Keeping It Real: I Don’t Look Like What I’ve Been Through!

My life probably looks a lot like yours, chasing hectic schedules that leave us limping a few steps behind. Never enough hours. Never enough us. Never enough.

My frantic pace screeched to a standstill last March. First, my world landed on its head; then a tsunami leveled every semblance of normalcy.

I suffered an incident that shattered my hip socket and pelvis, leaving me with nothing but long days and even longer nights. Every agonizing hour crawled into the next. I combatted physical pain as I had never known.

Three weeks later, as I lay flat on my back, I received a call in the wee hours for which nothing could have prepared me. My sweet Mama, who was helping care for me, died suddenly in the night. The torment in my body instantly turned to child’s play as the anguish in my soul overwhelmed every other pain.

In my most vulnerable season, I lost a fundamental piece of me. In fact, there had never been one moment of “me” without her. This fully-grown, fragile little girl grappled with the absence of Mama’s “love without limits” in the most chilling winter of life.

Each evening, feelings of hopelessness surged to high definition as the sun retired its shine. I wrestled against the heaps of grief trying to engulf me. Each time I attempted to change the channel in my mind, doctors’ dire prognoses broke in and reverberated in my head. The air of my soul hung heavy.

We inevitably find ourselves asking “Why?” when we hit hard places along the way. But where did we get the notion that we deserve a problem-free journey? Have you ever met one person (just one!), who lived such fantasy? It’s downright laughable when you consider it.

Life is a battlefield, not a playground. It’s all-out war because both Heaven and hell desperately want us. This conflict that rages internally is essentially about one thing: which voice we listen to. The one we choose will shape every part of our story.

Will we listen to the voice that persistently questions the Father’s goodness? Or will we attend to the voice that delights in us and seeks our good always? THIS, my friend, is where the battle is lost or won.

As the bitter winds of fear and grief howled through those dark days, the Good Father saw into my heart, spoke courage into my pain, and carried me until I could walk again.

I learned that fighting back on the inside is FAR MORE powerful than what happens to me on the outside. When despair tried to swallow me and dictate my course, I clung tight to the Rock that does not shudder with shifting winds. Ironically, the more I spoke God’s unchanging words into my depleted soul, the more I realized it was the Father who held tightly to me. I was pulled close. I was loved. I was safe. I was coming out.

It’s been one year since everything in my world shattered. One thing is certain – I don’t look like what I’ve been through. Doctors concede that my recovery is nothing short of miraculous. I’m doing everything they considered impossible.

Others still try to wrap their heads around my miracle. I know with absolute certainty what saved my life: I believed the Father’s voice more than I believed anything else!

Hear me. Hell will keep you focused on what you’ve been through. The good Father’s voice will hold you through the bitter cold and carry you to the other side of this painful season. If you keep staring at your past, you will miss your future. Which voice will you allow to shape your story?

It’s time to rise from heaps of hopelessness. It’s time to believe God’s whisper so emphatically that you allow Him to hold you close and carry you until you can walk again. No matter how dire your dilemma, I promise, when your heart listens for the Father’s voice, you won’t look like what you’ve been through! For comments or prayer, contact Dr. Lanier at PastorDebbie@HopeCommunityChurch.tv.

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