I had a bit of a crisis of faith this week.
We had an amazing testimony at church, a story of miraculous healing from stage 4 cancer. I fully believe that God does miracles, and hearing their story in a season of grief was a timely reminder of that truth. But when I went up afterwards to thank one of the speakers, I started crying. I knew that my soul needed reminding of visible miracles, but I was still struggling on a level I didn't even realize with confusion, hurt, and even anger at not getting a visible miracle with my husband's dementia. In fact, it felt like the harder I prayed, the worse things got!
I had a bit of a crisis of faith. Yet as I continued to pray and seek God, I sensed Him calling me to write down some unseen miracles, some of the things that were amazing to our family as we walked through that dementia journey. Here are just a few of them:
- Restoration of relationships
- Unity among me and his kids over every decision
- God took away my resentment and helped me to respond in love even when I was exhausted
- God gradually changed my heart to trust and not fear his death
- God perfectly timed the caregivers that were brought to us to be exactly the personality traits that we needed during that time
- Bob never lost his faith or dishonored God, and grew to love the church in a deep way.
- He remained a worshiper to the very end and the redemption God had done in his life, from a very broken and wounded person with a lot of regrets to someone who just loved Jesus with all that he had, was visible.
- God perfectly timed bringing in hospice to help us when we needed it most.
- We were able to keep him at home which nobody thought we could do at diagnosis.
- We had so much support from our church and my job. Even friends that were just acquaintances before became really close through this process as they walked with us.
- As hard as it was to lose him two and a half weeks before Christmas, I could see God's hand in it because I was able to have an extended time off to catch up on rest before I had to start back to work. Additionally, the money for caregivers was running out and God knew that was a concern of mine. And, as much as I'd love to have him here right now, I'm glad that we're not having to do dementia caregiving in the Covid world.
These are just a few of the unseen miracles of our caregiving journey. As I processed this week, I've thought about where I am in life right now. I'm in a season of prioritizing being, of learning to be present, of going slow. Of prioritizing those invisible traits that God cares about deeply, like joy and gratitude and love and faith. For example, I'm responsible for the care of my parents. God makes it very clear in 1 Timothy 5:4 that taking care of parents is our first responsibility when they are older. But, I can do that responsibility grudgingly, with resentment, sparingly. Or I can do it willingly, with joy, generously.
I really think that part of the second greatest commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves is learning to recognize the unseen miracles that we need to pray for. I think of Joni Eareckson Tada, one of my sheroes of the faith who is a quadriplegic. For 50 years now, she's dealt with people who want to pray for her healing. I read in one of her books that she said she had finally learned how to respond. She says "yes, please pray for my healing. Pray that I would be healed from bitterness, from laziness". She's learned to prioritize the unseen miracles.
I love this passage in Job, where we hear about a lot of God's visible miracles, and then we are told that these are only the fringes of his ways. They're just the beginning of what he does.
I want to rejoice at every healing from stage 4 cancer, every healing from paralysis, every person set free from drug addiction. But I also want to share and hear about unseen miracles. Those things that are sometimes only between us and the Lord, or between the people closest to the situation. I don't ever want to discount them. I want to know more about His ways.
