We all have a story and oh how I love to listen to the stories of other people that use theirs to reveal God’s glory. Some chapters are full of love, some overflowing with joy from beautiful moments that light up the face of the storyteller. Some are full of immense pain and grief just in the remembering that bring an onslaught of tears and pangs deep from within the soul who survived that dark season. But what I want to share today is that no matter the details…the good, the bad or the gut wrenching, there is nothing more beautiful than when these words move from their mouth into the very depths of my heart, “BUT THEN GOD”… Those moments that we can say I thought all hope was gone BUT THEN GOD reached down His merciful hand and pulled me out of the deepest, darkest hole I’ve ever known. Those moments when we believed our prayers to bring our prodigal home had fallen on deaf ears BUT THEN GOD rescued them with His relentless love. Those moments that take our mustard-seed size faith and allow that “BUT THEN GOD” encounter with The Risen One, to grow our faith into one the size of a great Sequoia!

My prayer for you, for all of us, is that we never forget one of my favorite truths in scripture found in Genesis 50:20 “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” This scripture that has been like a firm foundation on many a battlefield that I have stood on these past 10 years and always reminds me that He will never waste anything! He will take what the enemy intended to use to destroy us and turn it into a “BUT THEN GOD…” chapter in our story that He will use in the saving of many lives!! WOW! JUST WOW!!! It still brings me to my knees in awe that He will use us in the saving of lost souls when we give Him the pen and trust Him to write our story and use it to reveal His glory! A story that is being written by The One who sees what the world would call hopeless and He sees it as an opportunity to do the miraculous. The Author of The Story who healed the lame, gave sight to the blind, opened deaf ears and took the keys from death and hell as He arose from the grave on the third day!!! If you haven’t surrendered your life, your story, to Him I pray today is the day that you can say, “All hope was gone BUT THEN GOD changed everything when I called on His name”…if you do I believe you will find, like I have, that He will prove over and over again that HE IS ENOUGH, EVEN IF…