simply an adventure

August 13th, 2008 everything changed for us.

I was sitting in a chair next to a desk in the triage room waiting for the results.  She was young, but she was gentle and kind.  A breath of fresh air from other doctors I had been seen by.  She grabbed my hand and apologetically told me I lost my baby.

I nodded my head and struggled to fight back the tears.  I didn't want her to know just how broken I felt inside.  She looked up at my husband who was standing on the other side of me, then walked away giving us some time to grieve before she would process all the details of exactly what was going on inside my body.

I lost it.

I sunk in the chair and weeped uncontrollably.  This baby I had prayed for and wanted so badly was gone and eventually I would be an empty womb in the coming weeks.

But Jesus was alive and active that night and He was about to do something in our hearts that would forever change the way we lived.

Our community group was with us that night.  We were a group of couples, some deeply struggling with their faith and marriage.  They stayed with me late into the evening, sitting together in the ER waiting room.  They cried with me, held my husband when he broke down, and never wavered.

Jon and I would spend the next weeks on our knees praying for Jesus to reveal His glory through it all.  I wanted something big to come from the pain.  And today, a little over 6 years later He's still revealing His glory.

We've been on an adventure ever since.  All we were chasing became but a vapor to what Jesus was doing in us and among us, and we'd lived a life distracted from His glory and His call to anyone who wanted to follow him: "deny himself and take up his cross and follow me".  Luke 9:23

A few weeks after we miscarried our first baby, our friend in our community group who we had been praying for, was baptized in our pool with his wife and kids, and our entire church family there to support him.  He shared how Jesus had revealed just how amazing and deep His love is as he walked alongside us during our miscarriage.

A life for a life.

Jesus wasn't finished with us.  He wasn't finished with the little life He created that was gone before I ever got to feel a flutter or kick.  No.  Jesus was starting a revival in our hearts that would lead us on a crazy adventure.

Because it is never about things, bigger houses, comfortable living, and entitlement with Jesus.

With Jesus it's about His Glory, it's about the salvation of people, it's about the dying, the lost, and the broken.

With Jesus, it's about sacrifice.  It's about dying to your own selfish ways.  And when you come to a place where Jesus has been calling you, you find yourself in a place you've always wanted all along.

This is a place where your desires are His desires.  Your ways are His ways.  You love what He loves.  It's a place where suffering is counted as joyful and death is gain.  It's a place where you find yourself apart from all that the world tells you, maybe even broke, broken, and down, but your soul looks up to the heavens and smiles, because He's there smiling with you.

This is where we are and I have a feeling He's about to take us even deeper.

5 years ago He called us away from the American dream and into a life yoked with Him, and it simply is an adventure!