hope renewed.

We hear it in church all the time--that unbelief can hinder that which God can do.  That the lack of hope can prevent a miracle from taking place.  I have struggled with this concept for the last year.  Mostly because I have found that when you start believing more in the will of God than the hope of a miracle, your idea of 'hope' changes completely. 

 And secondly because it's hard not to have some unbelief when your child is 16 months old and is not rolling over or sitting up yet.  Or when her seizure medicine doesn't control her seizures.  Or when you have to physically help her to go poop.  Or when she doesn't look at you when you speak.  Or when she is on a high calorie formula and loses weight rather than gains. 

In all of it, it's sometimes difficult to maintain this great hope.

But yesterday...my hope was renewed. 

 Yesterday I looked at Mabel, in her gait trainer, and I felt a sense of hope that I haven't let myself feel in many months.  It's not because I don't believe that Jesus will heal Mabel or help her progress.  It's more because if he chooses not to, I don't want to feel the disappointment that comes with that. 

I know what scripture says.  I believe in a healing God...

 ...but I also struggle with this:

Mabel does not have a headache that showed up out of nowhere and therefore it makes sense for it to leave just as quickly as it came.  She did not live 52 good years before cancer struck her body and now has the strength to fight while medicine and technology help in the healing process. 

Mabel was born this way.  Whatever it is that she has, or is going on in her little body has always been there.  How, if she was born this exact way, do we believe it's the 'wrong way?'  I just can't wrap my mind around this thinking.  Because although scripture talks of healing and believing in that with our whole heart, the Word also tells us that we are fearfully and wonderfully made...and in the image of Christ, at that!

Of course I want her to be well.  Therefore, I believe that she can be healed.  But I believe that there is more of a healing that needs to take place in most of us than what needs to go on in Mabel.  I feel so humbled and so blessed that I was chosen to be her mom.  In fact, I can't understand how God could have chose me to experience the most pure form of love that there is.

 To love someone who knows no sin, is unaware of how to lie, hate, steal, gossip or think ill thoughts--

it's remarkable. 

Mabel is a gift.  And this precious gift that I have been given was wrapped in the Father's love from the beginning.  Yesterday I experienced the hope that she may walk someday.  I experienced the hope that she may even stand on her own two feet.  This is a hope that, as a mother, you never want to be without--but I have been. 

And now, God has renewed my hope.  He has renewed my strength, like He promised to do. 

In the words that we all hear so often are PROMISES from the Lord.  He cannot lie.  He is the King.  He promised to uphold me and strengthen me in this life, and He has.

And He is.

Just like He is doing with Mabel.  He is strengthening her.  But it may shock you to know that I believe it is in a much different way than we can wrap our minds around.  He has a plan that is purposeful for her little life and is divine.  For instance, how awesome is God to surround Mabel with such wonderful therapists and doctors who love her as much as we do?  They do!  They throw themselves into her care because they love this little girl.  And that is part of a greater plan than anyone could ever have orchestrated.  It's all God.

I hope we aren't missing it when we speak so much about physical healing and so little about spiritual wellness.  The Lord has chipped away at me this year and there have been many times when it has been difficult for me to sit through a service or hear a preacher on the TV talk about healing.  It feels good to finally write about and feel confident that what God has taught me is truth.  The Holy Spirit has  definitely taken me to a new place over the last few months and I feel good knowing that whatever God chooses to do will be because He is Lord and His will is perfect. 

I will never stop believing that He can heal children like Mabel, her friend Ethan or her cousin Stevie.  But if God chooses not to then there is a reason in that as well.  I know that Steff suffered in her life here on earth and God took her to Heaven far too young. 

But I know that she had a purpose.  An innocence that not enough people experience. 

And was she not healed? 

Thanking God for Mabel and hope today.  What an awesome sense of excitement this little girl brings!