A Daily Surrender

I've learned that loss is a daily surrendering of oneself. It's surrendering to the will of God and laying aside our own desires. It's walking through the valley of the shadow of death, clinging desperately to life. It's having a mustard seed of faith even though it feels faith has failed you. It's worshipping through the pain. It's taking one small step forward in reluctant trust. It's being a light in our darkest hour. It's exhibiting a supernatural strength that can only come from God. It's helping others through their grief in the midst of our own. It's bowing humbly before the Father, saying I have nothing else to give except myself.

Sometimes, I think, "nothing left to give" is the sweetest offering of all. It's ultimate surrender. It's real, and raw, and honest, and just when we feel we are completely empty and stripped of ourselves, God begins His work in us. He fills us with Himself and places His purpose in our hearts.

It's not about finding our true selves, it's about riding ourselves of us, and finding a true God.

I completely lost my identity after losing Briggs. I had laid up all my treasures on earth, and when one of those treasures was so tragically taken from me, I was left searching for purpose. Nothing that had once brought me joy, felt fulfilling anymore. Everything romanticized by Instagram, motherhood and homemaking, felt obsolete. I'm still unsure of life and what God has in store, but every day, all 447 of them since losing Briggs, I have felt God molding, shaping, and preparing me for His work.

"to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified." Isaiah 61:3