15th March 2011

15^th March 2011

As I sit here writing this – once again my heart is broken! So much has happened since the last happy entry. We headed off to South Africa for a few days mainly to collect the vehicle we are bringing back to Zim and also for a wedding. The doctor gave me the go-ahead and all was well with baby and mumma. The drive to Cape Town was very long but beautiful, we had a glorious few days there, the weather was gorgeous and the scenery spectacular. The wedding was in a quaint little town about 2 hours from Cape Town called Tulbagh – it had lots of history including an old chapel built in 1710! We started our drive back to Johannesburg and had a few hic-cups with the Jeep, the fuel pump was playing up so we had to go back to a town we had gone through already to pick up a pump. We had planned on breaking the journey up into two parts so stopping for the night wasn’t an annoyance – it gave us a rest and the Jeep a rest too. We set off for Johannesburg the next morning and all was good – the car only started playing up as we got closer to Jo’burg but it wasn’t a stress at all. We figured that the Lord was keeping us either from something up ahead or teaching us a lesson on patience and trust. Turns out He was! The vehicle took an extra day to fix and it was a day I needed to be in a town not in a car or at the border!

Later that day I started to bleed again, slightly heavier than before but prayed and went to bed believing it was all gonna be ok. The next day I just rested – Matt had done all the driving but I was exhausted – I then began to bleed more and by that evening I had to go into ER (which I must add is nothing like it is on TV – they don’t rush you in right away unless your arm is falling off) we sat for 3 hours from 10.30pm til 1.00am before a doctor saw me – who told me she could do nothing for me but did get me an appointment with her gynecologist the next morning. Matt was so strong and kept telling me it was all ok – but I knew that night it wasn’t – there was too much going on inside of me that shouldn’t have been. The next morning we went to the gyne and our precious baby was no longer there. The shock of believing and praying and trusting to find that it hadn’t worked out as we expected it to was too much for me. I felt abandoned and angry. Why again? What had we/I done wrong? Did we not have enough faith? What was the Lord doing to us? It is the hardest thing a woman can go through in life and just hope the Lord will use my pain one day to help someone else.

I flew that night back to Harare and left my poor husband, (whose side I did not want to leave) – who is so strong and so brave to drive the Jeep back. He sorted out papers and was meant to be here with me tonight but instead he is sleeping on the pavement at the border because he needed more money for the duty and he couldn’t drive back in SA as the car was already exported and has to wait until morning to get to the bank!!! (He is on the pavement because it is too hot in the vehicle at the border). He has been calm in his messages to me – he feels he obviously needed some character work. Again – why Lord? I do not get how our Lord works but He sure does it in mysterious ways – ways that are not ours!

I do not have the answer to my why questions and I may never know them – whatever it is the Lord is doing must be something good – I so desperately want our baby back. We didn’t even get a chance to say good bye but I know it is somewhere better. I feel so empty and can only ask the Lord to fill that space. My womb lies waiting for the perfect time for the perfect baby.

This was sent to me and it seems very much what life is about at the moment for us. It is a battle – but the Lord uses it for His good:

Encourager Classic: "Holding Patterns"

Many times, God will allow a painful situation or a painful circumstance in our life to "swallow us up." This season in our spiritual growth is a holding pattern. We can't move to the left or the right. All we can do is sit, like Jonah sat in the belly of that great fish, so God can have our undivided attention and speak to us.

God put Jonah in a holding pattern because He needed to speak to his heart. Jonah was all alone. There were no friends to call, no colleagues to drop by, no books to read, no food to eat, no interferences, and no interruptions. He had plenty of time to sit, think, meditate, and pray.

When we're deep down in the midst of a difficult situation, God can talk to us. When He has our undivided attention, He can show us things about ourselves that we might not otherwise have seen.

When we are deep in the belly of a difficult situation, there are no interruptions. God has our undivided attention. All we can do is sit, think, meditate, and pray. Like Jonah, we cannot run from God, because there are no mountains that are high enough, valleys that are low enough, rivers that are wide enough, rooms that are dark enough, or places that are hidden from Him.

We must remember to praise Him while we're waiting, and remember three things:
1. The pattern has a purpose.
2. The pattern has a plan.
3. The pattern has a process.

So stop struggling and start listening, praying and trusting. He'll keep you right where you are until you can clearly hear Him say, "I love you."

Suggested Prayer: Father, forgive my unbelief. I know you love me and I will come to see the benefit of everything in my life, even this holding pattern, and the manifestation of my God is assured through You. You have planned nothing for me but victories and I am ready to receive them regardless of how difficult the path.

In times like these I often want to just shut everything out and keep mourning – but I need to still my hurt and let the Lord in and listen to Him. Because at the end of the day all He does want me to hear Him say is “I love you”.