His Work. His Plan. His Name.

I know I just posted a blog before this one. But, I had to share this wonderful, glorious story with you all.

As you know, we named our son Jakob. - I wanted to use a biblical name, but to me, Jacob didn't have a very strong meaning... Until tonight. Has anyone ever said to you "It's in His plan"? "God has a plan for everyone"...? Well, when I first heard it, after losing two children I kind of thought, okay, yeah, sure. I have always been a Christian, but borderline bandwagon one. I prayed, I attended Church. I asked for Forgiveness. I prayed before a scary blood test, or exam... But I never GOT it. Until tonight. And through my son Jakob, I see His plan.

His plan was for me to become a believer. To become a Child of His. To learn Faith. And His plan worked.

I have been reading online, all night, about The Story of Jacob. God REALLY does work in mysterious ways.

Here, the writer on this website kind of used a "Reader's Digest" form of writing the story of Jacob, but that's all I needed. This one sentence. It was all it took.

"Jacob is not a special case--he is a picture of all of us. All of us struggle with God."

Wow. I was so angry with God after each miscarriage, and I even threatened him. I threatened to be a non believer. I thought, if this is your plan, then I'm out... He held tough, and He held me. He named our son Jacob, and guided me to learning more about Him, and Jacob in the bible.

I can't even explain how I feel right now. Epiphany? I think that word works. Here is more about what I read, and how much it is related to me, my life and how I have been feeling:

God had a will for Jacob's life and made promises to him pertaining to that will, but Jacob had been stubbornly resisting God's leadership at every step.

After wrestling all night, God dislocated Jacob's thigh with a touch (32:25). This showed Jacob who he was fighting with (someone with immense power who could easily beat him), and that this was a picture. God had been taking progressively more drastic steps (Esau; Laban; Esau) to teach Jacob to abandon his self-sufficiency and trust him.

Now crippled, Jacob can only hang on to God--a picture of his proper relationship with God. Now that Jacob's tenacity is expressed in a dependent posture, God blesses him (probably reiterates the Promise) and renames him to cleanse him from his old ways ("supplanter;" "deceiver") and give him a new identity to live up to ("one who strives effectively with God"). God has always been willing to bless Jacob. He has only been waiting for Jacob to ask with a trusting, dependent heart.

Jacob learned the lesson. The next morning, he dropped his elaborate and self-protective plan with Esau and instead passed ahead of everyone to meet him directly (33:3), trusting God's promise to protect him. He discovered that Esau had forgiven him, and he went on to supply godly leadership for his family.

God works through suffering and adversity to teach us our need to depend on him. Because the problem isn't merely misinformation about God, the solution requires more than simply learning that God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. Since the problem is deeply-rooted self-sufficiency, God works to "break" this through adversity.

I've been in tears for awhile now. I am so excited that He has shown me. Not often does He come right out and point the way, or show you why he does something. This time, He did. My life from this point on, will never be the same.

And I have my son Jakob to Thank. So thank you little bean, for showing mommy the Way. The Truth and The Light. You are my reason, and I am so blessed to have carried you for such a short time. I love you so much little man, and I can't wait to see you! Mama's gonna be alright. :)