Moments in Grace

My momma always told me, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” Yeah, well, I guess lately I’ve taken that to heart. I haven’t been able to write, to talk, to process much because the ugly truth is, I think I’ve been afraid if I opened my mouth, not too much nice was going to come out.   The ugly truth is, sometimes you can struggle through and put on a brave smile and hold back the spewing lava behind your eyes but it still burns you up from the inside.   It still burns.   Bitterness never leads to betterness. And here I am, this very, very pregnant mama, pregnant with this seventh baby, skin splitting ready,   any day now, ready, and feeling very unready to actually deliver this most precious cargo into the light of this broken world.   Maybe it’s because I’ve spent the last nine months contemplating whether his delivery day will be my dying day.   And sure, I shouldn’t be thinking those thoughts, I shouldn’t be focusin...

 Fear can do strange things to you.  Things that just don't make sense. This child, struggling with all this fear, suddenly just can't go to sleep anymore.  He checks doors over and over again.  He checks windows.  He locks the car with the remote 12 times.  He asks for me to pray, please will you pray?  Again and again I do but this fear just keeps holding on. After sleepless nights, all these nights up with a child that just can't sleep, he finally says it. He says, "I think part of what I was afraid of is, well, what if Jesus comes back and I don't go?  I mean, I think I am afraid that I am going to be left behind." What?  "Why are you afraid of that? I mean, why would you be?" I probe.  This child knows the verses.  He has memorized them again and again in Awana.  He knows the truth of redemption.  He's prayed the prayer of salvation and been baptized.  We talk gospel everyday of his life.  Where ...