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It's 3:30 am and I'm just getting home from the hospital.

We lost the second baby in less than a month.

I know that I usually these blogs are more informational or inspirational or try to teach a lesson rather than give you a "blog" about my life.  I may tell stories involving my life but I try to put a Scriptural lean to it so that the lesson gives you something to consider when thinking about God but right now I can't think of a good way to do it.  So I'm just going to ramble and if you want to go along then go along.

July 7th was supposed to be a day of celebration and joy for those connected to the Daily Audio Bible.  We were remembering the move of God on 07-07-07 by setting aside the day to walk with God.  I had taken the day off work and I went on a 22 mile prayer walk just to spend time with our Father similar to what I had done the year prior (although that was only 17 miles.)  I expected God to meet me and that we would have a day where I would praise Him and just allow Him to move in my life.  I expected joy and encouragement and an uplifting day as I've seen in the praise reports of those at the DAB who dedicated the day to the Lord.

Unfortunately, that day has been the start of a trial period that has pretty much killed me.

At the opening of the walk, I had a phone call at the prayers of my ex-wife had been answered for a job that was two hours further away than she already lives with my two sons.  This means that I wouldn't be able to be at every baseball game or parent teacher conference or choir recital.  God had asked me months prior if I would give up my children for Him and I said if I knew it was Him I could do it.  Well, He obviously asked me because He knew this was going to be happening.  I know that it's a good thing for my children and that my ex-wife has given her life to the Lord and is following His leading in her life.  I can't stand in the way of God's will for her life and that of my sons.

Still, that wasn't easy for me nor was it something that I considered joy.  I love my sons and I take my responsibility of being their father very seriously because the Lord entrusted me to be the earthly father to those children.  But God saw fit to take them further away from me.  It hurts.

But that wasn't the biggest bomb to drop during my prayer walk.

With two miles left to go in the walk, I get a phone call from my wife.  She was asking me about what I had planned to do for the rest of the evening and we chatted about it.  She said that she really needed to spend time with me that night but wouldn't tell me why on the phone.

When she picked me up at the end of my walk, she informed me that she had a miscarraige just before she had called me to see where I was on my walk.

So the result of my day dedicated to the Lord, seeking His will for my life, seeking direction for my future, seeking to see if He really was calling me into ministry was to have my two sons taken further away and to have one child completely taken away.

That was the start of what I've been calling a Holy Radio Silence.  God's basically just stopped talking to me and has left me to wander in a very deep, very dark desert.  I kept doing this blog and the podcast because I didn't really feel that I was supposed to stop doing it but then I really wasn't feeling anything from God.   That really was the driving force behind the blog last week where I said I really didn't have anything to say.  I felt empty, I felt dry, I felt as if things were being ripped away from me again like I was in the sequel to Job.  And like Job, God wasn't telling me why these things were happening.

Not that it's our place to demand to know why if God doesn't want us to know.   We're to trust that His plan is perfect and that we'll find out what we need to know.

Two days ago, it seemed like perhaps the desert was coming to an end and that God was starting to move again.  We had something happen where my wife would have ended up along a highway out of gas if I didn't go with her at the last second because she didn't have money with her to fill the tank.   It seemed like a God moment and we thought perhaps this season of trial and silence was ending.

Then we had what seemed like a miracle about to happen...my wife had a positive pregnancy test.  You see, even after the miscarriage she was having reactions in her body as if she was still pregnant.  She originally was pregnant with twins and lost one.  One friend of mine called it a "miracle baby" and we were starting to allow ourselves to think that God was blessing us after all.

Then Sunday arrived.

I sat in church and listened to a missionary and heard the pastor talking about the call of the Lord.  In the midst of the confusion I've been feeling and the pain and anguish over whether or not the Lord was really calling me or if all this time I've been merely chasing my own thoughts toward serving Him.  At the end of the sermon, the pastor said that if anyone was feeling the Lord calling them into ministry that they should follow that urging and come forward to be prayed for by the elders of the church.  Well, I won't go into the details of what happened because I'm already emotionally shredded but let's say that God made it clear He doesn't want me coming into His service in some kind of full-time ministry capacity.

That pretty much crushed my spirit.  Crushed it down into powder.  But...if God doesn't want me in full-time ministry then I don't want to do what He doesn't want me to do because it would only do more harm than good.  So now I have no idea what the Lord wants from me if anything at all.

So after having that weighing down on me all day...the feelings of anger, despair, frustration, confusion...my wife starts feeling pain in her lower regions around 8pm.  Within in an hour, it's so bad I had to put her in the car and take her to the emergency room.

At 2am the doctor informs us that we've lost the second baby.

I had a friend last week make a reference that I'm truly understanding the book of Job now and I can't dispute that anymore.  The thing I take away is that God never told Job why anything happened to him.  He blessed him at the end but He never said "Job, this is why this happened..."  I sit here typing this knowing that I am not going to know why these things have happened and seem to keep happening to me.  There's an odd peace that comes when you realize that God's just not going to tell you and so you can't dwell on it.

But where I go from here, I don't know.  It's not like I can walk away from God because I know the truth.  It's like Peter said in John 6:68-69 (ESV) "Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”   God's taken two children from my wife and I yet I cannot walk away from Him because I know all of this to be true.

I'm having no choice but to live Proverbs 3:5 (ESV) "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding" because right now I have absolutely no understanding why the Lord would take two children from us.  I don't understand why He would tell someone who wants to give their life to Him in full time ministry service "no, I don't want you doing that."

I also know that Isaiah 55:8-11 says : "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.  “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but sit shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it." 

I'm at the place of faith without logic, trust without security.  And it's not fun.  Not at all.  Even when I know there is some reason for this in God's perfect and Holy will. 

I'm sorry I'm not wrapping this up with some tidy little lesson for you to take away.  I'm sure that there are those of you reading this who are in much worse shape than I am in (although there are more things that what I have shared with you here.)  All I can say is that when you really let the truth of God's word sink into your heart you'll find that it really is a foundation that cannot be moved because you realize that no matter what happens and whatever God throws your way there is nowhere else you can go.

So I'm going to close this written blog, record the podcast and try to lay down and sleep although I don't feel like I can rest at all.  I'm exhausted but not tired.  Ironically, my spiritual self feels that way as well.