Affirmation

A "Miracle Man" spoke in our church today.  This man went into hospital two months ago with a pulled hamstring, and woke up 3 weeks later.  In the meantime, he had flesh-eating disease, the worst case doctors had ever seen and he should be dead.  He should not be alive.  Then, as he started to recover, it was certain he would lose limbs and whatever else deteriorates when you have flesh-eating disease.  But he recovered 100%.  Tens of thousands of people all over the world were praying for this man.  It has been a true work of the Holy Spirit how completely he has been healed.  He was preaching in church today!!

He had a message of humility and emphasized how we are NOT our own.  We were bought at a price and we belong to God.  In the hands of a loving, merciful, and just God, we are in the best place.  He is an authority that KNOWS the best for us, not like the authorities of this world, who we tend to reject, not wanting anyone to control us.  But we also try to control ourselves.  WE are in charge, we say, fooling ourselves.  The "Miracle Man" wasn't in charge.  As much as he thought he was the one doing the work to become Christlike, it's not about us.  We can't make ourselves into what God wants us to be.  We must have the Holy Spirit to experience transformation.

He said that this happened to him involuntarily, which is very true, as no one volunteers to be sick to the point of death.  And then he said something that struck me, because it's an identical prayer I have prayed in the past.  He had prayed, years earlier, that God would do "whatever it takes" to transform his life, to bring him to new places with God.  So, in a way, this experience was also "voluntary" for him.  He prayed for it, in a way.

When I was younger, someone once told me that they had prayed that prayer, for the salvation of one of their children, and it took a death in the family for that beloved child to fall to his knees.  I heard that and thought, it's a dangerous prayer to pray.  But I've prayed it.  I have prayed it for my brother, whose heart struggles in his relationship with Christ.  And I prayed it in my marriage.

About halfway through my marriage (it was 10 years long, so about 5 years in), it became very clear to me that the decision my spouse had made for the Lord was not something that carried over into the other parts of his life.  I was frustrated that he wouldn't step up, spiritually, in our lives.  I was frustrated that his faith didn't seem to mean anything to him.  I desperately prayed for God to do something, anything, even something drastic, to get my spouse's attention.  I prayed and prayed and prayed for my husband to WAKE UP!  I continued to carry the spiritual, emotional, and psychological burden of my marriage and my family on my shoulders.  And prayed that God would wake my husband up and get him to carry his share.  I prayed that God would "do whatever it takes!"

A few months before the adultery came to light, I was "done".  I was spent, spiritually speaking.  I couldn't pray for him anymore.  I didn't have it in me.  I prayed one night and laid down 10 years worth of pain and struggle and burden down at the feet of my Saviour.  In essence, I took my husband and put him down.  I was done carrying him, spiritually.  I said, "God, I can't do it anymore."  (Ha!  Like I ever could).  I said, "He's yours.  Do what you want with him."  And I didn't stop praying for him, per se.  But I did let go of that load.  I really loved my husband, but I was not going to talk about his spiritual life with him anymore.  It was fruitless, and it didn't motivate or encourage him.  So, I was done in that regard.

The ironic thing about all this was that other parts of our life seemed to be going okay.  Our finances were on track for the first time in a long time.  We were expecting a third baby, which, for all he let on to me, he was as excited about as I was.  So, it's not like our lives were a giant colossal mess at that moment.  But, spiritually, I couldn't do it anymore.

In a few short months, the husband that I essentially "gave up", admitted to adultery, moved out, and began a life that most certainly did not include me, and relegated his children to the very outer limits of his life.  In spite of the hours and hours and days and days of constant prayer that he would turn around and come back to his family, he didn't.

But, as I have written in the past, this event did not destroy me.  With the loss of everything I knew, I dove into the Word and into the arms of my Saviour as I never had before.  I didn't feel I had any choice!  In doing so, I was transformed and taken places, spiritually, that I never would have imagined.  I now live in a place of complete reliance on Him, and He is in the constant conversation that goes through my head daily.  He has become intricately connected with all that I am and think, and I know that would not have happened if I hadn't been left with NOTHING.

God does not cause people to get sick or cause husbands to abandon their wives.  But He does allow it.  He allows the first for reasons I can't understand and He allows the second because spouses have free will, and mine happened to choose a path of destruction.  But as the "Miracle Man" said this morning, God answered his prayer of "do whatever it takes".  And He also answered my same prayer.  I thought and hoped that prayer would be to make my marriage into something amazing and Spirit-led.  But, in God's infinite wisdom, He turned ME and MY life into something amazing and Spirit-led.  Could it have happened if I hadn't been through infidelity and abandonment?  Possibly.  But I don't know.

All that to say that I feel my heart uplifted when I hear affirmations of my own journey preached in church.  I hear these affirmations more and more each Sunday (and in many places outside of Sunday!) and have for the past 4 years.  For awhile, I thought it was an amazing coincidence how all the sermons I was hearing were always so apt and perfect for exactly where I was at.  And now I've realized that, when my heart and spirit are open to the Holy Spirit, I will find that aptness and affirmation through any sermon and through any words that are God-breathed and inspired by the Holy Spirit.