Having It All, Except What Really Mattered

If you know me or have read my "About Me" page then you know that several years ago my husband and I lost our newborn son.  He was born prematurely at 25 weeks and died 6 hours after he was born.  Through that experience I have learned a lot of things.  It amazes me that I keep learning new lessons from it and am reminded often of what God did for me and my family through it all.  Yesterday I was reading Matthew 5:3 (NLT).

        "God blesses those who are poor and realize their need for Him..."

Another version says "Blessed are the poor in spirit..."  I didn't plan for that to remind me of Nathan (my son) or of how God worked through the circumstances of his death but God chose to remind me of how He proved his faithfulness in our devastating loss. You see, when we lost Nathan, we had everything (or so we thought).  We had 3 beautiful, healthy children (my twins had even waited until 38.6 weeks to make their appearance).  We had a good marriage.  I had been able to stay home with the kids because my husband was making a decent salary. We owned a home and were slowly furnishing it. We loved God and were attempting to serve Him but I think we were coming up short because...We didn't need Him.

Life was good and nothing was driving us to our knees in desperation for God.  I know that He didn't cause Nathan's death (He created us for life, it is sin in this world that causes death), or my pain and difficult pregnancy but He sure used it...for our benefit.  We had a wake up call.  We began to be thankful for all of God's blessings and acknowledged that they came from His hand.  Because we now understand how much we need Him in our lives we walk in even more blessing. It causes us to seek His face even more and He gives us the answers and directs our paths.

This is our sweet Nathan drawn by Portraits by Dana
She does amazing work! Grab a Kleenex box and visit the "Memorials" section of her gallery.