Sharing our stories. Our history with God. Our triumphs. Our struggles.

Heart to heart.

Today, there is something on my heart that it's time to share.

There is healing balm released when we open the doors in our heart that hurt.

Sometimes what we find behind those doors causes such great pain that we quickly close the door again, because the pain is still there.

I was thinking the other day about a prophetess of God. Someone I learned alot about the tabernacle from years ago. She is known all over the world as His. But, she had not learned how to be vulnerable. She had a shield around her heart. In the area of prophecy, she was a warrior, but in the area of being a wife, she knew nothing on how to do it God's way.

Her wedding was posted for all to see; Broadcasted live.

Such joy watching her get to experience that day: Her day. The day her and her man of God became 1.

But not too long after that, I watched this strong woman disappearing from the public eye. Struggles within the house came.

 This strong woman also had a well known husband. Adored by many.

The pull at his heart was strong. The woman of God knew how to fight in praise. In intercession. But the woman she was was not equipped for the storm that she faced as she watched what she had said yes to, be pulled from her hands.

Their marriage wasn't build on the rock.

They were. Individually, They were powerful. But together, neither had learned how to carry the weight of their spiritual positions into the union.

Then I was thinking about being a mother.

 When I was a little girl, all I ever wanted was to be a mom.

Someone to take care of. To look after. To love.

Someone who would love me forever. 

As I thought about Hannah. Her heart cry to have a son.

Her own son, I realized there was someone who felt what I felt. Almost like what I heard in my heart too. I began to fellowship with Hannah within the pages of God's Word.

They became living to me.

 her vow : http://www.bibleseed.org/Artic...le/Hannahs%20Vow.htm

 The story in simple terms is here : http://www.dltk-bible.com/cv/hannah.htm e)

 Scriptural reference of account:http://www.biblegateway.com/pa...h=1Sam.1.1-1Sam.1.28

My heart had experienced being a mother. I did get to have my children.

I was an attentive mother mostly.  There were times i was distracted with creating to make a living. Selling the items I made. Baking for my family. Making flower arrangements, birdhouses, rustic cabinets and shelves, garden signs and artist teddy bears and dolls. Clothing for my kids and blankets for them to keep warm. I loved being a mother.

I was full. My marriage was not so warm. But my busyness being a mother helped me not struggle there. Needing to be loved by a man wasn't my deepest ache. 

But there did come a time for me when I began to fellowship with Abigail in God's Word. I understood her heart. Her pain. 

There did come a time when I couldnt endure the words that were like stripes. They didn't leave bruises you could see. But the damage was there. Just under the surface, where no one could see.

http://www.biblegateway.com/pa.../?search=1+Samuel+25

I smiled and acted like I was ok. I was very small my whole life. I began to put on weight. I hid under that covering so it wouldn't matter. I didn't 'need' to be a woman. I could just be a mother. A worker. Those 2 areas would fill every ache.

So I thought.

There came a time when in order to protect myself, I had to leave my marriage.  The words were more than I could bear day after day. The torment was like bruises on my brain. He didn't mean to. His mother had done it to him. He watched it his whole life.

I had to be brave.  Did I love me? Could I love me?

could I believe that there was life outside of abuse?

Would I risk leaving the only phsyical safe place I ever knew?

I had exchanged one form of abuse for another.

I had every form as a child. I ran from that. I knew love didnt look like that. The streets were safer as a kid. Lived on them most of my life. from home to home. Parks, tents in the cornfields. I knew how to protect myself from the elements. But not how to protect myself from this pain.

I didnt know yet that my choice to protect myself from that would result in my children departing too. I didnt know my protecting me would mean losing them.

i didn't believe that they would go, but I didn't put up a fight.

I layed down my rights. i didnt have anything to offer them.

I stopped being creative. I stopped living.

I had to let them go to give them a better life.

I watched the 9 months they were with me, the pain of struggle they experienced as I tried to provide for us 5.

2 jobs. No time with them. Always working. Single mothers dont have it easy.

I let them spend as much time as they wanted with their dad.

 I had given them covering, butI couldnt give them the desires of their heart. I couldnt give them bikes, or nice toys or provide a stable home. I did try. But i didnt know 'how'.

 When we went to court and 3 of them (ours) chose his home, I didnt put up a fight.

I watched them suffer because I couldnt give them anything.

They were worth it.

Dad could give them a home.The family home. The school they were raised in. He had  gotten a stable job. I couldnt fight that.

I didnt want to. I knew they were better off.

Love looks like something. It looks like sacrificing what you wanted your whole life to create a better one for your kids.

I began again finding solace in the Word of God. My place of refuge. He always had something to say to me. He gave me comfort in my pain.

I remembered how  the Hannah I had read about in God's Word had to give her hearts desire to God.

She had to let him go. The one she prayed for. her. I felt her pain in my heart deeply. I fellowshipped in her suffering.

I mourned like only a mother can.

Full. But then empty.

Sacrifice for the good of the ones I loved.

He had raised me since I was 15 1/2. He was the one who saved me from my childhood pain. I was divorced and pregnant when he met me.

He was the first man I trusted after my childhood abuse and neglect. He was my best friend. He was my friend through my pregnancy, then once my son was born, he became his dad and helped me raise him.

We had 3 more after that.

Somewhere along the way, we forgot to tend our garden. Our marriage.

We both stopped caring. Stopped needing a wife. I stopped needing a husband.

He told me later, the dream of his heart was the same as mine: to be a father.Parents. Our heart dream: To be a mom. To be a dad.

Sometimes there is places we have dreamed that once they are broken, somehow we put up walls where we dont want to be hurt again.

We push God out, or people out. Or children away so no one can hurt our heart again that deeply. We stop needing anyone, because it seems easier that way.

But GOD WANTS TO COME IN AND HEAL YOU EVERYWHERE IT HURTS

And teach you to DREAM AGAIN

TO HOPE AGAIN

 TO LOVE AGAIN

TO RISK ONCE AGAIN

My story might be similar to yours.

We both watched marriage not work as kids. Abuse as part of the cycle of what 'love looks like', (so we thought.)

When we both achieved the goal we had as children. To have kids.

We stopped pulling together as a team. We had them. They were our heart cry.

He is still my friend. 

Today, I want you to begin to look at your life and find someone in God's Word you can relate to.

I found such comfort in so many ways in the threads of word pictures that God created in there just for me.

His Word is how I process what I experience. It gives me a place to go.

When no one is there, just remember Jesus is.

He is with you. Every story in His loveletter is a present to your heart.

There are people in there He wrote about or had His writers put down in writing, because He KNEW you would need it.

The stories God writes about are not just stories beloveds.

They are written about to help us. To heal us.

To say: I understand and I sent help for you within the pages of my book.

Read it. Find comfort in it.

Come close. Close to His heart.

Let every story lead you to His heart.

To His ways.

To His face

You are not alone dear one. From the ashes, you will rise.

He is with you.

Talk to Him.

He is waiting.....