He fell prostrate face down to his knees, absolutely broken and poured out. Nothing left to offer but a wrecked spirit of emptiness after weeks of wrestling.
Anguished tears and sweat filled his cupped hands that covered his distressed and wrenched face. Weeks of struggling with fear all came down to this very holy moment of a powerful touch to his heart by the finger of God that would break him and change him forever.
…that moment that would change us ALL forever.
There he was in the dark midnight hour, at the throne room, with his open bible sprawled out on the floor beside him with words that literally jumped off from their pages…. and a precious little girl’s face in front of him that haunted his heart and wrecked his will.
A little girl that he wanted to call his daughter, who God was planting deeply into his heart, but a diagnoses of a very broken heart that made his own broken heart tremble with fear.
Fallen down before the Lord.
We are all broken….we all need saving.
LIVING verses speaking into his broken heart.
verses of repentance for his lack of faith pierced his trembling heart…
commandments of “Do not fear” illuminated off the page.
Living Promises of “I will BE WITH YOU…trust me.“…
“I will never fail you..”
Our daddy in heaven spoke into his weakness and doubt and wrapped him with love.
“Will you take the broken and messy path to more ….will you trust me no matter what, my son?“
He asks quietly…never forcing…not needing us, yet inviting us to be used by Him?
MY Son:
“I love you….Will you step off the shores of safety and answer my higher invitation to take the gift of abundance that I have for you.”
“will you bring me your emptiness as I trade it for MY ‘MORE “
“My way is a broken way, and it will be messy and it wont make sense but it promises treasures that will blow your mind.”
“I want to fill your empty net with more, but it wont make sense…the world will think you are crazy for stepping off the safe shores.”
“Will you trust me alone when it does not make sense?
“Will you fight like crazy for her hope but trust me in the outcome?
Will you trust me even if means facing your greatest fears”
“Will you step out with open empty hands so I can give you a gift that multiplies into eternity?
He repeated to us:
I have treasures hidden in secret places with your name on it that will BLOW YOUR MIND if you will only just blindly follow me down this broken way…”
Brian sobbed..hearing God speak so clearly……so desperate for strength that was not of his own. With open and abandoned fists before the Lord, a weak spirit…. my husband pulled me close, held me tight as I gasped in awe of the light and of HIS spirit that filled the room around us…You could feel the presence of God!
It took my breath away.
I saw the spirit of light winning over the darkness.
I saw my beautiful and crippled- in -spirit husband offering his gift of brokenness before the alter. ….many weeks of praying that God would speak to his heart.
God is faithful.
“Give US faith, GOD…GIVE US EYES TO SEE!”
A miracle before my eyes happened…
I am learning the biblical truth that Brokenness always comes before a miracle
The light was slaying the demons of doubt and self-protection right there in front of my eyes.
Humbled by a miracle…..we were in the presence of the Lord.
The kiddies were all sleeping soundly above us, unaware of the throne room just under their peaceful dreamy heads. We had all been praying about this beautiful broken daughter of the king. Would we run to her? Would we answer, YES!
But, it was US who were truly in need of a HERO.
We were the TRUE broken ones that needed saving.
Brian held me, crippled in his own strength from wrestling the Lord.
Our daddy in heaven held us both in his peace.
We were still.
We were changed …. and gripped each other and begged God for the strength to walk the broken road, believing that He was calling us to the gift of abundance in all the unknowns. We did not want to miss the gift!!! He was choosing us!!!!
We knew He answered our prayers.
“What if the deeply satisfying life was found in the givenness of sacrifice
–to something of significance–through the spirit?”
(-Ann Voskamp from The Broken way)
That precious man of mine was holding me tight near his surrendered heart, oh how I loved him even more in that moment than I thought was possible …. He was leading us, with his face planted on the ground, in dependence on the Lord alone.
A sacrifice of Self-reliance.
An example to us all.
Oh the courage and faith to lay his family on the alter!! To sacrifice his greatest fears.
To deny the fleshy instinct to protect us from possible pain, surrender to a path of unknowns, and to offer his family as a living sacrifice poured out on the alter. To get out of the way and let God be the God of our family!
To let LOVE WIN. He led us in LOVE.
You can not have love without pain.
A sacrifice that brings a gift of abundance from the Lord that would change his family forever.
He said boldly in my ear… (yet with a shaky and sure voice):
“LETS GO GET OUR DAUGHTER! She is OUR daughter. THE Lord has spoken,
HERE WE ARE, Lord, SEND US!!!!”
The fears were suddenly removed!!! A miracle!
TEARS…..so many tears. An undeserved gift that HE CHOSE US.
Oh Jesus, thank you!!
I cried and wept more than I thought possible. We wept together as if we were in the delivery room of a hospital, receiving the miracle of new life in our arms. It is the same beautiful miracle!
it was a different journey for me, her mama to get me at that moment.
my Jesus had planted our Gianna Lilyfaith’s seed in my heart a long time before that moment just like He does when He grows a baby in a mama’s womb. I knew He was calling us to a precious broken heart in China. God had given me this vision and told me this long before I had ever seen her perfect round beautiful face and squishy dimply soft cheeks. I was waiting for the sight to unfold….and what a beautiful sight to behold!
Now, here we were…we were the broken….he had to break our hearts first before He could give us such a wonderful gift.
Broken and poured out.
oh what a gift!
I knew she was ours…already born in her mama’s heart. The love already ran so deeply. My spirit was broken in a million pieces to be hers forever. He had given me the gift of a child-like faith. I was drunk in absolute dreamy love for my little girl that was NOT a diagnoses on a paper, but a beautiful soul that was wrapped around my heart forever and ever, a seed in my spirit….I knew it….she was my baby . I needed to wrap my arms around her… I needed to hold my baby!
this beautiful man before me, my brother in Christ….I had already been told he was her daddy.
God just needed to break him…and I needed to get out of the way!!!
This was God’s story for Brian, her earthly daddy.
God spoke…and he led his family in an offering before the Lord of brokenness….
Now Brian was the one stepping out of the way so God could boldly lead his family through this beautiful path to her. He was laying down his comfort, his doubt, he fear. He was laying down LOGIC and self-reliance.
HE was being poured out, so God could come and fill him and his family with HIS gift of MORE.
My husband gave his family a gift that night ….an eternal gift by sacrificing his flesh and safety.
He chose to slay the idols. In his weakness, he pressed into Gods arms of strength that were graciously inviting us to a broken path of more.
“abide in me,” Jesus said.
“I will give you peace that this world can never give….. my burden is light.. I will be with you!
We did not deserve such an invitation.
See, My husband had to have a greater faith than me that night. God gave him faith like Abraham.
For me, It was not a battle of fear of “the broken -heart that was beating in her body”….it was the fear that someone else may get MY baby. I knew she was mine from the moment I saw her name on the screen before me. I was beautifully blinded by a gift of love. He gave me a vision…a glimpse of the glory to come!
This is what it means when LOVE takes you over, people, and completely and absolutely wrecks you!
She was already in my womb and heart. MY pregnancy test had PLUS signs all over it! Whatever we had to face did not matter. SHE WAS OUR BABY…..We were hers. I knew this. She was a seed in my heart from the moment God told me we would be running to a broken heart in China, many months before. Now, I was given a faith gift to the promised calling. Eyes to see her!
SHE WAS OUR DAUGHTER.
But, I had to get out of the way so my God could open her daddy’s eyes
I had to let God show her daddy. This was not my work…this was not my story….it was between them. It was a story that GOD was writing on his heart and revealing for my family that would blow my mind forever and ever.
A story of redemption. A story of how God leaves the 99 to rescue to 1.
WE were the ones being rescued.
He was inviting us to a story that held treasures.
To see the Gospel come to life!
But Brian, oh that precious man of mine had to take a greater leap of faith and courage then me. See, God was having a very different conversation with his precious son. ….As the leader of the home. He was giving him greater understanding of such a surrendered calling and what it meant. He was literally calling him to lay his family and our comfort and safety on the alter for the sake of LOVE.
“Will you accept this path to more, when your eyes can not see…will you obey? Will you trust me EVEN IF it means a broken way…a messy way?
Even if …
even if it means that you could face your greatest fear?
Will you trust me still?
I am your God, I will not ever forsake you! Will you trust your family to me. I am your daddy in heaven.
I will carry you with my strong right arm.
Lean in to me. I hold you. I hold your family. I have a story of MORE that will change and rock your world.”
This was a battle for a soul …… The battle for the broken. This was a battle to trust our daddy in heaven when the flesh of logic screams to stay the SAFE road…the illusive path with no risk!
this was a surrender of the fear of the unknown future story to the ONE who knows…..
See, “We” are the broken.
We are the ones who needed saving.
He wrestled, God touched him. His eyes were opened. Fear did not win that night.
GOD won. LOVE won. LIGHT won. A miracle …a gift.
A gift of more.
Our nets and lives overflow with miracles and many laughs and kisses….a world around us changed forever by His miracles.
A story of redemption.
the blessings overflowed. Over four earthly years of PURE rockin GOODNESS that bubbled over with ooozy wonderfulness!
I am learning the upside down kingdom way.
I am learning that Miracles always multiply after the hard messy breaking of surrender happens
. …Visions of bread breaking and multiplying to feed 1000s, alabaster jars breaking and oil poured out… Our Savior hanging and broken on a cross that is saving the world.
Such grace for us …SUCH a PROMISE!.
Our empty nets just about broke out in the deep with over four glorious years of abundant JOY…abundant earthly miracles and an abundance of laughter and giggles and squishy kisses goodness that WILL continue on the shores of eternity. Memories of LOVE overflowing!
..We have the LIVING PROMISE of a restored ETERNITY of MORE GIA-BIA squishes forever.
A gift forever…. an eternal treasure.
…and just over four years later from that holy promise to run to her that anointed night, we found ourselves again fallen before the holy alter …but this time, it was midnight in a hospital room with desperate hearts and overwhelming fears…
…the throne room of God.
We wrestled.
oh how we wrestled!
DO NOT TAKE HER JESUS!!!!!!!
Please Lord, Please allow us more earthly time!!! PLEASE!!!!
We love her SO SO SO SO SO MUCH!!!!
He whispers to our hearts:
“Do not fear … Will you trust the broken road?? The path to more? The gift is not done being poured out on you…the giving will multiply in this offering.
I promise to keep giving you gifts from this sacrifice of brokenness.
I love you so very much.
I am the good good Father…..everything done in my name will be restored! Trust me and my plan.
I know you do not see it now….but YOU WILL taste and see that I AM GOOD!
Will you trust the one who holds the world? Will you trust me to hold our baby till I call you back home to restore your gift to your arms?”
….almost 7 months ago, The machines stopped moving…..her lungs stopped rising. We lost our breath when she took her last earthly breath.
Our world stopped when her heart stopped. The skies fell. Heaven came down.
The whole family fell prostrate, face down on our knees, absolutely broken and poured out around her bed. PAIN UNIMAGINABLE!
Songs of worship went up….anguished tears poured down. Cries of outrage, yet tears of surrender. Our cupped hands that covered our wrecked faces gasped for Oxygen.
Weeks of wrestling all came down to this very moment of a powerful heavenly touch to our hearts by the finger of God…a touch of heaven-healing that would change us all forever. a KIND OF SAVING that NO DOCTOR COULD DO…for any of us.
A glimpse behind a veil to a forever paradise where everything IS restored.
Where broken hearts are made new.
A surrender of the deepest kind.
pain is the risk of love.
but, LOVE IS WORTH THE RISK!
Jesus, we know you will redeem all this pain one day…..in our anguish we believe!!!
We handed back our greatest treasure.
A pain inexpressible with human language. Groans from another world.
But, His presence filled the room. I saw the spirit of light winning over darkness.
….Death did not win.
This time…it was our Gianna who was leading her tribe! She was boldly leading us to her DADDY in heaven ..through fields of flowers with a promise of MORE.
IT IS GOOD, she screamed to us!
LOOK! IT IS SOOOO GOOD momma and daddy and family…SEE THAT HE IS GOOD!!!
“Oh Gia-baby, this does not feel good!!!!! We want you back!!!”
Oh how WE HATE THIS part of the STORY!!!!!
Please God, not yet!!!!!!!!!!
God whispered
…..REST IN ME… REST IN ME
“my sweet broken child, she IS your gift forever….she is a gift tucked into your eternity.
THE STORY IS NOT DONE!
My stories NEVER end in ashes!
This world is not your home… TAKE HEART, I have overcome this world!!!”
Death does not win, my child.
You WILL hold her again.
We limped, crippled with pain, out of that room that night, paralyzed and broken from the weeks of wrestling… arms achingly empty, ….shocked in awe, swollen eyes that were open like never before to a truth and a promise.
hearts broken yet filled with a LIVING HOPE that can never -EVER be ripped away.
“Will You trust me, even in this slaying?
This world is not your home. I will restore everything done in my name?”
“LOOK UP child”…he breathes on us…….
“this IS the path to MORE…
“It is my broken way to abundance. I will shine through all your broken pieces. My light shines through this broken way..
Brokenness is how I saved YOU. Never run from the broken.
Will you trust the broken way?
Will you trust the broken path to a heaven -filled promise of more?
I am the GOD WHO RESTORES everything done in my name.
No one can take this gift and promise away….not even death. I am with you in this fire. You are not alone! I carry you!
I hold you with my strong right arm.
“I will never leave or forsake you” (Is. 41:10)
WE SCREAMED with voices that were terribly hoarse from crying for weeks.
“YES JESUS….we will drive a stake in YOUR PROMISES, LORD!!!!!
We CLAIM IT when We do not feel it!!!
We believe it even when we hate this !
It is a painful path forward….
I hate it. But I trust it.
But, we are blessed
We were invited to trade an earthly life of comfort and safety for an eternity of GLORIOUS OVERFLOWING LOVE AND GIFTS that were wrapped in a tiny precious little soul that forever changed our lives and hearts with her bravery, boldness, spunk, squishy-ness and fierce love and faith in her JESUS WHO SAVES.
Yes… WE wanted MORE TIME!!!!!!!!!!
Listen to me ….
This is not okay with us!
NEVER OKAY!
death is not suppose to be okay!!!! WE HATE IT!
WE ARE SUPPOSED TO HATE IT!!!!!!!!!
It is why God had to sacrifice his only Son! He hated it too! DEATH WAS NOT OKAY TO HIM EITHER! He had to give the ultimate gift for us to LIVE. Because HE LOVES US.
He made us for another world.
We were made for eternity. It will never be okay here in this painful earth… till we are truly home.
Our hearts will forever groan in this world as we await our fulfilled promise!
We have a living HOPE!
A gift of eternal time with her that will never run out!
A KNOW-so HOPE…not even a HOPE-so HOPE!
A KNOW-SO HOPE!
I know He will redeem and restore all this pain….
We will embrace our beautiful baby again!
I will feel Her hands tightly wrapped around my neck again!!
I loved how she held her tiny fingers pressed around my jugular!
Her love was the fiercest of fierce!
How blessed I am!
I miss those fingers pressed in to me.
That holy day, over four years ago, we were invited to a path of brokenness …..invited to the gift of abundance.
Called to China to bring home our treasured daughter!
What if daddy had not surrendered to his Daddy in heaven to take the broken road?
We would have missed the gift.
Gianna taught us something very powerful!
We have learned to Never be afraid of a broken thing….because our GOD IS MAKING ALL THINGS NEW (Ecc 3:11) and you just may miss the most beautiful calling for your life!
I am so grateful for a man who did not run away from a broken heart….
Had he not, we would have missed the beauty… He taught us a beautiful lesson of surrender and trust.
We were saved from a life of safety and comfort and from missing ALL THE GIFTS of our Gianna Lilyfaith!
We are the blessed.
We are the ADOPTED..
We are the SAVED...
over 2000 years ago God went for the Jugular too!
in a dark midnight garden, a perfect man fell fell prostrate face down to his knees, absolutely broken and poured out and being chased down by his enemies for death. Anguished tears filled his cupped hands that covered his wrenched face.
Sweating tears of blood, and poured out love that all came down to this moment of surrender ….a surrendered heart to the calling of His Father in Heaven ….to give HIS life for the lost sheep.
broken and poured out, He made a way to heaven through a broken path….
But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. (Is. 53:5)
His broken heart led to a way of RESCUE for us all. For those who believe.
He rescued US. I am thankful He did not turn away from Our BROKENNESS….
He obeyed the calling to take the broken road to Calvary and make a way of MORe for us. He did not run away from a broken world.
He wrapped us in saving LOVE.
God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn’t deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. The law code, weakened as it always was by fractured human nature, could never have done that. (Romans 8:3)
The spirit of light wins over darkness
A gift of life forever that even death can never take away from us.
Our daddy in heaven made a broken way to MORE …..
I am eternally broken with a gratefulness and wrecked with a HOPE that promises us MORE forever.
God,
we love you.
we offer our gift of our broken hearts here at your alter…knowing you will use it to multiply the gifts of abundance in your name.
We miss our baby so much! the pain could swallow us whole. The hurt is so overwhelming.
BUT You, God, you understand our sorrow like no one else can because You had to see your own SON die a brutal death so we could have THIS LIVING HOPE.
We know that death brings life.
We offer our gift…our offering, broken and poured out so you can multiply the miracles in a way that only YOU CAN.
We know our Giannas miracles go on forever!
Make us into MORE through our deepest and most heartbreaking loss.
Something only YOU CAN DO!
Only YOU CAN REDEEM!
What we lose in your name….
NO ONE CAN EVER TAKE AWAY!
** If you have not read THE BROKEN WAY by Ann Voskamp, run and get the book NOW….. It will change your life forever and is dripping in truth and HOPE. She translates the groans of my heart!
***also please read Gia’s Daddy’s own testimony …it is found HERE
*** You can read more about her beautiful miracles here:
What is God calling you to surrender to???…..please PLEASE Do not be afraid of the BROKEN….. It is HIS way to MORE LIVING….LIFE in abundance!