Podcast

Kelly: Welcome to the Unshakable Hope Podcast, where real life intersects redeeming love. I’m Kelly Hall and this is where we wrestle through faith questions such as, how do I trust God’s heart when his ways and delays are breaking mine? How can I believe God is good when life doesn’t seem good? My prayers that God would renew our hope in these conversations and that each of us would experience the very real power of his presence and love.

Today, I can’t wait for you to meet my dear friend, Deanna Nezvensky.

She and I served together at a church for many years in different capacities. She was in the children’s ministry, God bless her soul, exercising her many areas of giftedness in creativity leadership and teaching. Just helping those little guys meet Jesus and come to know him in a very personal way.

But here’s my favorite thing: she could meet me in the overwhelm of life because she knew what it was like to live there and [00:01:00] how effortlessly we would move from joy to sorrow, from laughter to tears, and from soul questions to faith declarations. I loved it, and Deanna probably never told you this, but every conversation with you lifted my heart to the Lord, and I’m so excited about today. So welcome.

Deanna: Thank you, Kelly. I feel the same about you, .

Kelly: Well, why don’t you start by just telling us a little bit about yourself, your family.

Deanna: Sure. My name’s Deanna. I am married to Butch. We’ve been married coming up on 24 years, and Wow. Still just my very best friend, so very thankful for my family.

I’m the mom to four boys, ages almost 21, and the younger ones are 14, almost 13 and 11 right now. So, Yeah, I work live in Pueblo, Colorado. I work in a foster care agency

Kelly: Before we get into more of your story, [00:02:00] I’m wondering if there’s a verse that God is highlighting for you today that is just anchoring you more firmly to his heart.

Deanna: As I was preparing to talk to and looking at some of the verses that walked me through the darkest times part of Psalm 27 is that,  Psalm 27 8 says, in the new living translation, “my heart has heard you say, come and talk with me. And my heart responds, Lord, I am coming.” I just saw that with fresh eyes because I’ve been in a bit of a season of kind of a dry spell with God, more acting on what I know in my head and heart rather than what I feel and “Lord, I’m coming.” It was just such a fresh way, like when you called your kids and sometimes they come right away and sometimes they say, Coming and it takes a few minutes to have that connection. So it just washed my soul over with. I’m coming. I’m coming. Yeah.

Kelly: I love that he is always [00:03:00] pursuing our hearts. I can remember times in my own life when. . I was very busy in ministry, but yet I was dealing with something deep down inside and he kept saying to me, Kelly, I wanna talk to you about that place in your heart. And I said, no So many times, before I finally said yes. And after I did say yes, and we worked through that together, I thought, Well, that was so worth it. I don’t know why I waited to run to him.

Deanna: Yep. I’m coming. Just gimme a minute,

Kelly: yeah. Now, I know you had dreams and desires when you and Butch first got married about your family and what it was gonna look like and things didn’t unfold as you expected. So can you tell us about that journey?

Deanna: Sure. Well, I mean, I had dreams and desires about my family from the time I was seven years old.

Kelly: Did you really?

Deanna:  I did. I, that’s all I ever really wanted to be, was a mom and I wanted to have seven kids and the perfect man [00:04:00] and just this tidy family. My, my parents were divorced and that affected me greatly as a child, and I just wanted, wanted what I perceived when I saw people at church, what their families looked like.

I’m sure their families didn’t look like that behind closed doors, but I perceived like tidy families and a man and a woman who loved each other and perfect children. And that’s just what I envisioned. So, when Butch came into my life, I roped him into that dream and he was kinda like whatever happened.

So, we started trying to have children pretty much right away after we got married. and I thought it would be easy. I had visions of how we would announce to our families at Christmas by having them unwrap onesies and all these things. And it didn’t happen. It didn’t happen the first Christmas. It didn’t happen the second Christmas.

And we ultimately had to get medical help to get pregnant. So, I started taking some [00:05:00] medication and the first month that I took that medication, I got pregnant. So excited and almost as quickly as I had a positive pregnancy test we lost that pregnancy. So I was just devastated because I didn’t understand why that would happen.

We had what I perceived to be. The ideal situation for a child to grow up in. I was very prideful back then. , before you have children, you know you’re gonna be an amazing mom,

Kelly: Yes. I tell my kids that they beat the idea of ever writing a parenting book right out of me .

Deanna: Right, back before I had kids, I knew exactly how great I’d be at it.

Anyway, it just, it took a long time. So we mourned that loss very deeply. It’s amazing how much you can love a baby that’s only earth side with you for, a week that you know about it. Anyway, so it was just hard. So about three months after that, we got pregnant again. And every day that I was pregnant, I was stressed and worried what was gonna happen, what [00:06:00] was gonna happen.

And we passed the 12 week mark and that was very exciting. And we got very deep into the pregnancy. And then at 32 weeks, when I was 32 weeks along my water broke very unexpectedly. So, . Thankfully we got medical treatment. We live in a place where there’s , great care for preemies.

So Josh was born on February 2nd, 2002. When people tell me that’s such a cool birthday, 2/2/02, I’m like, it wasn’t that day . Cause he was supposed to be born March 26th, so it was very scary. But he had a rough start and had some health complications early in his childhood. But ultimately he was born and while.

That day wasn’t exciting. I was so thrilled that we finally had the start of our family and very naively, I thought, well, that was just a rough start and I thought that was gonna be our testimony, that we had one miscarriage and God blessed us and they had figured out some medical things, so they thought that I wouldn’t have another preemie and we [00:07:00] were just ready to go.

When Josh was a year old, we started trying to have more children and it was a lot harder that time. A lot harder . It wasn’t one month and we were pregnant again. So, that was such a struggle. Such a struggle. So at the time, just to make ends me, I was a stay at home mom and to make ends meet, we.

Did a paper route. Butch and I, which was some of my favorite times, just walking in the morning. And so when I was delivering these newspapers, I would pray for a solid 45 minutes and it just sounded God, give me a baby. Please gimme a baby . That’s all I wanted, so when we were about six months into fertility treatments and still no baby, I was so frustrated cuz I just didn’t understand, I didn’t understand it’s all I wanted and I prayed a very clear prayer, God.

I can’t feel you. I can’t hear you. Are you even there? If you’re there please answer this prayer. And I never wanted to go through this again. So I prayed very specifically for twins, [00:08:00] so that. We could have twins and have our three kids. And at that point, the dream of seven was out the window.

I was just, I wanted to be done with it, so, well and behold, a couple months later I was pregnant. We went to the doctor to, no surprise to me. The doctor said jackpot, it’s twins. Butch didn’t know about that prayer,

but he didn’t quite have the woohoo excitement but at that moment I knew that God had answered me and I knew that he was real and I had always known that he was real, but that was just such a defining moment for me that God answers prayers. . So we continue on that twin pregnancy.

Josh at the time was almost three, I just saw the ideal perfect family coming together. On March, early March, I had some complications, so I was already on bedrest and the babies were due in July, so this was only about halfway through the pregnancy. So in early March I was on bedrest on March 10th.

Josh had been sick, he had some lung [00:09:00] issues. So we woke up in the middle of the night. He ended up having R S V, but he needed to go to the er, so, I couldn’t go with him cuz I was on bedrest and I sent Butch on his way with Josh and I went to the bathroom and knew something was very wrong. I called Butch back and said, I need to come with you guys to the er.

When we got to the er, my mom met us there. She took Josh Butch and I went upstairs and the babies were starting to be delivered. So that was on March 10th. I was only 22 weeks along and I knew that, especially back in 2005 that. Babies were not viable at 22 weeks. So, we had some decisions to make.

We talked to the on-call doctor and the on-call doctor said, you can go to a different hospital if you’d like to, but you know, I knew at that point having had Josh early, what the age of viability was. We ultimately, Didn’t know what to do. So I went to sleep and prayed for answers.

Our [00:10:00] doctor came in about seven o’clock in the morning and he said, there’s a doctor in Denver that will take you guys if you wanna try to save these babies. And so we said, yeah, we do. So they put me on a helicopter. Flew me to Denver. They did a surgery to kind of sew everything back up and I was able to stay pregnant.

That was on March 10th and I was able to stay pregnant another 12 days. And Gracie and Sammy were born on March 22nd. Very ill. I had a terrible infection. I was very ill. It was just horrifying. And they lived with us, excuse me, for three days. And then they went to their forever home. Sorry,

anyway, so after that we were just like, now what? , I am nothing if not tenacious. The answer to me was, This is our story. Now, this is our testimony that we’re gonna have this story of loss and redemption

Kelly: you prayed God just, get me pregnant, gimme [00:11:00] twins, and then you got pregnant with twins. It’s one of those moments where it seems God, this is your answer and then that answer just dissolved.

And into a lot of loss. . I’ve been in places like that where it seemed like God’s promises don’t align with the reality of life. . yet, when you tell your story, I don’t hear you giving up on God. I don’t hear you turning away from him or becoming bitter about this. Did you ask him questions about that

Deanna: certainly there were times that I questioned, I don’t know that I ever asked why, cuz I don’t know that answer is helpful. I read a book by Stephen Curtis, Chapman’s wife after her daughter was killed. She said, even if I knew the answer was that, , many people would come to a saving faith in Christ.

I still wanted my daughter, so, questions like why we’re not really at the forefront of my mind, but very much questions about what next? Yeah. God had [00:12:00] proven himself so faithful to us.

Yes. I mean, there’s just things you learn through difficult times that you never learn through the easy times. So, the relationships that we built with people during that time and there were some amazing things. That happened during that time.

Kelly: While you were pregnant with the twins or afterwards

Deanna: more during that time of grief and loss? Yeah. Okay. Just people showed up for us in ways that I can’t even explain. The physical presence of God I, I could feel him in a way I never have since.

Just sustaining me through each day like. It was so necessary to have him hold me up just to get through the day.

Kelly: Yeah. I’m glad you shared that because I feel like that is a huge part of going through our grief that the Lord is faithful to pursue us, to draw near, to send others to be empathetic listeners, to hold our story with honor and to care for us in [00:13:00] our grief.

That’s our hope too, that God never leaves us and he is always faithful. . .

Deanna: Absolutely.

Kelly: But you, with this delicious, tenacious mindset, okay, that’s the story we’re gonna write. That’s the end of the miscarriages, the end of the problem. So what’s next?

Deanna: Right? So I just knew that God still had a family for us.. That for some reason in my mind, never wavered like it, it never dawned on me that Josh would be an only child for whatever reason. And that desire in my heart was just so pronounced I couldn’t get away from it. , after Gracie and Sammy were born and passed, we waited probably six months before starting to try again, just to let our hearts and my body heal a little bit.

And then we went on to get pregnant and miscarry four more times. Figuring out where I was in my cycle and it was just all I thought about, all I planned about and it was absolutely exhausting. During [00:14:00] all of that, we had an amazing doctor and he ultimately did some genetic testing and found out that I have a very rare genetic condition that is called a balanced translocation, but basically my chromosome.

Broke off, switched places and reattached to different chromosomes. I have everything I need. But during reproduction is when it goes wrong. So we looked into options. Really, some of the options were just too much for what I was comfortable with playing with science. So we got to a point where we just realized this wasn’t gonna work, that Josh was really a miracle that this even worked once.

. And that is, I would say, when like you’d think losing my children was the come to Jesus moment but really after getting that genetic testing the night I found out about that, I remember I couldn’t sleep. I was wrecked.

I got in my face before God, [00:15:00] and I said, I don’t understand why you made my heart to be a mother. And my body completely unfit for the task. I felt guilty that Butch couldn’t have more kids because of my body, and I didn’t get it.

I received supernatural comfort in that moment. And God reassured me. I made your heart to be a mother. So what do you do with that ? No way to do it.

Kelly: One of the things I wanted just emphasize is as you shared about how God met you that night. Is that he was telling you I You’re not a mistake, Deanna. I didn’t make a mistake with you. I didn’t make a mistake with your heart. I didn’t make a mistake with your genetics. You’re gonna be a mom.

Deanna: Yeah. Thank you for that. That is so true. So we were at this place. Our doctor who we had loved [00:16:00] was retiring. I couldn’t imagine going through this with someone else. We shifted our focus to adoption. , we did not have money to pursue a private adoption. Some friends of ours had just started doing foster care and ultimately had adopted through the foster care system.

We went and found out what that was all about and prayed about it, decided that was the direction we were turning. We got certified in 2009, this was four years after the twins died.

We were certified one day and we got a phone call that there was a baby girl in the hospital who needed a home. They weren’t sure what was going on with her parents but asked if we would be willing to take her in. Absolutely. Who would say no to that. So she arrived at our house. It took less than a second for me to decide that I wanted to be her mom for the rest of her life.

I fell madly in love with her. And so for one whole day, I prayed that I would get to be her mom forever, and the next day I went [00:17:00] to take her to a visit and met her mom. Very young woman. Had a horrible addiction at the time. and I realized that if I was praying that I got to be this child’s forever, mom, I was praying that this young lady would stay addicted to drugs.

And at that point, that’s when I feel like I. I completely surrendered to God’s plan that whatever you have for me, cuz I cannot in good conscience pray that this woman stay in bondage. So that sweet little baby was in our care for six months. I was absolutely madly in love with her. But her mom did what she needed to do to get her daughter back.

During that time I got to kind of serve as. I don’t like to use the word mentor, but in a way, just encourage her to do what she needed to do and it was such a sweet, fun relationship. So I’m so thankful for that time and that was our first experience in [00:18:00] foster care because as badly as it hurt when we had to let her go, it was wonderful to see a mom do what she needed to do to get her child back.

At that time I had no idea what God was gonna do with all those feelings. But fast forward 10 years, over the course of the next couple of years, we ended up fostering. , 1, 2, 3, 4, 7 kids. And three of them we ultimately did adopt.

Each of those situations was very unique, very different heartbreaking loss for our kids that we adopted, that they had to lose their primary family, but an unbelievable blessing to us that. , we got to step in and be a family when their first family was unable to do so. There’s all kinds of feelings wrapped up in there, but I am beyond thankful.

Now that I know the faces of my youngest three sons, I can’t picture it having turned out [00:19:00] any other way and any story I could have written. Would not have been nearly as beautiful as this one.

Kelly: I love how you described all the ways that God met you how your faith deepened and how you got to know his faithfulness in much more personal ways, and that’s part of the beauty, right, of this family that he created.

So you had seven miscarriages and you have four children. Oh, what a joyous reunion. It’ll be one day and heaven.

Deanna: Oh can’t even imagine what that day will be like when we get to see everybody and meet everyone.

Kelly: Yes. So now I’d like you to just bring this full circle and tell us what you’re doing today that really illustrates part of God’s Redemption story.

Deanna: Sure. So about well almost five years ago now, I was looking for work and had applied for a job at a different place and gotten that job and [00:20:00] was literally driving to get my drug test for that job. And While I was in the car driving to that the executive director from the foster care agency that we used to adopt, the boys called me

He said, you’re not by chance looking for work, are you? Because we have an opening

so, I went and talked to them and obviously ended up taking that position. And so for the last five years right now I’m a Foster Care placement coordinator, which just means that I get to support foster families in their efforts to foster children. I also do some training and then I have a caseload of children that I get to help

I get to see them every month, so that just lights up my life. But this job has just been such. a blessing cuz foster care is not an easy thing. If you do it well, you end up completely attached to the children in your home. And then if everything goes really well, those kids leave and go back to their [00:21:00] families and it’s hard.

It’s so hard. So to be able to be there and say, I get it. Because I do I really do get it. It’s just been such an honor to walk with these families and our foster parents are the best people I know. They’re just fantastic, So that’s been amazing that this is now like my life’s calling and my life’s work to support kids.

I also have, the bio families that we work with. I think I just always, each one that walks through our door, I picture that very first mom of the child, the baby that we had first. And I picture her face and all of these parents. , like I have such compassion cuz I’ve yet to meet a parent who doesn’t love their child.

They just, oh, get burdened by some of the things that are going on in their own lives. So, it’s a happy day when they are able to overcome whatever [00:22:00] they have been struggling with and reunite their families. That’s a happy day.

Kelly: Yes. I like the phrase you used set free from bondage when you were describing the earlier story

you wanna see them set free. You want to see God rescue them and rescue these kids. One of the things I remember you telling me about a long time ago, and I’ve never forgotten. because it, it, to me, it seems to mirror an aspect of God’s love. And that’s how when you’re fostering kids that have had trauma backgrounds and maybe all kids who are being fostered, that you use time ins rather than timeouts to help them work through and process these traumas and develop stronger bonds.

So can you explain that? I’ve always found it so fascinating.

Deanna: Sure. Yeah. So there’s a I don’t know that it’s a parenting method, but like a set of parenting principles that came out of a genius women woman named Karen Purvis in [00:23:00] from Texas Christian University. But it’s called T B R I, which stands for trust-based relational Intervention .

She had seen so many failed adoptions just cuz kids are dealing with so much that they sometimes bring into a family. and parents are not always equipped to deal with the level of behavior and Just angst in kids with the trauma history. So, there’s several principles, but one of the things she talks about is to have a child with a trauma history and put them in timeout like so many of us use with our biological children, that’s devastating cuz they feel rejection and shame and.

Don’t feel connected. So T B R I is all about how to feel connected with a child even when that child’s having a hard time. So time ins is one of those things that instead of sending a child to go calm down somewhere else, you draw them very close and help them like co-regulate with them to calm down.[00:24:00]

So the whole T B R I principles are so much of how God. Treats his own children, you know that it’s never go figure it out or never like a shaming thing. It’s always that verse I read earlier. Come . Yeah, come here, I’m coming. And the more you can connect the better the relationship is.

So whether it be parents and children or us, and God. It’s all about connection and it’s not about being perfect or getting it right all of the time. It’s about that connection and when it’s a giant mess. even more so. It’s about connection to keep coming back.

Yeah. I just think that’s so beautiful.

Kelly: God never turns away from us. , he’s never drumming his fingers on the counter, waiting for us to get our act together. He’s never rolling his eyes. It makes me think of the end of Romans eight that says Nothing can separate us from God’s love. There’s security there. In Christ, we are lavishly, wildly loved children of God.

That’s our identity. Nothing [00:25:00] can change that. We are loved and we are held securely in the arms of the one who absolutely loves us more than we can imagine.

One of the critical questions that each of us have to answer along the way is, how do I navigate disappointments without losing my faith, without diminishing my hope in God, without becoming cynical?

And I still remember how beautifully you addressed that question when you shared your story to our women, and you were talking about contentment from Philippians four. Can you expound on that?

Deanna: Sure. So I think we’ve all heard, Philippians four 13

For I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength. I had heard that verse a million times like we all have, and it’s usually in relation to doing something really hard or I always pictured something in your career or something that would be public or fantastic.

But the verse, right before that says, , I know what it is [00:26:00] to be in need and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether welfare or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength. So God is not talking about moving a mountain in that verse.

He’s talking about being content with what you have. And when we were going through. I mean, looking back it seems like such a short period, but when we were trying to have more children and it wasn’t working out like it really took getting to the point where if this is all, I end up with Butch and Josh, and God forbid if something even happened to them.

I’m content because I have Christ, and when it got to, that’s enough. It’s enough. , it may not be what I want. It may not be what I prefer, but God knows he knows what’s [00:27:00] best for me. He knows the bigger plan that I can’t even see, and I do wanna be part of that plan so he knows and being content with whatever is today, even though it may not seem like enough or like what I want.

That’s the secret right there being content with what we have

Kelly: and what you’re describing is surrender. And He promises I draw near to the brokenhearted. I save those who are crushed in spirit. , he pursues our hearts to save us.

Deanna: None of us get through this life without having some really hard things.

When I was 20 and pictured the perfect family, I never pictured heartache in it, but that has been as much, if not even greater, a blessing to us. Than all of the easy times. Because it’s when we really got to know God and who he is.

Kelly: Y ou don’t get to know those deeper [00:28:00] dimensions of God’s heart until you’re desperate for him.

A couple of years ago, I was in the car and the radio came on and it said, if you could go back to one day in time and change the events of that day to have a different outcome, what day would it be? And just naturally, I thought, well, if I went back to March 10th, had we known that I was going into labor earlier, they may have been able to stop it.

And so in one second I thought that, and in the. Breath. I wouldn’t change a thing. Like I wouldn’t. Because I can’t imagine life without all of my children. I never would’ve met my younger kids. Like we would’ve been content with three kids and moved on our way and, I can’t imagine what my life would be like and now that, that’s my life’s passion in my job.

I don’t even know what I’d be doing, so there’s not a thing I would change. And that sounds crazy, [00:29:00] but it turned out how it was supposed to turn out. So yeah, I don’t, that’s beautiful. Yeah. I wouldn’t change a thing. .

Kelly: Thank you for sharing that. I’m wondering, as you, you’ve probably already answered this question, but as you look back on the whole journey, what have you learned about God? What do you know about God now that you didn’t know about him then?

Deanna: So that’s an interesting question because I’ve always known in my head that God is a personal God that we should have relationship, personal relationship with him. And, I came to saving faith in Christ when I was 10 years old. So it’s not like I walked a super long time without him. I’ve known that God was there almost my whole life.

But I knew that God was personal through this experience. At, on one of my darker days during this time, I was on the phone with a friend of mine and I was crying and [00:30:00] just devastated and I said something. I try to be very careful with my words to be sensitive to people, but I was not careful that day and so I said something very insensitive to her.

Kelly: Well, I believe this was your friend who had a baby with her boyfriend, and this was a day when you were really hurting and struggling you were comparing your losses with the gifts that she had.

Deanna: I said something to her about, I didn’t understand why God wouldn’t give me this blessing when he was blessing other people with a child. Oh. And that was rude and I shouldn’t have said it, and it was judgy, but it’s where I was at the time, and she was so gentle with me and she told me that had she not had her son, she didn’t know where she would be today.

She thought she’d probably be dead. And I thought it was so immediately eye-opening and immediately I apologized for being a total clod.. But God used the same circumstances, like the [00:31:00] circumstances to her in having a child that was very difficult for her, and she had to lean on God in that, whereas the same opposite circumstances with me and not having a child.

drew me to God. So I think God’s gonna use whatever he needs to, and it’s personal for each of us. And just like those of us with more than one child, like we know how different they are and some of them need more time with us, and some of them need less time with us , some of them need, all the love language kind of things.

So God knows what each of us needs to draw us to him. In this world when we’re constantly comparing on social media, that kind of stuff, there’s really no comparison because what God is going to deal with each of his children, how they need to be dealt with. And it’s gonna look different for each of us.

So, I would say that I’ve always known God’s a personal God, but, Really know that God is a personal God and has personal interest in each of [00:32:00] us

Kelly: . Yeah. You’ve experienced him. His very personal nature, his kindnesses, his faithfulness in sweet personal ways where he spoke to the deepest needs of your heart.

So before we close Deanne, I just wonder if there’s anything else you wanna share that might bring hope or encouragement to somebody who is wrestling through disappointment right now?

Deanna: So I wanted to share the verses Psalm 27, 13, and 14 were the verses that I just clung to during that time when we were waiting for what our family would look like. It says, Psalm 27, verse 13 says, I remain confident of this. I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord.

Be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord. And that wait word is so hard. Yeah can remember at times thinking if I just knew the answer was no. I could even handle that, [00:33:00] or if I knew it was yes, and when it was going to be, I could handle that. But just trusting each day wondering what was gonna happen was so hard for me.

Kelly: I think we can all relate to this struggle. Surrendering to God is so hard. Because we’re all a bunch of control freaks. I remember you mentioned once that it was really in this waiting

That you got to know God’s heart so much deeper and there’s a poem by Russell Kelfer called, Wait that was very meaningful to you and you wanted to read it to us.

It’s a couple of minutes long, but it’s a powerful conversation between God and someone who is struggling to wait. So go ahead and we’ll just let these words wash over us.

Desperately Helplessly. Longingly. I cried quietly, patiently, lovingly. God replied. I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate. And the master so gently said: Wait. Wait, you say, wait, my indignant reply, Lord, I need [00:34:00] answers. I need to know why. Is your hand shortened or have you not heard by faith?

I have asked, and I’m claiming your word. My future and all to which I relate hangs in the balance. And you tell me to wait. I’m needing a yes, a go ahead sign, or even a no to which I can resign. You promised, dear Lord, that if we believe we need but to ask and we shall receive. And Lord, I’ve been asking and this is my cry.

I’m weary of asking. I need a reply. Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate. As my master replied again, wait, so I slumped in my chair, defeated and taught and grumbled to God. So I’m waiting for what he seemed to then kneel. His eyes met with mine and he tenderly said I could give you a sign. I could shake the heavens and darken the sun.

I could raise the dead and cause mountains to run. I could give all you seek and pleased you would be. [00:35:00] You’d have what you want, but you wouldn’t know Me. You’d not know the depth of my love for each saint. You’d not know the power that I give to the faint. You’d not learn to see through clouds of despair.

You’d not learn to trust just by knowing I’m there. You’d not know the joy of resting in me. When darkness and silence are all you can see, you’d never experienced the fullness of love when the peace of my spirit descends like a dove. You would know that I give and I save for a start, but you’d not know the depth of the beat of my heart, the glow of my comfort late into the night.

The faith that I give when you walk without sight. The depth that’s beyond just getting what you ask from an infinite God who makes what you have last. You’d never know should your pain quickly flee. What it means that my grace is sufficient for thee. Yes, your dearest dreams overnight would come [00:36:00] true, but oh the loss if you missed what I’m doing in you.

So be silent, my child, and in time you will see that the greatest of gifts is to truly know me. And though often my answers seem terribly late, the most precious answer of all is still. .

That’s so powerful. I’m gonna repeat that last line because you got a little emotional and cut out. My most precious answer of all is still wait. I can see why it’s been so meaningful for you.

It helped to hear God’s heart in all of your wrestling, and all your heartache and all your waiting. Thanks so much for sharing. I’ll put a link to it in the show notes if you send that to me.

Absolutely.

Thank you for today. This was a very blessed, encouraging time, and I pray our listeners were just as blessed.

Thanks for listening to the Unshakable Hope podcast. If you enjoyed today’s episode, please subscribe and leave a review. To continue the conversation [00:37:00] and for free resources, be sure to visit [email protected]. Thanks so much.