Why am I so favoured?

This is the question Elizabeth asked Mary, a young, single, mother-to-be. And this is the question I too should have been asking in all my troubles over the years. Instead, I recited the wrong ones…

  • Why won’t you hurry up, God, and answer my prayers?
  • How can I survive in this intolerable situation?
  • Don’t you care, God?

But God has been helping me redirect my focus – to look for what is good. And that is hard for me to do, for everything in my heart cries out against these injustices, it cries out against the cruel behaviour of others.

So, today, I celebrated my father’s death, for 33 years ago today, he suddenly died. Derek and I shared an ice cream sundae, and rejoiced in the bravery my father had to admit that he had done wrong. We thanked God for the occasions where he stood up against wrong. We agreed that because of his severity, I grew much deeper in faith.

So, I celebrate with Elizabeth for God’s favour in hard times.

Hand-made by God

The question is – who knows me? I have met those who told me I was not enough. They vowed that they could remake me… Sadly, I trusted them.

But there was always another voice calling out, one that took me years to hear. For, “This is what the Lord says – he who created you…, he who formed you…: ‘Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine.'” (Isaiah 43:1) How I cried when I finally grasped that I had been following the wrong creators. But God picked me up and hugged me. He said, “Do not fear.”

And as I have gone on with him, I am relearning who I am. For God made me, not factory-style, but hand-made. He knows me.

Photo by Dane Deaner on Unsplash