My fellow blogger and friend, Shelly, recently wrote, “If you want to make God laugh, just tell Him all about your plans for your life.”  HA! Isn’t that so true?

Eric is a big planner. Ever so often he’ll try to get me to sit down and think through short-term and long-term goals for our family. I think I’d rather have a stomach bug… seriously. But I can guarantee that neither one of us ever planned to be parenting a brain-injured child. Never. But mysteriously, God had it planned for us all along.

Looking back, I can see very specific ways God led our family to prepare us both financially and spiritually before that fatal April day.

A few months before the accident, I remember being struck with a deep gratitude by how extraordinarily good our lives were. Eric’s job was going exceptionally well. I was serving in our church in a deeply satisfying way. Anne had turned a corner on all her hyper-sensitivity issues and for the first time EVER – all three kids were thriving (at the same time ;-). We were surrounded by a tight community of friends from both church and the community. Every aspect of our lives… was good. I remember praying with Canon one night – thanking God for all the goodness in our lives and then asking God to give us the strength to persevere when hard times would come. Canon stopped my prayer to ask about these “hard times.” And so began a series of conversations we had over the next several weeks about hardship – and how it was inevitable for every believer. We talked about how God is glorified through hardship – how God builds our character through suffering. Canon was extremely interested in the topic. I just remember marveling at how thoughtful he seemed to be at only 7 years old.

Now I know that I should have been marveling at God… not Canon :-) It was God that was bending his heart and mind to thirst after such hard truths at so young an age. Just think about the kindness and gentleness of God to prepare little 7-year-old Canon for what only He knew was about to happen. Those conversations laid the foundation for all the painful talks after the accident about suffering and grief.

Our God is sovereign, and I am. so. grateful :-)

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope” Jeremiah 29:11.