pride. joy. and life rafts.

never before have i hurt so much.

never before have i looked so hard to ease the pain.

never before have i cried so hard in anguish.

never before have i been comforted by His hands.

never before have i longed for something that is gone. until now.

never before, ever, have i been satisfied or content with what took it's place, until now.

the only reason i crave for my Savior each day, long for His direction and guidance and Love is because of the hole that was left with sydney's passing and how it turned my world upside down..the only reason i am humble and before the foot of the Cross each day, begging for comfort, patience, mercy and grace is because of my inability to survive it on my own and now my awareness of knowing i need Him to help me...the only reason i am starting to get off this deserted island i have called hell for almost 9 months is because i finally sent the smoke signal, the s.o.s and stopped waiting to die..if i am to live, i need to know and claim that He is my rescuer and my Life-raft...He is my compass and He has become the constant voice in my head, comforting me with Truth...not because i am so humble and willing and gracious, no- it is sheer desperation. it is because i want off this damn island. i HAVE to be delivered and rescued. i don't want to be a prisoner on this island of selfishness and anger and bitterness. i don't want to be trapped in sadness and pity and regret. so i have no other choice, than to build with my own two hands, in prayer, a raft to get the hell out of here....His name is Jesus Christ...he has saved me time and time again...once and for all on the Cross...at 20 when i was lost without direction and wanted to die and now again...when he took our sydney home and PROMISED me he would never leave me...and he hasn't. i would never see so things so cleary like i do right now, at this hour...if my child had not grown inside my womb, causing me to fall in love with her, only to lose her and grieve her everyday, sending me to an island of solitude and pain...and GRASPING for a life vest, a raft, anything to hold onto...i today, thank the Lord, not for my daughter dying...but the lessons that they both are teaching me as a result of her death...my life, my heart...my world..my walk, my view of Christ and how i am to live on this earth...never before have i rested in such peace of the Giver of Peace.

until you are stranded in the pits of hell, you won't know how much you long for heaven and the One who resides there. you won't know how desperate you are for water until you are parched dry....

"you're lost. your situation couldn't be more hopeless. and on your own, you're incapable of altering or escaping it...we have this acute tendency to deny the reality of our lost state before God. if you aren't aware of this danger, you'll never see the need to be saved from it and you'll never fully and sufficiently appreciate the significance of His death...." - (c.j. mahaney)


our sydney, our loss, our pain and dark days...all of this has catapulted my thinking, my eternal perspective of EVERYTHING into such a proper light...it has refocused my eyes on where they need to be....

"His death freed us from the power and penalty of sin, but we continue to fight the presence of sin in our lives...humility is honestly assessing ourselves in light of God's holiness and our own sinfulness. without an honest awareness of these two realities, ALL self-evaluation will be skewed. pride is when sinful human beings aspire to the status and position of God and refuse to acknowledge their dependence upon Him...." (mahaney)

"have you ever realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself? most of us spend more time listening to lies than we do speaking Truth to ourselves...where there's worry, where there's anxiousness, pride is at the root of it. when i am experiencing anxiety, the root issue is that i'm trying to be self-sufficient. i am acting independent of God...." (mahaney)

i have been prideful, thinking i could weather this great storm alone at times, without Him...worrying until i am pulling my hair out about this and that....anxious about what is to come and what has passed...trying desperately to control the axis on which my world spins....i told someone recently that we are all stronger than we know...she had remarked at how "strong" i must be through all this...but i told her that we really don't know the strength we have within or from Him.....until we are left on the island, to fend for ourselves in the dark storms, to survive...the amazing and joyful thing for me is realizing that God threw out a life raft for me long before i realized i was in need of rescuing...he had already prepared a way off the island for me, long before my crash into it...how can that not cause your heart to break and change?....i am broken and i am humbled by this. and that is exactly where i need to be....thank you sweet girl for being a vessel and for teaching me these things with your precious life...thank you Lord, for opening my eyes to see it.