Write It On A Rock

This last five months have been a bit chaotic but I’m not complaining- the changes we’ve had are great things, but change can also be stressful.  God has been so faithful through it all.

We got house ready to sell and lost our buyers, moved, did lots of projects, and for those of you who don’t know PREGNANCY!  Baby #5 is due this December 1st!

Our whole family is so excited.

We got back from a road trip to Orlando Florida a couple of days before Easter this year and immediately started painting and getting our house ready to sell.

On our trip Jason and I, for the first time, were able to both sit and enjoy reading a book while the kids swam in the pool, with lifeguards watching.

Parenting is never easy but we had “arrived” as it applies to no swim diapers, no strollers and semi-independence.  Our oldest is now 13 and our youngest is 6.  They can make themselves toast in the toaster, buckle themselves in, and swim without us an arms length away.

When we got home I was running errands by myself and I was listening to a song by Natalie Grant on repeat called, “More Than Anything.”  I was asking God to help me to want Jesus more than anything, more than the gifts He gives.  It was one of those moments where I felt surrendered to God’s will.

And right about then it dawned on me.  It was totally not on my radar despite all the pregnancy symptoms I’d experienced the previous two weeks.  I needed to turn my car around and pick up a pregnancy test before I got home.

My suspicions were correct.  I was pregnant with Baby number 5.  I kept it to myself for the next eight hours while I processed and then delighted in God’s plan.  We have never closed the door on having more kids.  We believe what the Bible says (sometimes by faith and not by sight ;)) that children are a blessing from the Lord.

We were open, using Natural Family Planning for most of our marriage, but life has felt way crazy and full.  I never saw myself being pregnant again.  The sickness in the first three months is debilitating for me.

The first thing I though of was my health, which has been better but I have unresolved issues, and just the night before I had been up half of the night due to an allergic reaction to a food I ate.  Would I be able to carry this baby?

As quickly as the worry came, it left with a sense that God ordains life, His plans are greater than ours and I was filled with such joy that God knows our deepest desires better than we do.

I was about to enter a season of hardship, that I knew, but am always comforted by the fact that Jesus is acquainted with suffering.  He uses it to refine us and would be with me every step of the way.

Within weeks the sickness hit.  I was attempting to pack, clean, and fix up our home that seemed to have never ending projects.   Some friends helped us get ready for our house’s online pictures.  Just their presence was a blessing to us.

Not to be overly dramatic but some days I was praying for energy in the midst of the morning sickness and fatigue just to take one more step forward to start another thing.

We put our house on the market before we felt it was completely ready and got buyers right away with a full price offer.  We lost the buyers almost as quickly as they came and decided to do some more work on our house before putting it back on the market.

In the meantime both of our boys were in intense seasons of AAU traveling basketball and with Jason’s speaking schedule I was driving our boys to tournaments all over the state and out of state, calling my mom from the car asking her to talk so I could stay alert while I was driving.

Each day was an opportunity to trust that God’s provision and that His grace is sufficient in our weakness.

The unknown, the fatigue, emotions and stress of something going wrong almost every day… I had turned into what my friend’s kids termed a “momster.”  All of this put a strain on our parenting and marriage.

What I love about marriage is that in those not fun spots is when the covenant we made to each other binds us.  Our faith in God’s commands for our good enables us to love/respect (sometimes out of sheer obedience), and to persevere through the stressful times of life.  When we come out of the stressful times it feels like a blip in the radar. Our love and commitment is deeper.

Without going into all the details of the ways we daily were required to trust Jesus, I was sending responses to my friends’ text messages that said, “trying to trust God with this.”

“I’m trusting Jesus with this” sounded like the right thing to say, but every time I wrote that I realized that the word “trying” was more honest.  I had asked a friend to pray for me, and I was so anxious and depleted from lack of sleep that I didn’t know what to ask her to pray for.

Jesus is so good to hear our prayers of desperation and He spoke to me clearly that next morning.  It was a turning point.

I was reading the book, “The Four Wills of God,” by Emmerson Egrich, (great book!!) and I was in the chapter on faith.  I was immediately convicted.  Either I was trusting and obeying God at His word when He says “do not worry about tomorrow” or I wasn’t.  I was looking at my circumstances and not to God.

At that moment, my son Jasper was listening to the Bible on a device next to me during our morning devotions and it was the story where the disciple Peter gets out of the boat to walk on water to Jesus, an unbelievable miracle. But as soon as Peter doubts he falls into the water.

I had always imagined that Peter fell only part way in, but realistically he probably fell under and felt like he was drowning.

That’s how I was feeling.  Jesus tenderly and immediately helped Peter, ““You of little faith, He said, “why did you doubt?” Matthew 14:31 (NIV).

That was me..so quick to doubt, to “try” in my strength to trust, but not actually make the decision to believe God at His Word when He says not to worry.

So, in that moment, I said, OK God, I hear you :).  I will not worry.  No more “trying not to worry.”  All of these things that are consuming my brain, I give them to You and I will not worry.

We had received two offers on our home and had chosen what we thought was the safer option over the contingency one that offered $10,000 more.

The day after I told Jesus that I would not worry, we received the news that the buyers we chose lost their buyers and needed to put their house back on the market again.  They still wanted to buy our house but they would need to postpone the closing on our home so they could put their house on the market again.

Right when I saw the text I remembered my vow to God the day before and there was no worry in me.

What a breakthrough and gift that occurred in my time with God.  I had peace whether we had to put our house back on the market for the third time or not.

Do you want to know how the story ends?  The buyers found new buyers within a week.  We closed on our home with them and found out at the closing how close we were to putting our house on the market again after they ALSO lost their financing due to a fine print mistake the week of closing.  But God made a way for them to buy our home.

And our baby.. I have two and a half months left of the pregnancy.  We did not find out the gender (everyone’s asking :)).  

I will enjoy not worrying about this baby :).  God’s plans are good whether the baby is “healthy” or not.  Whether it’s a boy or a girl, this is the baby for our family.

These 3D images are amazing.  I am more in awe of what a miracle babies are the older I get.

We have no nursery or clothes yet, but we have a couple of months to squish our four kids into rooms together to make room for a nursery, and we have a family ready to love on this baby.

Here’s to more diapers, more humbling experiences, more fingerprints everywhere, and more LOVE.

Peace to you no matter what your circumstances, peace that Jesus brings because His promises are true, eternity is what matters, He has resurrected, and He is faithful.