Restored

To follow this story start with: My Secret Sin 5/08/08
Forgiveness was something I desperately want from my children,yet so afraid to tell them the truth. Leading up to the moments before I revealed my secret sin, I wasn’t sure if my children would ever forgive me for making the choice to put my life before the precious child I once carried inside of me. It’s hard to describe the fear of rejection, I’m sure you’ve all been there one time or another. For me,it was to think what if I was to expose my secret would they a walk away one by one?

But they didn’t.
They had questions…I answered. They had ‘what ifs’…we dreamed together.

I was now free to share my (our) story with the rest of the world. So, there I sat at the kitchen table writing the last scripture into my testimony when I laid my pen down, bowed my head and asked God once again “Why can’t I love my daughter?” “Why do I always push her away with the very hands I long to hold her with?” I was tried of asking these questions...why was God taking so long to answer? Didn’t He want me to be close to my daughter? Couldn't He see I was killing her, too?

My mind began to spin thinking about all the words of anger and rejection that spewed out of my mouth. Words cutting deep into her soul, these words had started to build a wall between us and if our relationship continued down this path, she would fade away.

I began to sob uncontrollably from the pain that was welling up inside of me. Lifting my head off the table, my eyes focused upwards and with a loud shout,I cried out “God, what is wrong with me?” “I know you have forgiven me and in my head I believe it’s true but my heart, it’s empty…why?” I wiped the tears from my face and placed my head on the kitchen table once again, but this time in complete surrender. Within a few minutes, I felt His presence, call me crazy… but I knew He was there. His voice was so soft, almost a whisper as He spoke my name. I lifted my head from the table and responded “What is it, Lord?” Then the words of truth came out of His mouth like a two-edged sword “You can’t love Sydney, until you love your aborted child.”

Why did the truth have to be so raw? I thought God was all about love...saying the truth in love isn’t it what we learn as Christians? I knew He was right, just like the woman at the well; I too, needed the truth spoken to me. I could see His arms reaching towards me and then I saw him, my child. “Go ahead,” God said “Hold him, you need to hold him.” God was speaking directly to my heart, for my heart had never held my baby.

At first I hesitated,if I held him it would mean my child just wasn’t about a bible study for the post-aborted woman or even words of how sorry I was for making this choice. By holding him,placed him next to my heart, a place I skillfully guarded for years. It would be the first time in 16 years I looked into the eyes of Jesus and saw His heart…not mine. He wanted me to love this child…the way He loved him. He wanted me to be free to embrace the life…he would have had. He wanted me to lay the burden of never physically holding him at the foot of the cross…to holding him in my heart.

I must take a moment to catch my breath; it’s a day I will always remember. It's the day I was reconciled back to God.