Our Stories
This past Sunday we decided to have "home church." We are still hesitant to get Eli out and around a lot of people right now with his low immune system post kidney transplant. So we gathered the boys in our living room to have home church. This particular day we talked to the boys about "our story." And as Craig was sharing, the Lord started stirring in my heart. I hope and pray the same was happening in our boys hearts as well.
Why this stirring?!
Craig reached back into his past to when he first graduated college all the way to when God placed Eli, me, Parker and Tanner into his life. And in between...death of family members, death of a hopes and dreams, difficult life circumstances, heart aches, but also sweet community of friends, laughter, fun memories, a sweet adoption story and a life lived fully aware of God's Sovereignty!
I thought about how each one of us who were sitting in that living room has a story...Craig, Eli, Parker, Tanner, me! We each have very different stories that emerge into one family story.
You have a story too!
And nothing is an accident or by coincidence.
It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living, part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone. Ephesians 1:11-12 [The Message]
I don't know what your story in-tales...Death, divorce, abuse, struggles in single life, struggles in marriage, health issues...a deep sense of insignificance.
But one thing I know for sure...God will use it for His glory and His good purpose!
Corrie Ten Boom is one of my favorite authors. She was a dutch woman who survived the concentration camps of WWII. She wrote The Hiding Place in which she shares her story. She and her family hid Jewish people in a room in their home to help them escape from the Nazi's. Their work was soon exposed to the Nazi's and the entire Boom family was arrested. Corrie was sent to a concentration camp along with her sister Betsie. In her book she describes the horrific details of her experience in the concentration camp but also the amazing work of the Lord.
After she was released from Ravensbruck in 1944, Corrie would travel the world telling others about God's love and purpose for their lives. She would hold up the backside of a tapestry and talk about how the thread seemed to have no rhyme or reason, no purpose or real clarity. It didn't seem to make any sense.
But when she turned the tapestry around, a beautiful crown of gold with multicolored jewels was revealed.
“Life is but a Weaving” (the Tapestry Poem)
“My life is but a weaving
Between my God and me.
I cannot choose the colors
He weaveth steadily.
Oft’ times He weaveth sorrow;
And I in foolish pride
Forget He sees the upper
And I the underside.
Not ’til the loom is silent
And the shuttles cease to fly
Will God unroll the canvas
And reveal the reason why.
The dark threads are as needful
In the weaver’s skillful hand
As the threads of gold and silver
In the pattern He has planned
He knows, He loves, He cares;
Nothing this truth can dim.
He gives the very best to those
Who leave the choice to Him.”
-Anonymous
Corrie died on her 81st birthday, April 15,1983.
Live your story out loud...don't be ashamed or discouraged! From the beginning of time God had His affection set on you and a design on your life for good!
I hope you are as encouraged as I am to know that God uses every detail of our lives...the good and the bad...for His glory. When it seems to be a mess and doesn't seem to make sense, hold on to Jesus. He isn't finished with you yet. He is weaving a beautiful story for you and those around you.
