holy

Last night was a holy night.

I was scheduled to speak at a local church’s women’s small group dinner. I didn’t know what to expect, but I’ve done enough of these that I wasn’t nervous about it (tell that to my 19-year-old self struggling in public speaking class).

I entered a gymnasium/auditorium/fellowship hall with 8 round tables adorned with Christmas decorations. A buffet awaited its guests. One-by-one, women trickled in. Most 60+, a few 30ish to 60, but my table was filled with women over 60 who joked about how nice it would be to be 50 again. These women tucked me right into their fellowship, blind to my age. We became fast friends.

Dinner gave way to the speaking part of the evening. I took my place at the podium, microphone in hand, and slideshow ready to go. And, like dozens and dozens of times before, I shared the beginnings of Clothed in Hope.

The only difference was the state of my heart in that building. I was worn. out. Exhausted from pouring over fundraising efforts that weren’t happening. From staring at a progress needle that wasn’t rising to meet the goal.

I knew the words to say in my presentation and I recited them by memory. But somewhere after I showed the video of what we do and before sharing Jessy’s story, words became belief. I was speaking the words, the miracles of Clothed in Hope over my own heart that needed so desperately to hear them.

To hear of God’s faithfulness time and time again.

To hear of abundant provision.

To hear of lives set free, of chains of oppression broken.

To hear of 40-year-old women realizing their worth for the first time ever.

To hear of the road that God has allowed us to walk in, proclaiming freedom for the captives, bringing beauty from ashes, joy from mourning. Creating a place for women who are dejected, rejected, abused and forgotten, to experience belonging, love, fellowship, freedom. To experience a Love like no other. To meet Jesus.

We took a pause to watch Jessy’s story (now circulating on our social media sites), and tears just welled up.

I HAVE BEEN GIVEN THE GIFT TO PROCLAIM FREEDOM OVER WOMEN WHO HAVE BEEN TOLD THAT THEY DO NOT MEAN ANYTHING TO THE WORLD. I GET TO PROCLAIM LOVELINESS OVER WOMEN WHO ARE ABUSED DAILY. I GET TO BE PART OF GOD’S REDEMPTION STORY IN THE LIVES OF VULNERABLE WOMEN IN ZAMBIA.

I GET to do this!!! And that became my song, my invitation to women in the room. WE get to do this. WE get to be part of God’s great plan in the lives of women who are just like us but who are living in the midst of unfathomable hardship.

After the presentation I expected to get a few questions, a few “hello’s” as is typical. But instead I was handed a wad of checks and cash that was collected.

A 92-year-old woman learned of her YES, of her role in this redemption story, and she jumped in with the $10 she was able to give.

A grandmother who had yet to leave NC took the invitation to be part of life-change in Zambia, doing her part right where she is to empower and remind women of their dignity.

Check after check, $10 and $100 and everything in between represented the most beautiful thing. Women coming together for other women. Standing in the gap of injustice and oppression and really, really hard things to advocate and fight for victory.  Everyone doing their part to proclaim to women in one little part of the world that love is greater, that they matter, that Jesus loves them, and that they are not alone.

Holding hands oceans apart, united with a common mission: to see God glorified in the lives of His people.

I get chills now just typing it out and recalling it. The money raised was a miracle, a much-needed provision in this desert. But even more so was the raising up of world-changers in women who still have plenty of heart for missions regardless of age and location. And the miracle in my heart, Jesus giving me His eyes for a second, to see how brilliant this invitation is, and how even if not another cent comes in this season, His work will be accomplished. What He has called forth, He will accomplish.

The miracles go beyond the money. Our little seed of $30,000 that I used to launch Clothed in Hope back in 2012 has multiplied over and over again. We keep inviting normal people like you (and me) to be part of an eternal story, and Jesus keeps multiplying our gifts.

And if you want proof, here it is. With just 5 women starting the program in 2012, we have grown to hire 10 local staff to run the program. Clothed in Hope has impacted over 862 people. Women, children, some husbands.

59 people impacted in the very first class to EIGHT HUNDRED AND SIXTY TWO.

Y’all. WHAT? 862 people have been touched by CiH in some way or another. Some through realized worth and dignity, some through food on the table, some through lessened financial burden, some through getting to attend school for the first time ever. 

All because ordinary people, like you, like me, like the women last night, choose to be a part of an extraordinary story being written in Zambia.

We choose to stand up on behalf of the forgotten, the hurting, the marginalized.

We choose to put our little gift on the table for large multiplication.

Because this opportunity, to proclaim LIFE and HOPE over women in Zambia, is absolutely the greatest gift, and absolutely worth every sacrifice.

I left last night carrying the gifts like a most-fragile treasure. That money came forth from a holy place, and will continue its journey into hard and holy places. And I will continue to carry it with reverence, with awe, with gratefulness, because every single bit of this is nothing short of a miracle, of the greatest gift. 

floodwaters

As of yesterday, I’ve taken over a dozen pregnancy tests that have been negative. Over a year of this waiting and hoping and disappointment in a cyclical pattern. The only progress I’ve made is that of an “infertility” label by the medical definition from it having been more than a year of this pattern.

The longing remains. The grief isn’t eliminated from our loss, but rather takes a different shape. I look myself in the mirror and that woman isn’t the same one from 2015. She’s changed.

My story is still being written. I don’t have the “after” or the “why” figured out, and I may never. But I didn’t want this moment to pass me by to share what’s on my heart here- here in the waiting. Here in the not-yet-fulfilled desires planted in my heart by Jesus.

Some days come along that wipe me off my feet. Like a flash flood, unannounced, unpredictable in its strength and damage. The waters rise quickly, the waters of doubt and fear and insecurity.

Within minutes I am flooded with these thoughts in my mind:

“What did I do wrong?”

“Why can’t my body work properly?”

“What’s wrong with me?”

“God must not know what He’s doing.”

“He’s not really looking out for me.”
“Why did He give me these desires to only be wrecked by them?”

“What if I misunderstood the promises He spoke over my life?”

The narrative quickly turns to guilt, shame, fear, sadness. Loneliness. “No one else can relate.” “No one else cares.” Lies. But loud ones, fierce ones sweeping throughout my entire being as the raindrops hit with such intensity as to inflict pain. Raindrops of lies, darkness, evil vying for my soul in its vulnerable state.

And by the grace of God, I end up at a coffee shop near my sleepy little town on a rainy day. I plug in my headphones, turn up music, and dam the floodwaters of shame and fear and bitterness with pillars, stones of Truth. I open my Bible and climb. I find the Rock that is higher than I, and I climb onto it, with the floodwaters still rushing around me. I am safe. I am able to confess, to hear, to receive, to stay.

It’s on the rock, in the middle of the rushing waters all around me, that I hear Him speak to the burning question in my heart. For too long, but especially lately, I labor over the question, “What did I do wrong?”

I’m talking about the miscarriages, about the most recent loss of Matthew Dalitso when I confidently thought he was to be our miracle on earth. What happened? I see the miscarriage as a loss, as it is. I’m reminded of it every single day when I see my stomach flattening rather than growing. I’m reminded of it when I see little baby things tucked deep within the closet of Christmas wrapping paper. I’m reminded of it when my Facebook feed shows me how I would look like right now, what I would have to look forward to in just a few months, as friends shared my due date. I’m reminded of it when I hear the baby cry in Target. You get the picture. No mother of miscarriage will ever not remember. I feel that loss deeply. The grief, though becoming lesser in its severity, still remains. I’m learning to make place for it, as it will always have a place in my heart and my story. In my little world, I see the loss of Matthew Dalitso just that- a loss. Void of joy, other than the little while I was carrying him.  

But when the floodwaters aren’t pulling me under, I am able - for the first time in months - to hear His heart about the loss of our baby. When my heart jumps to claim shame for failing to keep Matthew and Evan in this world, His grace introduces His heart:

“Well done good and faithful servant,” I hear Him speak. “Matthew Dalitso and Evan Shane are with Me. They are with Me forever. They are Mine. They are experiencing everlasting life and the fullness of joy.”

That’s all I could’ve ever wanted for my babies. Yes I wish that they were here on earth with me, one growing big inside me and one playing in the living room this Christmas. But from the moment I knew about them, my prayer was that they would come to know Jesus, to love Him, to accept Him in their hearts as their Savior, and to walk with Him forever. I daydreamed about the first steps, the first holidays, the first day of kindergarten. I hoped they would be kind people. People who want to change the world through the gifts they’re given. But all of the daydream wishes are secondary. My prayer was answered for them – just not in the way I expected. I don’t get to hold them and raise them, but I do get to rejoice that they are forever with their Father, glorifying Him and worshipping Him forever. All that a mother could want for her babies.

Still in that joyous realization, there is pain. They co-exist. The expansion of suffering increases the capacity for joy. Or as a wise friend says, “grief expands the heart.” The suffering is real, and all up in my face.

The losses aren’t where the suffering begins or ends. I’ve been walking a long road for a little while now. Not as bad as it could get by any means, but still hard if I can be completely honest. The lies come shouting at me again when I think about everything that has happened: What did you do? You’re being punished. It’ll never end. Your life is just going to be hard. There’s no goodness to be found here. Jesus must not care about you.

So I climb again. Clinging to the rock that is higher than I. I read about suffering, God’s purpose in it and His heart toward it. And it starts to make sense in my little finite understanding, though many questions will still go unanswered on this side of heaven. I read passages like this:

The Spirit Himself bears witness with our Spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs – heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.  Romans 8:16-18

And I read about Job, whose suffering was not due to an absence of God or a fault of Job’s, but a result of Job’s faith. God found Job worthy to suffer, knowing that his unwavering faith (though full of real-ness and doubts and fears) would point to the glory, the goodness, the faithfulness of God to all who witnessed his suffering.

To partake in suffering is to partake in the heart of Jesus, who suffered for all of us that we could be united with God and redeemed and forgiven by Him. Suffering doesn’t equal punishment no matter how loudly the enemy wants to shout it at me. Suffering is not an absence of His love, but rather an opportunity to witness and taste the magnificence, intimacy, complexity, and power of His love.  And I as much as it hurts, as much as I try to fight it, I can rejoice in suffering, because I know and believe what God says about it. If it brings me closer to God, and is necessary to receiving the glory found in Him, then sign me up. Even if, even so, sign me up.

His power is made perfect in my weakness. In my doubts, in my fears, in the days that I let the floodwaters overtake me. In the days of drought when my comfort (and Netflix) wins.

And my current feelings, doubts, fears, sin cannot alter the path of the promises of God spoken over my life. I cannot ever ruin His good and perfect will. Rather, I can cling to the rock confidently that I am always in the center of it. And cling I shall.

For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is in Him. He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be shaken. On God rests my salvation and my glory; my mighty rock, my refuge is God. Trust in Him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us. Psalm 62:5-8

But now thus says the Lord, He who created you, O Jacob, He who formed you, O Israel: "Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you; when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you..." Isaiah 43