fleeting vapor or mist might seem bleak at first glance, it is also a great comfort. As a follower of Jesus, I know my pain and hardship won’t last forever. I trust the promise that when Jesus returns, “He will wipe away every tear from [my] eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4). My life on earth might be hard. Some hardships will last for short seasons and some for the “season” of my whole life – but even that is temporary. I have the hope of Heaven to look forward to where Christ will make all things new and end all suffering and pain.
In the meantime, I can trust that God will equip me each and every day to get through what he’s called me to.
Perhaps you, too, feel trapped in an unending season and feel crushed by the weight of your “no end in sight” circumstances. There is hope for you, my friend. Jesus already defeated death and is offering you an eternity without suffering. And in the vapor of our life on earth, He promises to walk through every season with us—the highs and the lows.
I am not an instinctively compassionate person. I think compassion and empathy come naturally for some people (God bless ‘em!), but I’m willing to bet that most of us could use a bit of coaching in this arena.
I’ve often thought of compassion as merely feeling sorry for someone who is hurting and recognizing the sadness of a situation. But compassion is much, much more than that. The root word of compassion (compati) literally means “to suffer with.” This is not a feeling, it’s an action. Compassion means stepping into someone else’s pain and wearing it with them and bearing it with them. This takes commitment. This requires sacrifice. It is hard enough to bear our own grief; it is a selfless choice to bear the pain of others.
I remember in the early days after receiving Shep’s diagnosis, feeling acutely alone in my grief and aching for the peace of God and the compassion of others. It was an interesting opportunity to observe how others fare in the compassion department when met with a friend’s suffering. I had friends who quietly pulled away from me, uncomfortable in the face of pain, unsure of what to say to me. But I also had friends (and even acquaintances) lean in and truly suffer with me.
As I’ve already stated, I am no compassion expert. I’m sure there have been many times when I too have withdrawn from others because I didn’t know how to respond to their suffering. But God has shown me a thing or two about what true compassion looks like through the people He has placed in my life at the exact time I needed them. So, I’ve compiled a mini guide for those of us interested in growing in compassion. This is by no means a comprehensive list, but merely the top three ways compassion has been shown to me in my seasons of suffering.
Presence
I believe the BEST way to show compassion is simply by showing up and being present with a friend in need. In the first week of receiving Shep’s diagnosis, my friend Amy showed up on my porch with a huge bag of food for dinner (and breakfast for the next day). I barely remember what I said to her or what she said to me, but that is not what mattered in that moment. Amy pulled me into a hug and we BOTH wept together for several long minutes. MY son was the one who received the life-altering diagnosis. MY life was the one that would forever be changed by the news we’d just received. Yet, here was my friend weeping with as much grief as if it had been her son instead. To this day, when I think of what it means to suffer with someone, I think of her. So often we get hung up on having the right words to say, and when we can’t find them, we withdraw to avoid feeling awkward. I’m here to say that there are times when the “right words” don’t matter. Being there matters. Hug your friend. Hold them while they cry. Cry with them. Just be there. Fight the urge to offer a silver lining perspective or quick-fix bandaid sentiments. Validate their pain by sitting with them in it and allowing yourself to feel the sting of it too.
Prayer
There is something so powerful about praying over a hurting friend. When you pray for someone, you are bringing their situation before the all–powerful God who alone can heal, provide peace, change hearts, and work all things together for good. Prayer is surrendering the illusion of control and actively trusting in the goodness of God. Prayer is standing in the gap and speaking life and truth over a friend who might not be in a season to articulate those things themselves.
Praying for a hurting friend is powerful. Praying WITH that friend is even better. When you pray with someone who is grieving, you are lifting the weight of a burden that is too big for either of you to carry and laying it down at the feet of the only one who can.
Practical Help
I decided to stick with all P’s here just so it’s easier to remember. Alliteration is our friend.
This aspect of compassion requires a sacrifice of time and energy. Part of suffering with others means acting on their behalf and providing practical help to ease their burden. Friends, I have never received an unwelcome meal. When you are grieving, getting dinner on the table for your family can feel like an insurmountable task. Bringing dinner to someone who’s hurting is an easy, practical way to show them that you are with them in their suffering. If meals on wheels were a love language, it’d be at the top of my list.
I have also had friends provide practical help for me by:
Watching my older kids so I could take Shep to appointments,
Babysitting all my kids so I could go on much needed dates with my husband,
Holding Shep at group gatherings so I could participate in discussions with fewer distractions,
Offering to feed Shep so I could enjoy my meal while it’s still hot
Obviously these examples are specific to my needs, but everyone has very practical needs like these—it just might take a little investigation to find out what your friend needs.
A side note—most people are terrible at asking for help and many of us struggle to even accept help when it’s offered. Be a bit pushy with your love. Instead of “let me know if you need anything” (they won’t), try “I’d love to bring you dinner this week. Which night works best for you?” It’s much harder to turn this down!
Another side note—you might not be called to show up in all three of these ways for every single person going through a hard time. Use discernment based on your closeness to the individual and pray that God would guide you. You may not always be in a season to offer each one of these forms of compassion, and that’s okay. But God could also be pushing you out of your comfort zone. Ask Him, and follow His leading.
Well, there you have it! My top three ways of showing compassion to others: presence, prayer, practical help. I’ve been so blessed by those who have ministered to my heart in these ways. I’m a total work in progress myself, but I’m grateful for the ways God has used my own suffering to open my eyes to the hurting of others. I pray He continues to help me grow in compassion.
I’d love to hear from you too! What are some ways that you’ve experienced the compassion of others?
Good Shepherd 