Where is God when You Know Everything is Going to Change?

 July 17 was the closest I've ever (knowingly) been to death.

As someone raised in the church, I've thought a lot about the mortality of my body. I never shied away from the idea of death, and in a sense-- sometimes healthy, sometimes not-- I even found the idea a comfort. The removal of pain and suffering and uncertainty and hormones and sickness and worrying about food and social anxiety. Knowing my soul will one day be free of the weight of surviving feels like a relief. 

And if this was it, I was ready.

My life didn't flash before my eyes. I didn't think about my regrets or my choices or my dreams I wouldn't get to fulfil. I just thought about my body.

At this moment of urgent need, I felt thankful. 

Thankful that my uterus tried and my heart beat and my lungs breathed and my kidneys and liver and stomach and brain all knew what to do from the beginning. Now, sitting in the hospital, bleeding internally, I knew my body again kept me alive.

That night, I could have dismissed my pain. I'd already wasted money at the hospital a couple days before where my pain was written off because it was quiet. Because it was calm. Because I didn't advocate firmly enough.

Because I let them ignore the results staring out at them from the screen.

There's a weight to things when you know they are true. That night, I knew if I went to sleep off the pain and silence the fear, I wouldn't wake up the next morning. And for that knowing, I was proud of my body. 

When you know everything is going to change, life looks different. Thinking feels different. Better or worse, it doesn't matter, but there's an awareness that it will never be this moment again. You'll never be this version of you again. 

Grief tugs at our anchor to reality, to our foundation. 

We are alive every day. As obvious as that sounds, how often do we wake up, complete our routine, and go back to sleep without letting ourselves feel or think, because it's too scary or overwhelming? We numb ourselves with normalcy and to-do lists and "this really cool new thing I'm trying."

The waves rise, and we feel that anchor tug against us. We can no longer drift idly on the tides, careful only not to disturb the surface. Whether the thing we lose is given up or taken, if it's sudden or slow, when we grieve, that pretense is disturbed. Now we're fighting every second against the waves just to be. 

A lot of people stay here the rest of their lives. Fighting. Always fighting. Fighting to make it calm, fighting to put it back to normal, fighting to ignore it by focusing on other things. Fighting against the real problem.

I've found myself here the last few months. Fighting to go back to normal, to focus on other things.

But the grief isn't mine alone. 

It's my husband's. It's everyone's who has lost a child, who has lost a loved one, who has lost a dream or a job or a friendship or an opportunity or a freedom or an ability or a love that never was. 

We're all anchored. 

The question is, to what?

Anchored to reality, sure. But what truth holds you fast? What keeps you from drifting off or capsizing or being broken up by the waves?

What truth steadies you in the uncertainty and the fear and the pain and the loneliness and the darkness and the anxiety? Is there a truth tethering you to hope and peace and confidence?

I will tell you mine.

In that room, while I sat alone in the hospital bed, knowing my ruptured fallopian tube was still pumping blood into my stomach while the OR techs "took their time," knowing my husband was waiting without update in the other room, knowing what this surgery meant, knowing that tomorrow isn't promised, that 20 minutes from now isn't promised... the truth that anchored me is the same that has carried me through every storm, that transcends this world, anchored in He Who created it. 

The stories about God walking Israel through the Red Sea, about Jesus calming the storm, about the Holy Spirit appearing as a flame in new believers... maybe they feel far away from you. Maybe it all sounds metaphorical. Maybe some of it is.

But I can tell you that His comfort, His peace, His wisdom, His love, they are ever-present. 

I didn't feel scared that day. Not of losing my grasp on this life. Because I know this isn't the best there is. This world and everything you can do here can be amazing. God didn't create a world of nothing, but of life and life abundant. 

Still, it isn't the best there is.

I wanted to stay, and I was ready to go. I knew there was so much more ahead. So much more above. So much more to this moment than random chance. 

And so my soul was at peace.

Where is God in Grief?

Though I write this from the perspective of losing a loved one, I know there are many grieving now. A chronic condition. An unexpected firing. A loss of normalcy. A system, touted to protect the people, set against them. A society that responds to their cry of, "I do matter to you, don't I?" with a patronizing, "Doesn't everyone?"

Grief.

A topic I've shared ad nauseum. But you write what you know, and grief is a path I've walked and felt and been drastically altered by. Sometimes I feel like the person I was before, during, and throughout the many years since, is so incredibly different that if they all gathered in one room, they'd feel shy and uncomfortable and they'd grasp at small talk straws with little success at finding common ground.

Grief changes you. It hurts, and yet in some ways, it fills you. It guides you. It gives meaning to everything-- a song you sang together, a joke they made about a street sign, a food they loved. Suddenly everything leads back to them. Nothing is just itself anymore.

It's all accompanied by that gnawing feeling. The questions. The numbness. The echoing pain in the pit of your stomach.

It's hard to define. There are so many emotions tied together and plated as "grief".

Grief is fear. As a female raised in the Christian church, a lot of my time growing up was filled with dreams of marriage. There were approximately zero days in middle and high school in which I didn't have romantic feelings for someone. Then, grief. My sister's husband dies. The walls go up. I didn't know I was building them, and I didn't really even notice them until I met someone that started turning this hidden key, and I was terrified and pulling away, and I'm yelling at myself like don't you dare let someone in that could be ripped away from you. Please. Not that again.

Anything else.

Grief is recklessness. I rebel against my insides by antagonizing my outsides. I run until my chest feels like it's collapsing. I throw myself at adrenaline. I'd rather risk everything else. At least it'll just be physical pain and not this emotional/mental/spiritual barbed wire I find myself wrapped up in. Constant movement, constant noise, constant distraction. Get up from my desk one morning and quit my job. Anything. Look outward, focus on the surface. Compartmentalize the deep.

Grief is disappointment. A lot of the loss felt when grieving someone (or something) is this sense of disappointment. You've lost a part of your future that you were really looking forward to. Like you're left standing there, holding the remnants of your dreams in your hands thinking it'll never be enough, it'll never go back together. Everything's tainted. All your plans have a huge hole running through each of them. Now what?

Now what?

Grief is anxiety. It'll never be enough. How can I face this? Was this my fault? What if I did something different? What if I'd called them back? What if I spent one more day with them? How is this fair? Can I ever be normal again? What will that look like? Can I really be happy whatever that is? And what if this happens again? What do I do tomorrow? What do I do in ten years when they're still not here? How do I cancel their mail? Are all these other people okay? Did all these other people already forget? Should I bring it up? Am I the only one still hurting? What if...What if...What if? And all the answers take time.

Grief is loneliness. It's like being stuck down a well. No matter how many people surround you, you're trapped deep down inside yourself. There's darkness everywhere you look. You get little glimpses of friendly faces and their words echo down to you, but by the time it reaches you, it doesn't sound real anymore. All you see are the empty places left behind. It's isolating.

Grief is anger. We want to blame something and when we can't determine what that object should be, it can cause us to lose sight of reality. We hide in our anger, give ourselves over to it. It focuses the hurt elsewhere, keeps it outside. We make up stories in our head and push everyone away because maybe it was their fault, maybe it was mine. Hate can creep in. It can force the good from our lives in search of the root of the bad. Anger at who we lost, anger at those left behind, anger at our reaction to it, anger at other people's reactions to it. Anger is grief's mask, because anger is easier to look at than all these other things hiding behind it.

Much of the grieving process takes place in our subconscious. On the surface, I'd try to play strong and positive for my family and friends. I wanted to be a rock, an encouragement, a reminder of God when they were tempted to forget. I tried to reframe everything in my mind to be optimistic and happy, but my body still grieved.

Exhaustion.

Tears.

Bereavement brain.

Grief is physical. No matter how far you push grief from your mind, it will still show up in your body. Studies have shown that the brains of people experiencing grief have an increase in activity on nearly every neural network. Grief affects every system, from simple things like remembering something someone literally just said to you, to your digestion or posture or heart beat or speech.

There were times I couldn't speak without stopping to regroup and remember how to physically say a word. I'd make that face, like the person in the horror movie that abruptly stops talking, goes blank in the eyes, and falls over to reveal there's a knife in their back, and they just literally died mid-sentence. And that's really as confusing as it felt. Like abruptly my body would just forget how to do things.

And I never attributed it with grief. I spent a lot of time at the doctor's office the year following Jake's death trying to convince them I had some crazy brain tumor. I wanted it to be a crazy brain tumor. In a weird way it made me feel close to him, because I knew he'd find it fascinating and ironic because we always hyperbolically misdiagnosed everything as a brain tumor.

It wasn't a brain tumor. I was just really sad.

All of it adds up to this: grief is confusing. It's hard. It's a weight on your chest.

But it doesn't have to end there.

I like organization. I like timelines. I like knowing what to expect. And that is not grief. Grief changes. One day it's laughter, the next it's crying in the bathroom at a party almost a decade later over a memory mentioned in passing.

It changes, but in that change I saw so so clearly that God did not. His Word did not. His grace did not. His wisdom did not.

In grief, I saw the kindness and the goodness and provision of God. In that darkness, I saw His light. His steady, hopeful, peace-giving light. I felt His compassion. His friendship.

When I faltered, I felt His strength. I could see Him leading me, holding me up.

Grief is a blessing.
Grief is clarifying.
Grief is renewing.

He turned my eyes from my pain to His plans, His Gospel, His Son.

His suffering.

Imagine, the grief Jesus went through on the cross. The grief God went through when He gave up His Son. The grief we cause the Holy Spirit when we fill the hole in our hearts with the world instead of with His presence.

We do not serve a God unfamiliar with grief. Instead, He joined us in it. Willingly.

Where is God in grief? Right beside us.

A One Year Anniversary

"When we pray to be sanctified, are we prepared to face the standard of these verses? We take the term sanctification much too lightly. Are we prepared for what sanctification will cost? It will cost an intense narrowing of all our interests on earth, and an immense broadening of our interests in God. Sanctification means intense concentration on God's point of view. It means every power of body, soul and spirit chained and kept for God's purpose only. Are we prepared for God to do in us all that He separated us for?... Sanctification means being made one with Jesus so that the disposition that ruled Him will rule us. Are we prepared for what that will cost? It will cost everything that is not of God in us." -Oswald Chambers.

It’s hard for me to believe it’s been a year since my brother-in-law went home to be with the Lord. I’ve seen such beauty in the grace and goodness and providence of the Lord. Jesus has proven Himself to be the joy and stronghold in the stormy night for me, my sister, and our families. The storm has rained down grief and sorrow, but it has only served to water the ground of grace, founded in the Gospel of Christ, bringing forth praise!

It's been a difficult path, one that we hadn’t intended to walk, but God, in His infinite wisdom, led us on that way. I am thankful for His grace that kept my feet upon His narrow path, and I am thankful, in Him, for the path itself. It took time for me to be able to say, by grace, that because of the sovereignty and kindness of God, I am thankful for the life and timing of the death of Jacob.

Charles Spurgeon has said, “There is an essential difference between the decease of the Godly and the death of the unGodly. Death comes to the unGodly man as a penal infliction, but to the righteous as a summons to his Father's palace. To the sinner it is an execution, to the saint an undressing from his sins and infirmities. Death to the wicked is the King of terrors. Death to the saint is the end of terrors, the commencement of glory.”

So, for my brother, I rejoice. And I rejoice, too, at the promise in Christ that I will one day join him. What grace! And what grace it is to be able to see in a heavenly perspective the death of those who “fall asleep in Jesus” to soon be “raised imperishable...in glory...in power” (1 Thessalonians 4:14; 1 Corinthians 15).

I think of Jake every day. I am reminded of him-- his mannerisms, his laugh, his list of things to tell me on Wednesday nights. His honesty and care were something I happily experienced much of, and it was one of the first things I missed about him after he went Home. I miss him. I couldn’t have asked for a better brother-in-law.

He was an answer to so many of my parents' prayers, an answer that went above and beyond their hopes for their oldest daughter. From observation, he was an excellent husband. His leadership and love for my sister shaped my ideas of Biblical marriage in a very beautiful way. His pursuit of Diana, her joyful submission to him as he submitted himself to God all graciously portrayed the Gospel. As a fellow believer and as a sister, I appreciated it more than I knew.

My parents eagerly adopted him into our family, treating him as their own son. I quickly adopted the idea of him as my brother. For five years, I watched Jake become a part of my family, and for the past year I’ve seen his death affect each of us in a different, but equally beautiful way. Both periods of time were designed by God to accomplish His good and kind-- even when painful-- purposes, which are common to all “who love Him” (Romans 8:28). I've come to see that God has a wide range of comforts that He lavishly gives as we come to rest in Him.

There are expectations placed on us as we grieve. It can be difficult to separate what people say we should be feeling or doing from how we really are. It can make it even more difficult to, by grace, “not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God” and remain daily in the Word, speaking Its truth to my heart and “taking captive each thought to make it obedient to Him” (Philippians 4:13; 2 Corinthians 10:5). To allow God to take care of what my feelings accomplish.

Shortly after his death, I wrote these words:

“I pray that we all would rejoice in the will of God, praise the Name of God, and trust in the perfect character of God. His plans have been firmly established since the beginning of time and there is nothing that can happen apart from Him. And He is GOOD all the time; all the time, He is good!...There hasn't been an hour gone by that I haven't thought of him, yearned with great pain to talk to him again. I hurt. A pain so deep and severe that I've never known before. Please, God, sustain me! Where is my hope in this grieving? Am I grieving as the world does? Were my love true and real, for God and for Jacob, wouldn't I be rejoicing for his current and now eternal state? May I never forget Your goodness and worth! There is much pain in the night, but joy comes in the Lord! So as my tears continue to flow, may I never forget the blood that flowed out of much deeper pain, but equal sovereignty-- this blood that redeemed my life, that bought Jake an innocent verdict and a warm welcome as He stood before our Creator and Judge. 

What a comfort to know that the Lord has as much wisdom and care in the plans for each part of our lives as He did in planning His eternal redemption through His Son! May I continue to grow in the values and characteristics Jake complimented (or corrected) in me as he applied Your Word to the world around him. May Your Word be my guide, the lens I see through. For there is nothing else of worth and no higher calling than to be called and made a child of the Most High God. May these tears lead only to Your Throne and to Your feet in service. May I not neglect the pain of others in the anguish of my heart. And though he is currently the most commonly occurring thought and the most desired friend, may he not become to me more precious than You. Please keep me from earthly thoughts, from such lowly expectations and imaginings of Your Kingdom. Though You crush me, yet will I praise You (Job 13:15). Praise the sovereign, wise, matchless, worthy, loving Father, Son, and Holy Spirit! Maranatha (Lord, come quickly)!”

Now, a year later, I read these words and I feel that pain, but I feel also the sweetness so intricately intertwined within it.

I can look back and see the purposes of the Lord in Jake’s death. Not all, but some-- as many as He's allowed me to see. I sense the presence of the Lord hovering over this past year, intimately tending to each hurt and question of my heart. I saw Him do the same for so many others.

God often seemed quiet, even distant at times But through that I came to know even more assuredly that His promises are not based upon my thoughts or circumstances, but on His unchanging, always faithful and true nature; that His words and commands, as written in His Word, are “holy and righteous and good” (Romans 7:12); that every pain and every joy in His will are “good, pleasing, and perfect” because, though it may be difficult at times to see, “in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose” (Romans 12:2; Romans 8:28).

Truly He works for our good and joy as He seeks His own glory! His exaltation is our highest joy. And God is so greatly exalted when the saints rejoice in suffering. It is this walking “by faith and not by sight," this heavenly mindset that says “this world is not my home” and “this earth has nothing I desire besides You” that lifts our eyes-- and the eyes of the world watching us-- up to the Lord, Who reigns sovereign, His worth steady and high above our circumstances (2 Corinthians 5:7; Hebrews 13:14, NLT; Psalm 73:25).

As we made our way to Gainesville to meet my sister and his family, the Lord brought me to Psalm 97-103, particularly the words “Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous, and give thanks to His holy Name... know that the Lord, He is God! It is He Who made us, and we are His." And this is great cause to rejoice in Him!

We are His; we belong to Him. He commands our steps, our first and final breaths. And when one of those whom He has claimed as His own is taken to His side, we cannot think we have been robbed, that perhaps that particular saint was ours first and the Lord’s second. In fact, it is the very opposite which causes us to see death in a clearer, brighter lens: We belong first to the Lord, and whatever He does, He does because “as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are [His] ways higher than our ways and [His] thoughts than our thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8-9), because He is so much wiser and more wonderful than we are, and because His plans are filled to the brim with His grace and kindness and goodness.

So we must breathe in and out the words of 1 Samuel 3:18: “He is the Lord, let Him do what is good in His eyes,” His loving, perfect, all-seeing eyes.

When God's Timing Confuses You

"...Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me."

I'm not sure I have much to say-- at least maybe not directly pertaining to Israel and the time we've had here-- but I think I do have much to say (truly... be warned about the length of this post) about the TIMING of being here and the God Who wisely and sovereignly orchestrated it. 

As most of you know, my brother-in-law was called Home a month and 5 days ago, and Olivia and I left a little over a week after that. I've mulled over this decision many times, wondering if this was right, if it really was the best decision, and the nights where I feel the most grief I think maybe not. But it's a very good thing that my feelings don't dictate truth. They don't always even indicate it. God dictates truth. So while I often feel maybe it would be nice to be home, I know that this was the will of God for me to be here, because it happened and God is sovereign. Nothing I do can happen unless He says it can happen-- just as in Job 1:6-12, God tells Satan to ask Him to test Job, and then He gives the permission for it to happen. If God has power even over the actions of His enemy, why would we think any differently about His sovereignty over us, His people?

Here now, in my room in Israel, I'm thinking over the past few weeks so far. They've been filled with exploring, organizing, CD-making, book-selling, and falafel. We've had little opportunity (well, there's people everywhere, so I don't know if I can really say this) to share the Gospel, but we have been aiding in this ministry's sharing of the Gospel.

Unfortunately, with the lack of speaking the Gospel to others, I think I have also fallen out of the habit of speaking it to myself. I can't lie, my heart lately has felt burdened and tired, like maybe this faith in me is not true after all or maybe my initial joy and peace really was (as I feared people thinking) just me not accepting the facts that someone I love very very dearly and looked up to so much would no longer be available for conversation, advice, Bible-interpretation, brotherly love and friendship, laughs, or, more importantly, partnership for my sister. However, (!!!) he instead has attained the goal for which he was running-- the salvation of his soul.

Those of us still here, though now for a little while are grieved by this and other various trials, which test the genuineness of our faith in order to bring praise, glory, and honor to God at the revelation of Jesus Christ, rejoice in the future hope of our own departure to be with Christ (1 Peter 1, Philippians 1:23).

In this time and the many times to follow, may I never forget the atoning blood that flowed out of even deeper pain, but equal sovereignty-- this blood that redeemed my life, that bought Jacob his innocent verdict and a warm welcome as he stood before our Creator and Judge. What a comfort to know that the Lord has as much wisdom and care in the plans for each part of our lives as He did in planning His eternal redemption through His Son. May I never forget His goodness and worth! There is deep pain in the night, but joy, true joy, comes in the LORD, not just in the morning!

I was talking (well...typing) with my sister the other day and talking about how wise God is and how foolish we are, thinking so often that Jake's death disrupted our plans for our future, when they were just that: our plans. God's plans remain firmly in place, and have since the beginning of time. We think now the future is so uncertain... but how silly! for when did we ever know our future? We know as much now as we did before, it's just that the plans of our heart had different circumstances to work with at the time. These have been God's plans from the beginning, and they are good. May our faith be found genuine, our trust be found in Christ! By grace alone can we continue to stand, despite our weaknesses!

I feel much more acquainted with this weakness lately. Acquainted much more closely than I'd like to be, but I think that is a great lesson from this. My weakness, my utter helplessness without His power and grace and joy and peace. I forget Philippians 4 says that while I'm making my prayer and supplication in everything, I am to do so with thanksgiving! "Thanksgiving?" you may ask. "For what?" For Isaiah 55:8-9. For Philippians 2:13. For Ephesians 1:13-14. For Genesis 1:1. For John 19:30. For everything God is, does, says, wills. There is, in fact, nothing that we shouldn't thank God for! All things He works together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28).

Just the good and happy things? No. I don't see that anywhere in the Bible. I see "all things", which, I'm sure, if you look in the Greek, at the cultural context, each of the cross-references, they will all come to one conclusion: ALL things. Everything. Happy and heart-wrenching alike. Do you doubt this?

Sometimes my actions confirm that I doubt. When I doubt, I'm doubting not only the Holy Bible, but also the Holy God Who wrote it. Job 2:10: "Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive adversity?" Job 1:21: "The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the Name of the Lord."

The Holy Spirit confirms that this doubt is sin. In those times, I must seek His face and heart and will. I must repent and submit and rejoice, thanking Him that as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are His ways and thoughts higher than mine (Isaiah 55:8-9) and that, because He is perfect in wisdom and power, He doesn't allow my (short-sighted) plans to happen. 

Is that always a natural reaction? Heck no. Does that make it any less required? Also, no. "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God-- through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Romans 7:24).

So... while I am still in mourning, I am being taught to be constant in rejoicing and content in Christ. When Jake was born, Who ordained it? When Jake met and married my sister and became a part of my family, Who brought it together? When Jake died, Who ordered it to be so? God. He is always on the throne in Heaven; may He be always on the throne in my heart, soul, mind and strength.

Oh how I've been learning the dissatisfaction of this world and the value of Christ! Though I've been feeling home-sick, wanting to be with my family, my sister, my friends, my church...even more than that He's creating in me a Home-sickness that is centered around His Heaven, my true Home, His presence forever! He has made Psalm 73:25 my cry.

Though perhaps I do not feel as close to my Creator, my Sustainer, my Salvation, my Comforter, my Joy, and my Strength as I would like, I know His character, I know His Word, and I know that both of those confirm that He is here, He is working, He is healing, and He is sanctifying. This process is often painful but still pleasant, because we know the end result: 1 John 3:2-3, which tells us we shall be made like Him for we shall see Him as He is. So, the end result? Glorification. Total conformation to the image of the Son. No more sin. No more desire to sin. Christ. To die is great gain!

"He can do all things, and no purpose of His can be stopped. He is our God. And because He is our God, even when we don't have our questions answered, even when we don't know the purpose, we can have hope and we can have rest and we can even have joy, because He is Who He is and we belong to Him. At the heart of it is knowing Who God is and knowing Who is God. He is God and because He is God, that is enough." -Stephen Rummage

My mind knows truth, and I must remind myself of these Truths, to "take captive every thought to make it obedient to Him" so that my faulty flesh will follow my corrected thoughts (2 Corinthians 10:5). Please pray that I would not allow my feelings to dictate what I believe, but that truth would dictate my feelings!

God is wise. He is moving. He will not yield His glory to another.
He is sovereign over salvation. He will not yield His glory to another.
His plans are right, good, exciting.
He's perfect, atoning, alive.
He is Messiah, His Word incorruptible, His body unable to be contained in the grave.
His Kingdom advancing. His Gospel proclaiming. His plans succeeding.
He will not yield His glory to another.

“Worthy is the Lamb Who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!...Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen."

Amen. MARANATHA.

Thank You for Praying

"Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous, and give thanks to His holy Name... Know that the Lord, He is God! It is He Who made us, and we are His." Psalm 97:12, 100:3.

Thank you all for praying Jake. Please continue to pray that my sister and our families would rejoice in the will of God, praise the Name of God, and trust in the perfect character of God.

Even when we don't understand His will, we must remember His worth and act accordingly. His plans have been firmly established since the beginning of time and there is nothing that can happen apart from Him. And He is GOOD all the time; all the time, He is good! Let us practice what we just sang at church and continuously rejoice in the sovereignty we so vigorously defend, in the hard times as we do in the happy times (I almost said "good" but He has declared His will to be good and He has accomplished it).

My brother-in-law, Jacob, has attained the prize for which he was running and seen the face of the Lord he was serving. Jake has seen God as He is and been transformed into the likeness of His Son (1 John 3:2). In life, he was being guarded by God's power for an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading that he has now, by the grace of God, obtained (1 Peter 1).

Praise the sovereign, wise, matchless, worthy, loving Father, Son, and Holy Spirit! Thank you for your prayers, fellow Body and Bride of Him Who is worthy of all praise in the midst of all things!

"Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in His wonderful face and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace!"

"Carried by Your constant grace, held within Your perfect peace... we know every victory is Your power in us... Every step we are breathing in Your grace, evermore we'll be breathing out Your praise. You are faithful, God, You are faithful."