“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

Jeremiah 29:11 NIV

 

I sit across from him at our favorite Italian restaurant, waiting for our pizza to come out of the wood-fired oven behind us. We lean in close to each other, my aging ears finding it hard to drown out the surrounding din of waiters serving, plates setting, silverware clanging, other couples talking.

I’m struck by his hair—his once thick, brunette hair, now silvered and thinning, showing the pink of his scalp. I look at him and smile, grateful we’ve survived what many married couples don’t.

My husband of 25 years will be 64 in October, two months after I turn 59. Thirteen years ago, this month, we stood in the backyard of this log home looking west over the farm field. He placed his arm around my shoulders and asked, “Can you see us growing old together here?”

Five months later, we moved in. We’re still here. We built a barn, fenced three pastures, learned how to grow hay and compost horse manure. And, of course, we all learned to ride horses. In short, we jumped into a foreign world. I was scared but not as scared as I was at the beginning of us.

Twenty years ago when we began adopting our three kids, we were full of hopes and dreams. Then, I had some hunches that turned out to be facts. Our lives became a steady stream of assessments, diagnoses, appointments and therapies for invisible, permanent disabilities associated with prenatal exposure to alcohol: ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), speech/language disabilities, neurosensory hearing loss, visual disabilities, multiple learning disabilities, intellectual disability, Bipolar Disorder. And then there was me.

We didn’t know then that I, too, would deal with my own invisible disability—recurrent depression so debilitating and painful at times that I’ve wanted to fall asleep and not wake up. Thankfully, proper medication, prayer, healthy lifestyle, supportive friends and the love of my husband and kids have helped me manage this leading cause of disability worldwide and a major contributor to the overall global burden of disease.

Twenty years has taken its toll, to be sure, with all our challenges. In fact, I have often wondered if we would crumble. On more days than I can count, I begged God for grace to keep us going when I couldn’t even keep me going. Thriving seemed out of the question. Surviving was my goal.

I looked at the future and wondered if God’s promise given in the life verse I chose for all three of our kids (Jeremiah 29:11) was actually believable. Did God really intend to prosper us and not harm us? Did God really have a purpose and a plan for us? Would God really give us hope and a future?  This verse sounded so perfect in the beginning but how would God’s promise pan out when all seemed to be breaking?

Turns out, God used every word of that life verse not just for our kids but for us all. In the hardest of times, we’d repeat God’s promise out loud to each other. It didn’t necessarily change painful feelings but God’s promise helped us all grow in trust. Because it’s one thing to say you trust God when you don’t have to trust God. It’s quite another thing to have to trust God when God is all you have to trust.

Having always been an “I can do anything”, seemingly self-sufficient woman, I found myself in the repeated position of crying out to God, “I’m at the end of myself. I have no idea what to do. I have no idea how to cope.  I have no idea what You’re doing.” Just when I thought that surely this “bruised reed” would break, I found God helping me/us every single time, showing us the next step, miraculously providing for our every need. Twenty years. God’s never failed. What I thought might kill me has actually strengthened me. All these trials have grown up our faith in our God.

Today, I walk through quiet rooms filled with framed photos of ages past, from orphanage through high school, of a family not only still intact but knit together in a way that only God could have done. We’ve survived. And we’ve thrived.

I snap photos of the photos, the slight blur of them all. I breathe deeply the wonder of God—thanking Him for His great love and faithfulness.

Nicholas the day after leaving the orphanage. 20 months. 15 pounds. Couldn’t stand. Couldn’t hold a sippy cup. Infested with skin and intestinal parasites. Raging ear infections.

Yes, through the years I’ve prayed for God to heal our kids. Because it’s heart-breaking to watch your kids feel the pain of not developing like their peers and not experiencing what many take for granted.

We’ve been through many a dark pit together. It’s been painful beyond what I could have ever imagined. But God has rescued us from each dark pit and brought us out better than before, deepening our dependent relationship with our Lord. Because you know?  We’ve come to know that spiritual dependence is the best dependence. Spiritual growth is the best growth. Every other kind of human development may be stunted, but the soul has no bounds. The soul doesn’t depend on an intact brain or a functioning body. Depending solely on God when all else collapses, the soul finds the best way.

Through all the fears and tears, through all the years, God has held us tightly and lovingly, providing for us perfectly, even miraculously. And God has grown a love in us for each other that is beyond anything I could have ever imagined or hoped for in a family.

We are family. True family. Wrapped up in and held by God. And I know—I really know now—from doubting deeply to knowing confidently, God will always have hold of us all, most lovingly, now and after death when we depart.

God’s given me all I ever wanted and more than I could have ever imagined. God’s given me this blessed assurance that no matter how shattered our original hopes and dreams, He has new and improved hopes and dreams that will fulfill.

Indeed, God has known his plans for us all along. Indeed, God has prospered us and not harmed us all along. Indeed, God has given us hope and a future all along.

I’m looking my 60’s in the face. My husband is nearly half-way through. Will we have another 25 years together as a couple, as a family here on this sphere?  God only knows. But I’m going to savor each and every day, embrace my now-grown kids, and keep walking hand-in-hand with this silver-haired man I get to have and to hold as my husband. All the way Home.

Thanks be to God for His amazing grace.

 

 

Through many dangers, toils, and snares,
I have already come;
’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promised good to me, His Word my hope secures;
He will my Shield and Portion be,
As long as life endures.

Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,
And mortal life shall cease,
I shall possess, within the veil,
A life of joy and peace.

John Newton