It took me a week to click on it but Holy Spirit would not let up. When I finally did click on the blog, my heart sank as I read, “… when [we] were begging for our [baby’s] life…” I remember begging God for our babies’ lives. I remember thinking He had done one terrible job at this “trust fall” as I held our lifeless son’s little 2-lb body in my arms. I remember feeling confused but choosing to trust “His ways.” I remember well-meaning loved ones and even strangers offering me scriptures and worldly repeated “truths” to explain why God would allow that.
I also remember the unrest in my spirit with these typical comments. Holy Spirit, which I didn’t even know on a first name basis at the time, would not let up on leading me to believe in the impossible for our surviving twin daughter. Frustrated, I often went to God a bit demandingly with questions. “So you let one of my babies die but want me to believe something crazy for the other? Either heal her or take her too. It feels worse to watch her die slowly! What game is this?”
God is so good. He is so patient. He put His truth in my heart before I even knew it existed in the Bible. You see, I only knew the Bible basics: Adam and Eve, baby Jesus in the manger, and Jesus on the cross. Oh yeah, and Him raising up so we could all go to Heaven one day (please don’t dismiss the sarcasm here). I didn’t know all the scriptures that were given to me to explain why God “allowed” our son to die. I didn’t know them so I just received them. I mean, everyone kept saying it so it must be true, right? So when God nudged me to believe for a miracle for our daughter, many came with similar scripture and sayings… “God is in control.” “All we can do is pray.” “We just have to trust God’s will.” “God’s ways are above our ways.”
I tried to settle these in my heart and shake the nonsense that I kept hearing in my spirit about believing but Holy Spirit just kept shaking me with a “no.” Not knowing my Bible and feeling very overwhelmed with it altogether, I had to rely on the knowing that we would see something totally unbelievable. I, at times, would think how maybe it was all in my head and what “God was telling me” was really just my desperation to not have to go home without this baby either.
All these well-meaning comments and plucked out scriptures left me feeling powerless and at the mercy of a “sometimes” God. Sometimes He’ll have mercy on a begging mother to take her baby home. Sometimes, it’s just not your day.
I know so many of our hearts are in the right place and when we think God allowed our babies to die, we don’t want to turn from what we are believing is still, in some way, a good, loving Father… even when His character does not seem so. This is why it is so important to truly know His character. What better place than to look than Jesus?
“… He who has seen Me has seen the Father…” -John 14:9 (NASB)
“Therefor Jesus answered and was saying to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner.’…” -John 5:19 (NASB)
“And [Jesus] is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power…” Hebrews 1:3 (NASB)
So if you have read Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John, I have a question for you? Can you see Jesus saying, “Let that baby go to Heaven. The parents will be better off because of what they will learn from this.” Or “Let that baby go to Heaven. It’s our Father’s plan for Him to go without living out a full, healthy life.” Or “Let that baby go to Heaven. The parents have had a lot of sin in their lives.”
Sounds outrageous, huh? If you haven’t read Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John, I will just tell you that those are the books God first took me to when I kept trying to conform what He was telling me, in my spirit, to what the world had taught me. I kept arguing back with earthly reasoning, so He simply had me take a highlighter and see firsthand what His will is. Not once, not twice, not sometimes, not maybe, but ALL the time, for ALL people. That was Jesus though, right? Guess what? He had disciples doing the same thing and even gets on them when they allow a suffering child’s symptoms intimidate them out of God’s will to heal ALL. And then… drum roll please… Jesus’ departing words to the disciples? To go out and continue to do these things and teach others to do the same.
Not sure how we got so far off from this, but it breaks my heart. It breaks my heart that what Jesus literally paid for in blood, sweat, and tears has crumbled down to blaming God for what the enemy does… steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10 NASB).
Let’s continue this talk. Let’s talk about how God is indeed sovereign and what He chose to place within us (and how He has told us to utilize it). Let’s talk about how we don’t have to beg. Let’s talk about how Job and Paul and bits and parts of scripture don’t null out the life of Jesus (but in fact, if studied out, also support the continuity of the Father’s character). Friend, let’s tackle this thing head on. I know that we want to be obedient to our Heavenly Father and that is so beautiful. So let’s dig into the Word and ask for clarity so we can make sure we are not letting our experiences dictate our understanding of the Word.
“Forever, O Lord, Your word is settled in heaven. Your faithfulness continues throughout all generations…“ -Psalms 119:89-90
I actually did a video on this topic awhile back. You can find it here: https://youtu.be/u17AEYRW4BA
Please don’t hesitate to reach out. I’m always open to talk about this because I was on the other side of this perspective and God showed me how it keeps us from true intimacy with Him. So my heart is on fire to set the captives free in this particular area. ❤️
, I’ll still put your name in the mix for the giveaway. 
Do you know that one of the “issues” I previously shed many tears over was that Sophia didn’t smile? I remember walking through Tx Children’s Hospital NICU and seeing so many of the babies smiling. It warmed my heart but also shattered it. In the first few months, I had only seen Sophia halfway smile on a very few occasions (around a big ‘ol breathing vent tube, at that) and I longed for that full, joyful smile babies give. As you can see from her pictures now, she is literally all smiles. Even when she’s grumpy or frustra
2014 transitioned her from a feeding pump to bolus syringe meals, but the prognosis was still that she needed a feeding tube surgically placed. The window for her to learn to take in enough food without it long passed, or so it seemed. I wouldn’t move from the promise God placed in my heart though: no feeding tube, eating by mouth. Three months later she exponentially started taking a bottle over the course of a week. A week! Years later we introduced purées and she had been on them since. Well this January, Sophia and I went to a healing conference together. I had never traveled alone with her and on the last day there, I ran out of purées and yogurts. I went through a drive-thru chicken joint and dared to get green beans with her mashed potatoes. I sat in the back of the car with her and she ate all of it. Then I offered her teeny pieces of chicken. She ate it. 
Grace got me to that finish line. That’s what gets us to every finish line. God’s grace. You can say, “Well, you must’ve been somewhat prepared…” or so many other dismissive excuses. I’m telling you what I felt in my body that day. What my heart experienced. It was God saying “This is indeed your victory race. And even when you fall short and didn’t do all that you felt you needed to do on your part, still show up. My grace carries you the rest of the way, victoriously.”
In honor of Sophia and in memory of Nicholas, we will be participating in the Austin Marathon (completing the 5k and half-marathon) on February 17, 2019, a week after our babies’ 6th birthday. Please help us raise money for this awesome organization that helps families like ours!
DELUSIONAL FAITH 