CHAPTER 4: DEVASTATION & DETERMINATION

I was devastated. I was utterly crushed and heartbroken. I curled up like an infant on my floor and cried the deepest cries I have ever known. I cried from an eternal place, a place that reached out from this temporary home to where my baby was. I knew that she was there, but I couldn’t touch her. I never got to touch her…

And yet... I did touch her. In my dream, I had held that tiny little embryo in my hand. I had hated that early November dream with a passion. But now, strangely, it was such a comfort to me. That dream had been my visitation. It had been my viewing. It had been my memorial service.  

Before I ever even knew she existed, I had held her. And I had said goodbye...

Still, I didn’t understand. 
Why the promise? 
Why all of the dreams? 
Why Psalm 144? 
Why this loss?

Without even realizing that this was the first week of advent, the week of hope, I felt compelled to name this tiny little wisp of a child. The name HOPE was ringing in my spirit, because despite the excruciating loss I felt, she gave me HOPE. I had HOPE that I would see her again in heaven. And I had HOPE that I could still conceive. I had HOPE that I could still receive the promise here on earth!

The Advent Candle of HOPE

Laura, gave me this precious HOPE Angel as a remembrance of our beloved child. This is what I clung to as I went through the stages of grief. We had only known about our Hope for such a short time, and yet she changed us forever. 

My HOPE Angel

How significant, how sacred life is, no matter how young, no matter how small. Every life has meaning. Every life has value. Every life has impact.

In the days and weeks that followed Hope’s passing, the Lord kept reminding me of Psalm 144,

“Praise be to the Lord my Rock who trains my hands for war and my fingers for battle…”

I felt the Lord saying so clearly to my spirit, 

“Yes! Yes, I have promised you this child, my daughter, but she won’t be like the others. You must fight for her! You must go to battle for her!”

I knew that if we were to have this promised child, I was going to have to fight for her. I was going to have to fight like I had never fought for anything before in my life. 

On December 1^st, 2015, I had this significant dream.

I was traveling through Iraq and Iran, the most war-torn nations on the face of the earth. I was standing outside a 3-story enemy compound. The windows were dark and I knew that the enemy was aiming straight at me. I was out in the open, completely vulnerable to attack. But beside me was a large picnic table. Suddenly, a compartment opened up beneath the table top and I hid inside until the immediate threat was gone. Then the compartment opened again and I climbed out and stood beside the table. (December 1, 2015)

When I woke, I immediately thought of Psalm 23:5-6, 

"You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies."

The enemy had attacked me in the most brutal way, he had stolen the most precious thing from me and I was devastated. But as I pressed into the Lord in my grieving, this DEVASTATION was giving way to a newfound DETERMINATION. These diametrically opposed states of being are two sides of the same coin, if we will allow God to flip it from one side to the other.

I thought of the empty table in my dream and I told the enemy that one day, he would watch me eat a feast on that table. He would!

So in the midst of my heartache and gut-wrenching pain, I became determined. I mobilized. I gathered 6 pages of Scriptures containing God’s promises. Promises that He would increase our numbers. Promises of a full quiver. Promises of divine health and that I would not miscarry. Promises of God’s faithfulness. Promises of God’s character. Promises of HOPE, of reaping a harvest if I would not lose FAITH… (Galatians 6:9) I made a pamphlet out of these Scripture, and I took it with me everywhere I went. 

INSERT PIC OF SCRIPTURE PAMPHLET

On the back, I put a picture of the enemy compound that I had seen in my dream and the picnic table where the Lord hid me. I'm not much of an artist, but I wanted to look at the image of my dream every day, and declare victory over my enemy!

INSERT PIC OF BACK OF PAMPHLET

Bryan and I began praying these Scriptures over my body every single day, without fail. 

And I thought of the women from my Bible Study, the women who were surrounding me in Laura’s dream as I was 7 to 8 months pregnant. God would not have given Laura that dream if He had not intended to fulfill it. He wouldn’t grant the promise and then snatch it away. That would be cruel, and God is not cruel. God had given Laura that dream so I would not lose HOPE in my darkest hour. Those women, who were my spiritual sisters, would walk me through this journey and surround me in prayer.

And God conceived another dream in me… He conceived all the hopes and dreams of these women in me. I knew these sweet sisters so well. I knew the promises they had been waiting for. I knew their loss. I knew their barren and broken places, all the places where they were, like me, trying to muster hope to believe. So I created a list of all the things we were praying for and we covenanted to join together in prayer to see every last promise fulfilled. We pledged to pray for each other every single day for our promises to come.