Love-Struck

I have been doing a lot of thinking about Eleanor as her first birthday fastly approaches. Just thirteen short days until out baby girl is one. So hard to believe. How is it even possible that my husband and I have a one year old? O how different our lives would be right now. I cannot even imagine how our day to day lives would be. So much we have missed out with her being gone, but so much we have gained as well.

Today I am going to write about another hidden joy I have found this past year. Something that I have dwelled on is how much love that we have for our little girl even though we only knew her for a short time. I know her daddy would have done anything for her. Watching the way that he looked at Eleanor anyone could see the love just pouring out of him. The crazy thing is that our love would have grown continually and in different ways for her as we watched her grow up and into her own person. I remember as a child my dad telling me that he loved me this much, and he would open up his arms as wide as he could to show me his love was never ending. He would say that I could never do anything to make him love me less. I never understood what he was saying until I became Eleanor's mommy. You look into your child's eyes and all I saw was love. The amount of love I have for this child that we made, and she hasn't even done anything. It's just like your heart opens up so much more then you ever thought it could. Just like the Grinch's heart on Christmas morning....

My dad would also tell me that God loves me that much and more!! How is this even possible? When we first found out that Eleanor did not have a heartbeat I believed that God was going to do a miracle. He could wake her up. So when we left the hospital and had to leave our precious daughter there, I did not understand. This God who I believed in why was he not doing the miracle I fully believed that he could do? He was capable of it. He had raised Lazarus from the dead (John 11:38-44). He raised a Jewish leader's daughter from the dead (Mark 5:21-24, 35-42). I knew all of the Bible stories of tons of miracles he had done, and I am sure there are even more that weren't recorded in the Bible. So why didn't he save our baby? Did he not love me the way my daddy told me he did when I was younger? Didn't he love me more then my daddy could? Didn't he love me more then I loved Eleanor? So why was she not going home with us? It took me awhile to see God's love for me in this, especially early on. I still struggle with it. I am starting to see that love pour out on me more and more as I let go of my anger towards God.

Some people might be thinking how can you say a God who allowed your daughter to be taken away, love you? That is such a good question, because I struggle with that question, too. Here is what I have found through this last year. The biggest reason I can say that God loves me is, because he sent Jesus to die for me. I took this statement for granted most of my life. People would ask me where are you going when you die? Of course Heaven, because Jesus died for me. I never understood the weight of this sentence. Now that I have lost Eleanor I understand it more. Jesus was God's son. God allowed Jesus to die for a world that in better terms could care less about him. He allowed his precious son to go through the worst death anyone could go through (Matthew 27:32-56). Then we see God's love for us again, because he did not allow Jesus to stay in death. He rose him from the dead three days later (Luke 24:1-12). So in all of this, us, as a sinful people, can confess our sins and believe that Jesus died for us and rose again; we can spend eternity with God in Heaven (Romans 10:9-10).

You might be thinking what does any of this have to do with God being loving when he allowed your daughter to die? Ok, so here is the correlation (at least in my mind). Eleanor is in Heaven!!! All because God loved me enough to sacrifice his only son (Jesus) for me. So I know I will see her again. I know that she is safe. I know that she is celebrating and worshipping God. She is free from everything. She is perfect. All because God loved me with an unfailing love.

Zephaniah 3:17 The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing. (emphasis mine)

Romans 5:8 God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (emphasis mine)

So you guys in all of this I know God loves me, even though my daughter is not here with me. I still miss her; I still struggle with her being in Heaven and not here with me. For the first time in my life, I know without a shadow of a doubt that God truly loves me, because I somewhat know what it is like to lose someone you love so much. God loved his son (Jesus) that much (even more then I could imagine loving Eleanor), but he loved me more to sacrifice Jesus to allow me, us to spend eternity with him.