Last week, I made a ridiculous statement. I was on the phone with my friend lamenting a few of our family’s current trials, and I said something like, “Sometimes, I long for last July.”
Ridiculous, right?
You may remember what happened to our family a year ago. (If you don't, check out the blog I wrote about it.) On July 13, my daughter took a terrible fall that could easily have killed her. Thank God it didn’t, but she landed on her hands and crushed both of her wrists and cracked her sternum.
Three days later, our son and his cousin were in what could have been a fatal car accident. Thanks to the people the Lord put right behind them on that lonely desert highway, they both survived. But it was a terrible time.
A horrible time.
We had a daughter in Oklahoma with casts on both wrists planning major wrist surgeries, and we couldn’t be with her.
Instead, we were in a hospital in Utah at our son’s bedside watching a machine breathe for him and praying nothing would go wrong.
Still, sometimes, I find myself longing for the clarity we had then. Because on July 12 last year, we had trials. My husband was out of work. I was grappling with issues related to my business. We were dealing with the everyday problems of everyday life. And then… boom.
The world changed.
Suddenly, among our children, we were dealing with three broken wrists, three broken ribs, a broken sternum, and two collapsed lungs—not to mention my nephew’s severe concussion and intestinal injures. We had much better things to worry about than my novel’s ranking on Amazon. Than Ed’s job search. Than… I don’t even remember the other things that plagued us the first half of July last summer. Suddenly, none of it mattered.
None of it.
A year later, a lot of those issues we had the first half of July, 2018, remain. Eddie is working but still seeking full-time employment. I’m still dealing with the day-to-day trials of running a business. The house needs repairs, and my car has a mysterious new dent.
Maybe that’s why I sometimes have these weird longings for last July.
I’m letting the little things get to me again. I’m lamenting over a stupid dent in my car.
And I’m reminded of that Scripture where the Lord tells Joshua to build a memorial so the Israelites would remember when He cut off the waters of the Jordan River so they could cross into the Promised Land on dry ground. (Read the whole story in Joshua 4:4-7.) He didn't command the memorial so they would remember the four hundred years of slavery or the forty years in the desert. No, God wanted them to remember His faithfulness to bring them through.
Like the Israelites, I have a short memory. I need memorials in my life. This week, the Patchen family will be celebrating—not the accidents that nearly took our kids’ lives, but our great God who, because of His mercy, spared them.
What memorials have you built in your life? How do you remember the lessons they represent?
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She's not giving up her home, no matter what threats come against her.
Realtor Ginny Lamont's family has abandoned her, leaving her with nothing but a warning that she’s in danger. But Ginny's built a home in New Hampshire. After a childhood of nomadic living, she’s not running again, certainly not because of some nameless, baseless threat.
Real estate developer Kade Powers is thrilled to go out with Nutfield’s beautiful new real estate agent. But the prowler they surprise after their first date offers a glimpse into Ginny's past and the legacy of lies her parents left her with. She brings a mystery, one he’s determined to help her solve.
With Kade’s help, Ginny searches for the truth of her parents’ criminal activity while her enemies close in. When mobsters show up in her quaint New England town, will she find a way to bring them down, or will she lose the home—and the man—she’s come to love?
Legacy Rejected is the first book in a new Christian romantic suspense series. If you like romance coupled with page-turning suspense that’ll keep you reading late into the night, you’ll love Legacy Rejected. Buy it now.