Ask and you shall receive?

This subject came up in an online message board today and I began to think about how angry I used to be God for not healing the girls, for not answering my prayers for a cure. I was a good person, so why was God ignoring my pleas? So much for 'ask and you shall receive', right?

Looking back, I can now answer my own question.

Addison wanted to jump off the bed today. She was gearing up to do it, and I looked at her panicked and said, "NO! Absolutely not!" She sat down and began to cry.... I had ruined her dream of jumping off the bed! She was defiant and upset with me. She didn't understand why I would not let her jump, it looked like fun to her. But with better judgement as her mother, I knew what she was trying to do was dangerous for her. I was trying to protect her!

And then I realized, God always knows better. He is a Father, too, shaking his head and smiling everytime we throw a tantrum because he told us no. All along, knowing that he is doing the right thing for us, even if we don't see it that way.

Everytime I pray now, I pray for better days instead of easier ones. I pray for more patience, more energy, and instead of 'fixing' things for me and making them easier..... he's given me more obstacles, more challenges that ultimately bring these blessings upon me. To make me more patient! To inspire me to keep pushing on no matter how tired I am.

When we ask God for something specific, like healing..... perhaps it is not the sick one who gets healed. Perhaps the true healing, the miracle here, is the healing of the people surrounding them. The heart, the body may not be healed, but after life on Earth, we don't need that anyway. What we need is the healing of relationships, with God and with each other. We need more faith, more hope, more intent to spread God's love into the world, less hate, less anger, less bitterness. Those things were being healed in me, while I was busy praying for medical healing. And maybe that's the point here - our babies are innocent and whole in the spirit of God's love. They are perfect in His eyes, sinless, and welcomed into heaven as they are today. But we are failing God, the way our children's bodies are failing them. That is the healing that we truly can't live without.

Dealing with Addison and Audrina's struggles, has changed me, changed my heart.... in a way that only the love for a child could. If God had given us an easy answer, I'd never have gotten to the desperation point where I knew God was the only one who could truly save my life in the end. He was the only way we would ever be happy throughout this battle. I'd never have fully trusted, and then, if I hadn't, what about the girls? What about Adam? What about our friends and family and people online who are reading about us? This is all a means to an end, a life in Heaven and God has chosen a difficult path to get us there, no doubt about that. Our job is to trust in what He thinks is good, not our own version of good.

So, if we ask for healing, and that is the best thing for us, we should not doubt that He will do it. But if He does not provide healing, we must assume that NOT being healed is a necessary part of a larger plan that is ultimately for our good. The important lesson we are learning is to grow a desire in ourselves for that which God wants for us, instead of what we want for us. We can never fully achieve satisfaction in what he provides us.... unless we rely soly on his descretion to choose.

Psalm 37:4 says “delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart.” Keep seeking out what God intended for the true desires of your heart to be, and you will find them!

In faith,
Kim