the story of the church channel and my sick baby and the goodness of the Lord . repost from last year . Two years ago I was laying in a bed with my daughter in Toronto , Canada . It was Christmas time and we were visiting my father for the holiday . I was pregnant with our daughter Lucy and my husband was serving in the war in Afghanistan . Two days into our trip Grace had gotten sick and we had to take her to the ER . She had a virus which left her listless , coughing and with a fever that was so out of control , she could barely breathe . It was all so out of control . We had just made this big trip that was supposed to be full of joy and fun and here we were in a strange place and sick beyond belief . It was cold and dark and I remember googling ERs and trying to find a place that would accept our insurance . She was so sick . I found myself so alone and scared . I stayed up with her all night , watching her struggle to breathe . I held her in the bath tub . We took hot showers to help open her airways and I just wept . I was crying out to Jesus to heal her . There was nothing I could do for her , except pray . I found myself reaching out to everyone I knew to pray . . . The trip was so full of supernatural I just couldn 't believe it . A few weeks prior to arriving there I had been trying to sell some things on our local yard sale website and included my phone number in the ad . While we were in Canada , I received a text message from a number I didn 't know , and all it said was that there was healing in the name of Jesus and that there were so many of her friends and family suffering with physical illness and she was praying for us . I had no idea who this person was so I asked , and it was her . We had never spoken , but she had a word from God for us . We spent days upstairs in bed , both of us . All we did was take baths , sleep and watch tv . For some reason the tv upstairs in the room we were in only got a few channels , one of them happened to be " the church channel " . And as I lay there one night very late praying over Grace , James and Betty Robison were on with their Life Outreach International . . . Mission Feeding show . I watched in awe of the passion this husband and wife had for these suffering people . . . I watched and my heart once again broke for all the people in the world who suffer . Something happened to me that night . Something I cant explain . And as I sit here and write this out , I can now see how all the suffering in my own life was a beautiful way of preparing me for what God wants to do in me . I was a mom in a desperate situation . A mom who was hundreds of miles from home , in a different country , pregnant while my husband served in a war . And I had a very sick child . I had no control and I hate not having control . My personality is one that God chisels at daily , the way I need to be prepared , have a plan and a way to execute that plan . And there was nothing that I could do . And then God just started speaking to me . . . Melissa , my child , don 't you know that I am already healing Grace ? I hear your prayers . . . and I am meeting your needs . I have brought you here , to this place of feeling so helpless and scared so that you may understand what I am asking you to do . I need you to pray for all of my other children who are in need . All of the children who don 't know me , and are hungry . I needed you to understand what it felt like to not know how to meet your child 's needs . . . I needed you to understand that there are millions of mothers who cry out to me every night in desperation because their children are on the verge of death . . . because they are hungry . Everything I have let you see in this life , everything I have allowed you to go through , is for your good . It is for me . Just as you lift up your child to me tonight , so many others do , and they don 't have the resources you do . Wont you help me ? Wont you lay down all your fears and just allow me to work through you ? Help me tonight , my child . James and Betty asked for donations . They pleaded with whomever was watching and it was on their heart to do so . So what did I do ? I gave 100 bucks . I didn 't tell my husband , I lived in fear that he wouldn 't understand that God asked me to do this . I just knew he would think I was crazy . Grace eventually got better and we went home , just in time for Christmas . The day we got home , I went to get the crazy amount of mail that had stacked up . I opened a card that caught my eye , and it was from my mother in law . And in the card was a check . For 100 bucks . It was then that I truly understood what God was asking me to do . Trust and follow Him . * * * REPOST FROM LAST YEAR God has been stirring up a burning passion inside me to use art as a way to provide for my family and his . He has been using all of the pain and suffering in my life to bring me here . To a place where I feel so encouraged and confident in his love and hope that I could believe that I am able to make a difference , for him . I would love to use my art as a way to give back to our Amazing God who has been my healer , my encourager and my hope . He has answered big prayers for me and rescued me from places you wouldn 't believe , and I just cant imagine my life without Him . It is my desire that all people have their basic needs met on this earth in the name of Jesus . That no more children would go to bed hungry or sick or in need and not wake up the next day . And I know that 's a burden I carry on my heart and I will never be able to make that happen . I will never be able to build a well with my own two hands in a place where there is no water , and I will never be able to fill all the bellies of all the kids who suffer in poverty each day . But he can . And I want to be a part of it . I feel so blessed to live in a country where I have shelter , a clean place to lay my head at night and the freedom to worship my God whenever I choose . There very fact that I can sit here and share my love for our God and speak the truth is a freedom that most of the people in these countries don 't have . They don 't have a grocery store to drive their cars to and shop for food that will nourish them . They don 't have a faucet to wash their bodies and quench their thirst . There are some days I cry over my basket of groceries and just thank God that He has provided so much for me and my family . I am just so grateful . . . so grateful for the abundance we have here in the United States , in our home . I used to never understand how God could use ONE person . I used to not understand how God could use ONE dollar . I used to think that the world had so much hunger and sickness and darkness that one person could never make a difference . Someone once asked JamesMelissa If Part 1 was a tragedy , Part 2 is hope . There is more pain and hurt . . . but this is where we enter Jesus . Part 1 was the ground work . God was showing me that no matter what my husband was going through or how horrible he was or however bad it got , I was too . . . guilty . It was hard living in Virgina after my husband came home . It was hard because he had forgiven me and we decided to move forward . . . but we were still in the place . Everything around me was a reminder of what had happened . Very early on in our relationship we had talked about kids and I don 't remember when or how but we always knew that we would have 2 girls . And for some reason , we knew they would be Grace and Lucy . And not soon after he came home , we got pregnant with Grace . I knew that it was God now . . . helping to protect us because at this time , Scott was still drinking and if I wasn 't pregnant , we would have been back at the bars where all the people I had been hanging around with and thank you God for your protection . And at around 32 weeks we moved to San Diego . We moved to San Diego for a school that he was going to attend . He didn 't really want to do this school but a lot of people were pushing him so we did it . We were only going to be there for around 6 months . We settled into a downtown high rise and at 36 weeks , I gave birth to Grace . It was magical and wonderful and the worst time in our life . She was colicky for 4 months and cried for 17 hours a day . He was gone all day long and had a lot of pressure on him and HATED HIS JOB . I joke around with people I tell this story to . . . and say at one point , we were all going to jump off the high rise because this was bad . My husband was miserable and drinking and shut off . There was nothing . I remember scheduling times to talk with him telling him that I couldn 't do it anymore . I just couldn 't be married to this . There was no life . I was miserable and he was miserable . . . but in the back of my mind , what in the world would I do ? Where would I go ? This is when I began to feel so lonely that I started talking with one of the people I hung around with in Virginia . We emailed back and forth for a while and it was a release for me . And even though nothing happened with this person back then , he was always really into me . He was always very sweet but it started to become an obsession on his end . My husband quit the school and we got new orders to North Carolina . We when moved there , I was still talking to this person and it made coping with my husband and his absence in our marriage bearable . It made all the nights I watched him drink himself into a passed out mess . . . it just made it better . My husband was still working and providing but I had a " emotional husband " too . Someone I could talk to and someone who cared . I remember at this point , the Lord sent me a great group of military wife friends . And one day , this group met at my house . I remember one girl in particular who had long black hair and she sat quietly and listened . She never said a word . I complained and whined about my husband the whole time . And and she left I remember her asking for my number . This is the point in my life where everything changed . She came back later and she said she wanted to talk with me . So we sat and talked and she listed to me again , complain about him . " He doesn 't know how to talk to people . . . he wont go anywhere with us . . . he just drinks and watches sports and we have no life . . . and he isn 't interested in anything I am interested in . . . he doesn 't even know how to light the grill . " it went on and on . . . My heart literally felt like it was being ripped out of my chest and my stomach was up in my throat . I was overwhelmed with a spirit of conviction that I had never felt before . All wrapped up in one moment I felt God who I wasn 't even in a relationship with . . . I felt him speak to me . I felt him calling me . I felt him put the spot light on me and take it off of him . . . I was still a sinner . I was still having an emotional affair . I was just as bad . She gave me a book . And I read it and it changed my life . I couldn 't put it down and I read it and read it and read it some more . It was called Created to Be His Help Meet By Debi Pearl . We bought a house and moved into a different neighborhood . I kept reading and learning and I fought Satan hard . I still hadn 't cut off the relationship with this other person but I was convicted . My husband was worse than EVER and it was the only comfort I had . I also was up to 232 pounds because all I could do was eat to calm the feelings of loneliness and anger . But something strange happened . The person I was talking to started to go deeper into things and at one point started trying to convince me that my husband wasn 't going to change and that I should leave him and come to be with him . We talked about me leaving and how he would be a great husband and he would take care of me . . . this is when my husband and I had our first serious divorce talk . It was around Christmas time . I remember sitting with him and we were making plans to go see the attorneys on base . But then there was Grace . And I just could not do it . I JUST COULD NOT LEAVE HIM . I wanted to most of the time we were married but from the moment I saw him . . . I saw through him and saw to who he would become . I couldn 't stop holding onto the glimpse of hope God kept giving me . I just knew that we were supposed to be together and I didn 't know why but damn it . . . I couldn 't leave . My conscience wouldn 't let me . It was horrible . I fought it . But I couldn 't separate my baby from her dad . That was the bottom line for me . So I told my husband about the emotional affair and he again , forgave me . And I made a choice at that moment , after much reading in the bible . . . to break it off . It hurt like hell . I remember crying and it felt like I was dying . I really felt like the life was being sucked out of me . I quit smoking when I found out I was pregnant with Grace and I wasn 't drinking . . . and now I had to get rid of the one thing that gave me comfort . But I did it . Because I just knew that God could not bless my marriage if I was not in it % 100 . We made a pact that day , that we would never talk about divorce again . That no matter how bad it got , we weren 't going to go there . That it wasn 't an option . That we had no choice but to deal with what we had and take what we got . That no matter what , we weren 't going to discuss it again . This is where I began praying for him . But this is also where I began a cycle of spiritual superiority . I was reading the bible and I was receiving revelation and I was changing my life . . . but my husband . . . he was still drunk on the couch . And I began to become angry . And I began to feel entitled , again . But now , I was thinking . . . God , now I am a Christian and you want me to be happy right ? You say that your husband should love you like Jesus and look at all these happy husbands and wives here at church . . . you want that for me . . . right ? So I would think , I deserve a Christian husband . My preaching to my husband became full of selfishness and the Lord took him away from me again . Literally God said , I am taking your husband away again Melissa because you are going to ruin this . You are giving him the good news , but only so it benefits you . So he deployed , again . And this time I was scared . You see , this whole time I believe the root of my issue was fear . I felt this ever since I was a little girl . When my parents split up I was always in fear of losing them . My dad traveled alot for work and I was convinced he would die . And my mom , whenever she would leave , I was in such a state of panic and fear , I would have full on panic attacks . I would scream and cry to the point of throwing up . And when I met my husband , he became my steadfast . He became my God . I always put all my trust and faith in him and whenever he would leave I would feel that same fear . I was back to being a little girl again . He had to go to training for several months away in California before he actually deployed . And when he came home , we had about 2 months until he was to leave and we decided to try for another baby . We got pregnant with Lucy in one month , one month before he left . And the day he left , was another one of the most horrible and amazing days of my life . I remember crying so hard as the bus left , I watched it drive away and I texted my husband , I don 't think I am ever going to see you again . He told me to stop it and that he would be back , and that he loved me . He was going to be embedded with the Afghan Army . He would be living with them , amongst possible terrorists and this was like a living hell for me . I remember coming home and putting Grace in front of the TV and I went and locked myself in our bedroom . I called my friend Melissa and began to tell her that I felt as if God has destined me to suffer , that my marriage , my husband . . . God was making me suffer on purpose . And that he was going to die and I would just have to die with him because as much as I hated him , I loved him . And he was everything to me . He was everything good and everything bad , he was my life . And within a few moments , she had about 3 people on the phone , one was a pastor and I fell to my knees as they prayed for about 20 minutes over me . They began to speak life over me and my husband and began to speak the promisI remember this one day though , one day that I will never forget . It was way before Lucy , way before the deployment and it was a day that God showed me hope . Because no matter how bad things get I believe God wants to give us something . People were praying that for me . I just wanted something that said , your on the right track , and I am making all of this right . For me , it was the day that my friend asked me to babysit . And I thought here we go . . . its just going to be me and Grace and her friend and what are we going to do all day while my husband sits on the couch and watches TV and nurses a hangover ? I decided to take the kids to the aquarium which was on the way to the beach . It was about an hours drive away . And he came with us . I will never forget it . We had so much fun . He was fun . For about a day , I got to be with my husband like we were a normal family . We were out in the world and we were doing something the kids wanted to do and not what he wanted to do . And my heart was so happy watching him with our daughter and it was a good day . On the way home we stopped off at the beach and took the girls shoes off and let them splash around and get messy and wet and I thanked God that day . That he showed me that he was doing a work in him . We stopped and got ice cream and the girls fell asleep on the drive home . When we got home , he carried them both in , they were both in diapers . And I have a picture of him carrying them in , all slumped over and sleeping and it will forever serve as a day that the Lord gave me hope . Posted by my people is us , and their land is our marriage . and my people is you , and your mess too . Maybe I could tell you first , that the reason I feel so connected to staying in a bad marriage through pain is because I was a kid on the other end , suffering the effects of my parents divorce . And I should tell you that at a young age , to calm the pain , I turned to food , drugs , alcohol and men . I have forgiven my parents and have relationships with both of them and feel nothing but love and gratitude for this journey I have been on . . . but the other part of my story is that I walked in unforgiveness for about 7 years . And it wasn 't until I forgave and became present in those relationships , that God would allow me to walk into my destiny . I had to separate myself from the pain I was carrying and live in freedom and in the life that Jesus died for me to have . Maybe this whole story will come out in detail one day . I hope so . But for now , the shell of it will be enough . Because on a day where I am thanking God for the amount of opportunities I have been given the past few years , as I am reflecting on all that God has done in my husbands life . . . reflecting on all of these things leaves me in a place where I want to tell you about the horrible sin that my flesh has committed , in order to better paint a picture of the love of God . that if he could love ME through all of this , if He could give ME new life . . . my God . Thank you Jesus . I felt a deep need to escape my life at the age of 18 . I applied to work at places that would take me out of the life that I was in and would take me somewhere new . I got a job at an amusement park called Cedar Point , in Ohio . I was coming from Arizona . And at a goodbye party that my coworkers at the restaurant I was working at had for me , I slept with someone , woke up naked on the floor in the living room . . . gathered my things and walked to my car . I smoked a cigarette and drove home . My new job in Ohio allowed me to come late and I will NEVER EVER FORGET the night before I left . I was saved at 13 years old , but I had become very wreck less and I was not walking with the Lord . But that night , I prayed . I prayed that I would go to Cedar Point and either make a lot of money so I could start over or find the man I was going to marry . And God would never let me forget that prayer because for many years , that was all that I had to hold onto . And I thank God that he answers prayer , not in the way that we expect , but he answers . And he did give me the man I was to marry , but I didn 't know that it would take us 10 years for us to be healed and reconciled to him . But he answered my prayer . So I left . And my train and plane arrived into Ohio and I was standing at a dark train station at 5 am with 2 suitcases and a carry on . Some guy asked me if I needed a ride to the park I said yes . . . and he drove me . I showed up and it was too early for the park to be open so I found a park bench to sit on . As I sat there waiting , 2 guys walked by . I knew they had been drinking because what else would they be doing there at that hour . . . they said hi , we talked for a minute and they asked if once I was settled we could hang out . I said yes . One of them was my now husband . For the first few weeks at the park , I hung out with them . . . and it soon became evident that he and I were onto something . he was so cute and funny and he was the life of the party . And when work was over , we would drink until the morning . We had so much fun and everybody loved us . I felt deeply connected to him , he felt it too . It just made sense , we couldn 't explain it but it was happening . We both loved music and sports and booze . We were always the last ones out . . . I would sing and he would write . I would draw and he would come up with beautiful poetry . There was more than just that thought , I knew that God had a plan . I didn 't know what it was but I knew that he was part of it . We knew from early on that we would be together forever . I cant explain tWe would spend the next several years in an alcoholic state . All we did was drink . I did it because that 's what he loved to do . And I became depressed . And for one year , I stayed in bed . I began to feel physical illness . I felt too ill to work so Scott worked and payed our bills . My car got repossessed . We were down to nothing but he always got up and went to work and took care of things no matter how drunk he got or was . I was the opposite , I just shut down . It was a very weird circle of he needed me and I needed him . His drinking was getting worse . I would find myself on our porch many times drunk along with him . . . trying to explain the gospel to him . After all , I was saved when I was 13 . I felt like we were different . I would drink and be normal again the next day and he would be angry and confined and shut off to the world . . . it was different . We would cancel plans and we would get into heavy arguments that sometimes got out of hand . One time , I was actually so angry with him for being so mean while he was drunk that I slapped him in the face . I called the police to come and help me because I was scared . . . and they arrested me . For domestic abuse . He tried to get the cops to let me go but they wouldn 't . He always had a feeling that even though my response wasn 't justified , that he had something to do with bringing us to this place . We kept on going though . Sometimes I don 't know why . I had feelings of suicide , feelings of depression . . . I was angry at God . Why was I back here ? Why God do you say you are my provider and my safe place but I never feel safe or taken care of ? I began to try to help him out of his mess . . . the alcohol . All while I was still a mess . For some reason I just couldn 't leave . He would tell me at times , that I was the only reason he was still alive . That my support and love was sometimes all he had . . . I just kept making a choice to stay . It hurt like hell . My husband decided to join the military . I spent many days pouring into his spirit about what he COULD be and WHO he was created to be instead of who he was being . We moved to Chicago and he joined there . And we found another place to live and we waited for him to leave for boot camp . But before he left , we decided the best thing for us to do was get married . It wasn 't something forced but it definitely didn 't feel magical . We just did it because we always felt like that 's what would happen . We loved each other deeply , but we didn 't know what love was . When he left for boot camp I remember feeling like it was the hardest thing ever . I had developed a very unhealthy notion of who he was . My husband became my God . I remember feeling like I had no identity outside of him . He went to boot camp and then we moved to Virginia . When we got to Virginia , he worked at the hospital and I stayed home . I had no idea who I was or what I was supposed to do so I just supported him . I remember feeling so bogged down with fear that he would be deployed and he would die in war that some days I wouldn 't even get out of bed . I would sit in the bath tub with panic attacks and I felt crazy . I felt like I was dying . I felt paranoia and fear like never before . I was scared almost to death . What would I do without my husband ? It got so bad that here I was again . . . not working . Not moving . I would just exist and then on the weekends , we would go out and drink . This is where my husbands drinking would get really bad . There were nights of passing out in the middle of the floor and I had to check if he was still alive . Nights of watching him angry and punching holes in things that I felt physically ill . What was I doing here God ? Why am I here in this ? Why do you have me HERE . Why am I married to this . I was very angry . The day came that my husband would come home and look me in the eye and tell me he was going to war . My response was to curl up in fear and panic and that led to more physical illness . Somehow I decided to muster up the strengthThis would begin the cycle of months of my horrific experience with Satan and lust and entitlement . It wouldn 't be just once . It would happen many times with many people and I became so out of control that I did things that I only God and I know about . Toward the end of my husband being gone something hit me . I had a sense of deep regret and shame that I had never felt before . I remember thinking , this ISN ' T ME . This isn 't the person I am . I used to love God . I loved my husband . I longed for a different life though . I didn 't want to be in such a dysfunctional place . I began again to have feelings of suicide . I was on my way to check myself into the hospital because I was afraid of what I was doing to myself . . . now I know that all those times I felt that , that it was God intervening on my behalf . I now know that satan knew that on November 3 , 2014 I would sit here and type this out and he wanted to stop me . Glory to God for rescuing me . On my way out of the door that day , my husband called . I answered the phone and began to weep . He knew what I had to tell him . FOR SOME REASON HE JUST KNEW . And I will never forget what happened next . He was calm , he was quiet , and he forgave me . Right there . On the spot . He didn 't care how many or how often . . . he didn 't want to know everything , he wanted to help me . He wanted me to know that he knew that he had something to do with bringing us to this place . I had no sense of justification thought . I had a heart of full repentance . I knew that I needed to be forgiven . He came home about a month later . I remember seeing him in the crowd and I ran up to him and he hugged me . I wasn 't different , he wasn 't different . . . but together we were on the path of healing . We weren 't submitted to the Lord at that time , but God was there . He was starting something new . A few months later , we were pregnant with Grace . We were on the same playing field . Not one was better than the other . We started at ground zero . Sinner . Neither one of us could claim righteousness . We were both guilty . God allowed that on purpose . It makes the story about him , and not us and what we did to make it better . He is guilty , and I am guilty . Going through those years and coming out on the other side is what gave me freedom to forgive my parents for their divorce and the pain it caused because I could see how two people in the world could fall apart . I saw how easy it was , without God , to fail . And it gave me a sense of great compassion for the lost and the broken . I remember even from an early age , connecting to peoples pain and sorrow . I had felt it . I had seen it . I had committed every sin a person could . . . even murder . And I had experienced the precious blood of Jesus come into my body and cleanse me . I had met our God who loved me through it all . The God who said I AM NOT READY FOR YOU TO BE DONE . I have plans for you . . . and all of the suffering you have felt from those around you and by your own hands . . . I will use it all . I am free . our testimony PART 2 If Part 1 was a tragedy , Part 2 is hope . There is more pain and hurt . . . but this is where we enter Jesus . Part 1 was the ground work . God was showing me that no matter what my husband was going through or how horrible he was or however bad it got , I was too . . . guilty . It was hard living in Virginia after my husband came home . It was hard because he had forgiven me and we decided to move forward . . . but we were still in the place . Everything around me was a reminder of what had happened . Very early on in our relationship we had talked about kids and I don 't remember when or how but we always knew that we would have 2 girls . And for some reason , we knew they would be Grace and Lucy . And not soon after he came home , we got pregnant with Grace . I knew that it was God now . . . helping to protect us because at this time , Scott was still drinking and if I wasn 't pregnant , we would have been back at the bars where all the people I had been hanging around with and thank you God for your protection . We moved to San Diego for a school that he was going to attend . He didn 't really want to do this school but a lot of people were pushing him so we did it . We were only going to be there for around 6 months . We settled into a downtown high rise and at 36 weeks , I gave birth to Grace . It was magical and wonderful and the worst time in our life . She was colicky for 4 months and cried for 17 hours a day . He was gone all day long and had a lot of pressure on him and HATED HIS JOB . I joke around with people I tell this story to . . . and say at one point , we were all going to jump off the high rise because this was bad . My husband was miserable and drinking and shut off . There was nothing . I remember scheduling times to talk with him telling him that I couldn 't do it anymore . I just couldn 't be married to this . There was no life . I was miserable and he was miserable . . . but in the back of my mind , what in the world would I do ? Where would I go ? This is when I began to feel so lonely that I started talking with one of the people I hung around with in Virginia . We emailed back and forth for a while and it was a release for me . And even though nothing happened with this person back then , he was always really into me . He was always very sweet but it started to become an obsession on his end . My husband quit the school and we got new orders to North Carolina . We when moved there , I was still talking to this person and it made coping with my husband and his absence in our marriage bearable . It made all the nights I watched him drink himself into a passed out mess . . . it just made it better . My husband was still working and providing but I had a " emotional husband " too . Someone I could talk to and someone who cared . I remember at this point , the Lord sent me a great group of military wife friends . And one day , this group met at my house . I remember one girl in particular who had long black hair and she sat quietly and listened . She never said a word . I complained and whined about my husband the whole time . And and she left I remember her asking for my number . She came back later and she said she wanted to talk with me . So we sat and talked and she listed to me again , complain about him . " He doesn 't know how to talk to people . . . he wont go anywhere with us . . . he just drinks and watches sports and we have no life . . . and he isn 't interested in anything I am interested in . . . he doesn 't even know how to light the grill . " it went on and on . . . My heart literally felt like it was being ripped out of my chest and my stomach was up in my throat . I was overwhelmed with a spirit of conviction that I had never felt before . All wrapped up in one moment I felt God who I wasn 't even in a relationship with . . . I felt him speak to me . I felt him calling me . I felt him put the spot light on me and take it off of him . . . I was still a sinner . I was still having an emotional affair . I was just as bad . She gave me a book . And I read it and it changed my life . I couldn 't put it down and I read it and read it and read it some more . We bought a house and moved into a different neighborhood . I kept reading and learning and I fought Satan hard . I still hadn 't cut off the relationship with this other person but I was convicted . My husband was worse than EVER and it was the only comfort I had . I also was up to 232 pounds because all I could do was eat to calm the feelings of loneliness and anger . But something strange happened . The person I was talking to started to go deeper into things and at one point started trying to convince me that my husband wasn 't going to change and that I should leave him and come to be with him . We talked about me leaving and how he would be a great husband and he would take care of me . . . this is when my husband and I had our first serious divorce talk . It was around Christmas time . I remember sitting with him and we were making plans to go see the attorneys on base . But then there was Grace . And I just could not do it . I JUST COULD NOT LEAVE HIM . I wanted to most of the time we were married but from the moment I saw him . . . I saw through him and saw to who he would become . I couldn 't stop holding onto the glimpse of hope God kept giving me . I just knew that we were supposed to be together and I didn 't know why but damn it . . . I couldn 't leave . My conscience wouldn 't let me . It was horrible . I fought it . But I couldn 't separate my baby from her dad . That was the bottom line for me . So I told my husband about the emotional affair and he again , forgave me . And I made a choice at that moment , after much reading in the bible . . . to break it off . It hurt like hell . I remember crying and it felt like I was dying . I really felt like the life was being sucked out of me . I quit smoking when I found out I was pregnant with Grace and I wasn 't drinking . . . and now I had to get rid of the one thing that gave me comfort . But I did it . Because I just knew that God could not bless my marriage if I was not in it % 100 . We made a pact that day , that we would never talk about divorce again . That no matter how bad it got , we weren 't going to go there . That it wasn 't an option . That we had no choice but to deal with what we had and take what we got . That no matter what , we weren 't going to discuss it again . This is where I began praying for him . But this is also where I began a cycle of spiritual superiority . I was reading the bible and I was receiving revelation and I was changing my life . . . but my husband . . . he was still drunk on the couch . And I began to become angry . And I began to feel entitled , again . But now , I was thinking . . . God , now I am a Christian and you want me to be happy right ? You say that your husband should love you like Jesus and look at all these happy husbands and wives here at church . . . you want that for me . . . right ? So I would think , I deserve a Christian husband . And this time I was scared . You see , this whole time I believe the root of my issue was fear . I felt this ever since I was a little girl . When my parents split up I was always in fear of losing them . My dad traveled alot for work and I was convinced he would die . And my mom , whenever she would leave , I was in such a state of panic and fear , I would have full on panic attacks . I would scream and cry to the point of throwing up . And when I met my husband , he became my steadfast . He became my God . I always put all my trust and faith in him and whenever he would leave I would feel that same fear . I was back to being a little girl again . He had to go to training for several months away in California before he actually deployed . And when he came home , we had about 2 months until he was to leave and we decided to try for another baby . We got pregnant with Lucy in one month , one month before he left . And the day he left , was another one of the most horrible and amazing days of my life . I remember crying so hard as the bus left , I watched it drive away and I texted my husband , I don 't think I am ever going to see you again . He told me to stop it and that he would be back , and that he loved me . He was going to be embedded with the Afghan Army . He would be living with them , amongst possible terrorists and this was like a living hell for me . I remember coming home and putting Grace in front of the TV and I went and locked myself in our bedroom . I called my friend Melissa and began to tell her that I felt as if God has destined me to suffer , that my marriage , my husband . . . God was making me suffer on purpose . And that he was going to die and I would just have to die with him because as much as I hated him , I loved him . And he was everything to me . He was everything good and everything bad , he was my life . And within a few moments , she had about 3 people on the phone , one was a pastor and I fell to my knees as they prayed for about 20 minutes over me . They began to speak life over me and my husband and began to speak the promises of God over me . I began to feel my physical body and my spirit submit to God . I felt it . Like I was so weak and so covered in lies and fear that God was breaking it right then and there , that day . And this was when the rebuilding would start . God took my husband away from me so he could heal me . I gave birth to Lucy while he was on the phone with me ! It was amazing . And I took care of a newborn and my 3 year old for about one and a half months before he came home . And I rocked it . It was my call . He had restored me , he had shown me who I was . . . the word was speaking to me . Satan was backing off . And I knew I had a job to do . I had to love my husband . I had to love him no matter what . It became my job . I remember this one day though , one day that I will never forget . It was way before Lucy , way before the deployment and it was a day that God showed me hope . Because no matter how bad things get I believe God wants to give us something . People were praying that for me . I just wanted something that said , your on the right track , and I am making all of this right . For me , it was the day that my friend asked me to babysit . And I thought here we go . . . its just going to be me and Grace and her friend and what are we going to do all day while my husband sits on the couch and watches TV and nurses a hangover ? I decided to take the kids to the aquarium which was on the way to the beach . It was about an hours drive away . I will never forget it . We had so much fun . He was fun . For about a day , I got to be with my husband like we were a normal family . We were out in the world and we were doing something the kids wanted to do and not what he wanted to do . And my heart was so happy watching him with our daughter and it was a good day . On the way home we stopped off at the beach and took the girls shoes off and let them splash around and get messy and wet and I thanked God that day . That he showed me that he was doing a work in him . We stopped and got ice cream and the girls fell asleep on the drive home . When we got home , he carried them both in , they were both in diapers . And I have a picture of him carrying them in , all slumped over and sleeping and it will forever serve as a day that the Lord gave me hope . I was taking a bath this morning and I hear the Lord say to my heart . . . I hear your prayers . And he put your life before my vision and I sat there for a while in that moment . And there were some things I wanted to say , some things I felt I had to say before I could do anything else . I don 't know if you will ever read this so I wanted to make sure it was here , for whoever needs it after you . I want you to know that I am still praying for you for complete healing in the name of Jesus . I believe that he lives and lives IN US . And I believe that God is still in charge . And I believe that nothing that happens is out of his vision . I wont ever stop praying for the physically and mentally ill even though we see some pass on at an early age , I wont let that blur my vision of who Jesus is . I don 't have all the answers as to why some are healed on earth and some are not but my job here is not to even consider that . It is not my place to even question it . It is my job to pray without ceasing to a God who is healer . I don 't know if you know Jesus Christ as your savior , and if you don 't , I am praying for a complete restoration back to him , before your time is up on this earth . The truth is , we are all sick . We are all dying . Physically and mentally and this world is full of suffering and pain . And Jesus came so we could be released from that . That we may have life and live it to the fullest . And I wanted to say how wonderful it is for me to see the clips of you with your husband and mom , how much you love them . I am also praying for them as well . For comfort and peace in this very difficult time . I know what the tests show . I know things are getting worse , but I am called to pray for you for things my eyes can not see . And I wont stop until the day comes for you to meet our Father . I know that you you have postponed the date that you have chosen to end your life and I believe that somewhere deep down inside you feel that its not over yet . And I pray that even in the suffering you feel in the horrific disease that you would feel a completeness and wholeness as I pray over you today , in the sufferings of Jesus Christ who died on the cross to save your soul . For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ , so also our comfort abounds through Christ . 2nd Corinthians 1 : 5 . It took me a very long time to come to that place . I used to be very angry with God over sufferings , painful sufferings , emotional and physical . And I realize in a very deep corner of my heart that this is where I met my true God . The God of peace and healing and restoration and life and love . So today this is my prayer . We look to you for wisdom and peace for Brittany . That you would not allow one single thing for her that you don 't want . That we would all realize that we are fearfully and wonderfully made and our lives are not over until you say they are because you see things we don 't see , and you know things we don 't know . I pray that Brittany and all those reading this would come to know your son as their Lord and Savior and accept him into their hearts to rule and reign . And I pray right now in the name of Jesus that physical healing is for Brittany . That my prayers would not be weak , that you would hear me father as you have promised you do , and that you would send your son and the holy spirit to wherever she is right now with healing . Healing in her physical body , healing for her soul and for peace and comfort in this difficult time . I thank you Father , that we can come to you and you hear us . And I thank you for the blood of Jesus , shed on the cross , for us . And we would all be covered with the revelation and power of that blood today . I am praying for a miracle today . For healing . In the mighty name of Jesus , * * * this is a re post of a blog I wrote last year . . . it was a big turning point for me and it was on my heart to share again . I hope it finds the one who the holy spirit layed on my heart . I will never forget this . The only reason this blog exists is so I can remember the goodness of the Lord , and I can share his goodness with you . Its really easy to forget when the storms are above you , when the clouds are rolling in and you feel like surely , nobody sees your pain . I have felt that . I sometimes feel like this world is so big , so full of pain and suffering , that God just passes over me and doesn 't care about the small things . Sometimes I feel like he doesn 't hear me , how could he ? There are millions of people everyday lifting up their needs to him and he says he hears all of us ? We woke up on Saturday thinking we were going fishing but for some reason we got our coffee and huddled up on the couch and I stared to sing " old MacDonald had a farm " to the girls . . . it reminded us that the Rodeo was here and we had such a great time last year we decided to go . I looked on the website and it said it was dollar days , dollar popcorn and hot dogs and rides . . . we packed up and left under the assumption that we would get tickets there for the show and be able to get everyone fed there for a few bucks . This was good . But for some reason I ended up packing a full cooler of lunch just in case . We got there and the rodeo was sold out , both shows . We could pay for just the grounds and walk around and see the animals and some rides , but no show . My husband wanted to get out of the way so he headed out of the line towards the parking lot while I stayed at the ticket office . I could tell he just wanted to leave and come back another day . I was also in the cash only line which meant , well cash only . We only had the 20 we just broke for parking and our our card . I sort of just stood there thinking about what to do while some sweet lady behind me said , Ill pay for you . So I let her . I grabbed my husband and told him we were going in but We went in and walked around and it was fun . But I had this nagging feeling that I should have just listened to him . This story is not about that but I have to say that this is something the Lord is dealing with me on . I am beginning to understand that submission to my husband does not come from a place of a God just barking rules out or saying that I am weaker than my husband or incapable , but it really is for my benefit . He gives my husband certain wisdom and then he gives that to me . That 's just the way he wanted it and I have trouble trusting anyone so I like to jump the chain of command and pretend I know best . We sat down to eat our lunch in the beautiful sunshine and I just looked at him and felt this wave of guilt come over me for all the times I have left my husband wandering around with me with his tale tucked between his legs because I am so sure that I am right . It was like a movie playing in my head and I just felt so sorry . Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ . Wives , submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord . For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church , his body , of which he is the Savior . Now as the church submits to Christ , so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything . Husbands , love your wives , just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy , cleansing her by the washing with water through the word , and to present her to himself as a radiant church , without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish , but holy and blameless . In this same way , husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies . He who loves his wife loves himself . After all , no one ever hated their own body , but they feed and care for their body , just as Christ does the church for we are members of his body . For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife , and the two will become one flesh . This is a profound mystery - but I am talking about Christ and the church . However , each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself , and the wife must respect her husband . I couldn 't stop praying . I just kept telling God how sorry I was that I was like that . I couldn 't stop thinking about how much trouble I have put us in because I refused to listen to the wisdom he gives my husband or even give him the opportunity to lead our family in this way . I walked the rodeo with my husband and sweet kids . The sunshine was on our face and their was so much joy in their eyes . But I made a personal plea to God , God I am sorry that I didn 't listen . I am sorry that I don 't always follow your rules , but i want to . I feel so bad for my family right now , we are here but we could have come back and seen the show when it wasn 't sold out . If you wanted to , and I know you could , you could just give us tickets . You could just bless my family despite of my mistakes . . . I 'm so sorry . I am not asking you to , I 'm just saying you could . We walked for about an hour and then went to the reptile house . It caught my husbands eye since they were doing fishing and dog stuff near . . . I thought to myself there are so many people here . Thousands . How could one person just single this family of 4 out and know that we needed tickets . How could it be possible ? But I had this feeling that he was going to do it . At moments , I questioned did he hear me ? Does he care that I let my family down and need some help redeeming this situation ? Because there are people suffering in this world right now and people who really need him . . . and I just need tickets . Surely he is somewhere else , where really important things are happening . . . The reptile house led us out to a walkway that led to the carnival rides . For some reason I stopped to ask this information lady where the pony rides were and how much they cost . She pointed in the direction . . . we started to walk off . Then she called us back and said are you going to the rodeo ? I said no , its sold out . . . she smiled and waved me over . I lost it . I couldnt breathe . The tears are streaming from my face right now as I type this out . . . One person in the thousands of people around us singled us out and gave this family tickets to the show . I started to cry a very loud ugly cry . Sob . Tears streaming from my face and she grabbed me and hugged me . I said I 'm so sorry you probably don 't understand why I am crying . . . its just you are an answer to prayer . You are an answer to my prayer . She smiled again like she knew something I didn 't and said have a wonderful time . I cried the whole way there . We got into the show and the lights were so bright and the music was so loud and my blood was pumping and I felt so alive . But then suddenly everything stopped in my body . It was quiet , I could see everything happening around me . I could see my kids laughing and having a great time , but I could hear nothing . It was as if I was the only person on this earth . Like I was in the presence of God , just me . It was just me and him . I wanted to get on the floor , body sprawled out all over and just thank him . Its like i could not get low enough . Not because of the tickets . . . but because he heard me . He knew that I needed something and it wasn 't too little for him . The whole day , even when we got home until right now all I can think about is how beautiful he is . I am not alone . We are not alone . We don 't walk around here aimlessly trying to fix all of our problems , come up with money for our bills , fill our life 's calling . None of it is separate from him . He is everywhere . He is everything . Today was a game changer . Today was a day that I will always remember not because of something huge that he did for us . I will forever cherish today because of something small . Tickets . Nobody knew that I was praying for them , nobody knew that I needed them except him . And the thousands of people walking back and forth all around me , they didn 't know , but he knew . And he made it happen . Those tickets will be a forever reminder of his goodness , his faithfulness , his mercy and his grace . Posted by