I am an eternal optimist! Life is always going to end well! I love stories like that of Cinderella; even though it looked as if she would be forever doomed to live with her wicked step-mother, her moment of chance came when she was invited to the Royal Ball and met the prince. It was love at first sight. She had to flee the ball and return home lest she be discovered. Leaving behind only a beautiful slipper, he searched for her. Once he found his love, he rescued her from the wicked step-mother and they lived “happily ever after.” I love their story and any story that ends with “and they lived happily ever after.”
Mark and I enjoy watching Turner Classic Movies. Our rule is that we don’t watch any movie produced after 1959. It seems like the older movies are the sweetest. I don’t like any movie or story that has sad overtones or one that has a depressing ending. Lest you think I’m not in touch with reality, I do realize that life is not like the fairytales or the movies we choose to watch. Real and raw things happen in life. But, since books and movies are not, for the most part “real” life, I like escaping into the romantic and sometimes unrealistic.
My romantic “happily ever after” story came to a screeching halt seven years ago when Mark was diagnosed with a very rare condition. The month he was diagnosed in 2007, I remember sitting in my corner chair one morning and opening my Bible to Jeremiah 30:17 and reading these words, “For I will restore you to health and I will heal you of all your wounds, declares the Lord.” Right then and there, I knew God had given me a word, a promise! In that verse He said that He would without a doubt restore Mark. Several months later, I woke during the middle of the night and began to claim that promise asking God to heal and restore Mark. I suddenly felt the gentle whisper of the Spirit say, “My child, remember just as restoring an old home takes time, so does a bodily restoration. But, trust Me and know that I keep My word.” Over the next four to five years, I continued to claim the promise given me for Mark and optimistically knew it would come true. I continued to trust God’s timing and know that what He had promised he would do.
Around the end of the fifth year of this journey, I was struggling with surrendering to the fact that yes, God, was going to keep His promise, but what if He chose not to restore Mark until he met Him face to face. I wanted him restored while he was here with me. I fought against surrendering to God and allowing Him to make that choice. I reasoned with Him that Mark’s healing would bring the lost to Christ; that his healing would enable many to have a faith in God they never would have had otherwise; on and on I went trying to reason with Him. I wanted my “happily ever after” ending. Finally, the struggle to surrender was wearing me out and robbing me of joy and peace, so with great agony and an abundance of tears, I said, “Father, I lay down my expectations of how You will choose to heal and restore Mark. I lay down my desire for a “happily ever after” life. I surrender to You and Your sovereign will for my life and for Mark’s life. This is Your story, you write the ending.”
The life expectancy for Mark’s condition is eight years, and we are seven and a half years in. Although he is continually declining, and losing control of the different aspects of his bodily functions, he is still here and the neurologists are amazed at how he is doing. The news we have received lately is not good, yet with each report God gives us His sustaining power and strength.
We were lying in bed recently; he reached over as if to draw me close and then began to tickle me. I giggled as if I were like that fifteen year old girl he had asked out for the first time in 1971. Then he laid my head on his shoulder and we talked. In the tenderness of that sweet moment I realized that I am living my “happily ever after” story. The ending is going to be heavenly!!
Father, you know the tears I have shed in the stillness of the night as I have wrestled with trusting You. Thank you that you caught each one and you hold them in your hand. You, my Promise Keeper, will keep your word to me and restore the one I love so much. My heart aches at the thought of being without this treasure of a man, yet you bring peace and joy in the midst of it all. When the time comes and You desire to have him with You, I know he will stand in Your presence healed. For with You, Father, we will all live happily ever after!
“Fear not for I am with you, be not dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.” Isaiah 41:10
“My soul, wait in silence for God only, for my hope is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation, my stronghold; I shall not be shaken. On God my salvation and my glory rest; the rock of my strength, my refuge is in 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