Tuesday, January 11, 2011

The God of second chances

(This is my last post on this blog.  Go to our new family blog for future posts or read about our love story that Loree's been writing at www.brianandloree.blogspot.com ) 
He is the God of second chances; of redemption.  He is faithful.  “I once was lost but now I’m found and now my lifesong sings.  I once was blind but now I see and now my lifesong sings.  I once was dead but now I live.  Now my life to you I give. Hallelujah!”  Song lyrics by Casting Crowns
We are lost without Him. If we only give God the opportunity, with our lives...everything, He is all that He claims to be.  Loree has made such a wonderful account of our God story.  Even then, we only scratch the surface on just how good God is and all of His mysterious ways.  
Over a year ago a new thought unexpectedly overtook my heart.  A desire growing in me to have two more kids.  I was a single dad with four boys...why on earth would I have such a notion burning in me?  I shared this feeling will many (who thought I had lost my mind!!!) then tucked it away in my heart and thought of it no more.  
A couple months before the wedding the thought resurfaced in my mind as if God wanted to remind me who had been at work in our hearts from the beginning...preparing the way.  I would soon be blessed with two beautiful children to love as my own.  
“A page is turned in this life, He’s making her his wife and there is no secret to the source of this much life.  When the grace that falls like rain is washing them again. Just a chance to somehow rise above this land.
Where the God of second chance will pick them up and he’ll let them dance.  Through a world that is not kind and all this time, they’re sharing with the one that holds them up when they come undone.  Beneath the storm, beneath the sun and once again, here you stand.  Your day has come.” A Page is Turned by Bebo Norman
It's what He does isn't it?  Holds us up when we fall apart.  Picks us up and sets us on our feet.  Then we dance.  Grace, God's grace.

I would not ever be able to fully describe just how miraculously God worked through our lives to bring us to where we are today.  Some things I will just cherish in my heart. His grace...is sooooo good.  I don’t feel like I deserve second chances, but He gives them anyway. 
He was down right showing off by bringing Loree to me.  (He’s God after all and that’s just fine with me!)  She is beyond an exceptional woman.  Her character in Christ makes it easier for me to be the husband and leader God calls me to be.  She has such a fun easygoing heart with the same love of dancing as myself which includes dance movies :)  (Step Up 3 was pretty rockin’ for us!)
I don’t know your story.  I’m sure it has/had its own set of difficulties and heartache, but there is one thing we have in common.  Our God, our Redeemer, our Healer, our Comforter, our God of second chances.  “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and discipline.” 2 Timothy 1:7  
Let go and let God.
Jesus is very fond of you and so am I,
Brian