22 years into life. 4 years into marriage. 2 years into being a mommy. There’s nothing like birthdays and TimeHop to get you thinking about where you are and where you’ve been and where you’re going. And those  are good things to think about every now and then.

Year 22 is starting out happy. Sheer, indescribable joy. I have literally looked into the faces of two of my baby girls, and tears have filled my eyes and flooded my face because I realize that I am looking at the answers of thousands, even millions, of prayers….. Prayers of my own and prayers of those closest to me. I’m driven to thankfulness to the great Giver of good gifts. … Perfect gifts.

All this happiness and thankfulness and joy have been running through my head, and today my TimeHop reminded me that these are different circumstances than last year. Year 22 is starting out on a different foot than year 21.

Oh, what a good reminder for me about the nature of the goodness of God. God is good. He just is. … He’s not good just because He has given me good gifts. How do I know? Because I knew Him and His goodness a year ago, too, when good gifts were being taken away. The Giver of good gifts is good even when the gifts aren’t coming. Because the ultimate good gift is the gift of Himself, and He will never leaves us or forsakes us.

So when the good gifts are coming, we praise Him. “Praise God from whom all blessings flow!” And when the good gifts are taken away, we praise Him. “The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.”

It is ok for me to feel unspeakable happiness today. Great is Thy faithfulness! And it’s ok that yesterday I cried because I looked at my sweet baby and agonized over the sweet faces I will never get to see. Great is Thy faithfulness! God is faithful when I feel pain, and God is faithful when I feel joy.

I love this picture from the book of Daniel: King Nebuchadnezzar was about to have Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego thrown into a fiery furnace because they would not worship his idols. And their response was this: “O Nebuchadnezzar, we have no need to answer you in this matter. If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

And so we should also say in times of hardship! “God, I know you are able to do it, and I believe you will…. But even if not, like Job said, ‘yet I will praise you!’”

Martin Luther said, “Although it hurts us when he takes His own from us, His good will should be a greater comfort to us than all His gifts, for God is immeasurably better than all His gifts” That is a very gutsy thing to say. That’s gutsy because one must be certain of two things. First, one must have faith that no hurt can be so painful that God can not comfort the hurting one. Second, one must have faith that no gift from God could ever be greater than the gift of Himself. That’s a gutsy thing to say and an even gutsier thing to try and live. And the gutsiest thing to do is to pray on a daily basis that God would show you how it is true.

~Glimpses of Grace