I recently came upon a piece in the book I'm currently reading about Christian marriages, and it has a lot to do with where I'm headed with this post. So lets start off with this so you can get the gist of the whole post-
"The Bible begins with a Being so powerful that His words command the non-existent things to exist, and they obey. It presents to us a Being so holy and just that he once drowned every person on earth, sparing only the eight people who still looked to Him. This book is full of examples of God punishing the arrogant and blessing the humble. And the Bible concludes with visions of a terrifying future judgement, where every person is cast eternally into either a place of perfect pleasure in union with God or a place of ultimate pain apart from Him." -You and Me Forever by Francis Chan & Lisa Chan
I want to start by saying I don't think it honors God by getting into past mistakes, but just so you know, I have had my share of really REALLY big ones. My friends and family can account for that. With that being said, I knew in my heart God was going to punish me somehow, because we all have to face the consequences of our mistakes no matter how big or small. Some may call it karma, but I call it God. Every mistake you could make as a teenager, I probably made it. The sad part is, I'm serious. But I was still a teenager and didn't really care about my conscience. I attended church and was actually a big part of the church but that impact only went so far for me. There was really something wrong inside me. I had my own demons. Don't get me wrong, I believed in the Lord but I wasn't willing to walk the walk in that time.
When I hit the stage in my life where all the bad things I had done came flooding to me, like I had just become a whole different person and I was on the outside looking in, was when I fell in love with Matthew. I knew I loved him and wanted to have a family with this beyond wonderful man, but how in the world could this man love someone like me? His approach was Godly to me, he didn't care what bad things I had done and he was accepting. I knew then I wanted to marry him and I wanted to change those parts of my personality that were tainted.
Those parts are long gone now, but I still ache when I think about the horrible things I did. I can't believe it was me.
But my punishments came like a raging fire. When I got pregnant with Levi, I experienced the most excruciating pains I have ever felt in my life. We ended up at the ER and they did an ultrasound and Levi was okay but I had 50 tiny pebble size gallstones itching to escape from my gallbladder. I had to live with these pains for 5 months of my pregnancy. I was living on cereal and sandwiches, and had high blood pressure. That wasn't the end for me though, it was far from over. At 35 weeks I started to get stretchmarks, which wasn't so bad, but came as a surprise. But something came riding along with the stretchmarks, a rare rash that only 1% of pregnant women get inside your stretchmarks. The Puppps rash. I fought with the rash for 2 weeks, with no sleep, and I was days away from losing my sanity. I lived in the bathtub. And poor Matthew was days away from losing his as well. He was such a trooper and my angel through everything but it took a huge toll on him to watch me suffer while carrying our child. At 37 weeks they had no choice but to induce because of high blood pressure and to tell you the truth I don't remember much about my labor and delivery, only that I was suffering from exhaustion and couldn't stop shaking for some reason.
There is something specific and very important you should know though. The night we went to the hospital to have Levi, before I felt I needed to go, I was in the bathtub crying my eyes out to God asking him to please make it stop, make everything stop. And he did, that same night.
We should have a healthy fear of God. He brings consequences, but He also brings mercy, grace and love. I am a true believer because God fed my faith that night and in the midst of everything I dealt with, I never turned my back on Him. I prayed to Him to heal me, to take the pain away. I was never angry with God, I knew I had to face my punishment, but I also knew only God could be the one to let it end.
Someone once told me that the people who know the story of how Jesus died on the cross for our sins and still choose not to believe, or maybe once did believe but then had a change of heart, hell on earth will be more excruciating for them when the time comes. I'm not going to say I know for sure this is in the Bible but it is powerful and convicting words.
My relationship with God has grown immensely and I don't like to look back on the seasons of my life that were very dark for me. But I love to tell my story because it's definitely a faith feeder. God loves to continue to feed my faith in little ways every day, and I love that part of our relationship. He really wants me to know He's here with me all the time and to always trust Him with everything.
And let's not forget out of all of this pain came the most precious angel I have ever laid my eyes on -
My Levi :)
"Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world..." -Philippians 2:14-15
I hope my testimony inspired or encouraged your faith in Christ!
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