I had a very amazing experience today at a job I was doing in Paradise Valley. I was sent to a job to fix some outlets and a fan that wasn't working, nothing crazy just a quick in and out. I went to do the door, rang the bell and knocked but there was no answer. Just as I was about to pull away in the van the lady came out the door in her robe, telling me she was about to get in the shower and she was sorry but asked me to come in and she would get changed. She showed me the issue with the fan in her daughters room and said she would show me the outlets after she got her husband up and dressed in the master bed. She told me her husband has ALS and needs help getting ready before I go into the bed room. I checked out the fan and found the problem quickly, but she was still in the master bedroom getting her husband up and dressed, so I made sure I knew what I needed and waited for her to come out. After she came out she informed me that her son was going to be coming home and he is autistic, just so I know. The husband wheeled out of the bedroom and said thank you for helping them today and asked if I needed anything taking breaths from his respirator between every other word. I told him I was good thank you, and went into the bedroom with his wife, she showed me the issues she was having with the outlets and where they were located. She needed them fixed soon because they were the outlets used for his respirator, feeding tube, and hospital bed. At this point I was beginning to see what an amazing woman she was, raising an autistic son and caring for her ailing husband.
As I was leaving to get material, after her son came home, she informed me that her son likes to give gifts. As I was walking out he handed me a bundle of junk mail and news paper held together with scotch tape, one of the best gifts I have ever received. After getting the material and returning to the house I met the daughter as her, her brother and father were headed out the door. I was fixing the outlet in the master bedroom and the wife walked in, I felt an urge to tell her how beautiful her family was and what an amazing woman she was. The answer I got back was not what I expected but not surprising either. She said the only reason her family is the way it is, the only reason she is the way she is, is because of the Lord.
After fixing the electrical issues in the house I spent the next two hours in the kitchen with the husband, in his chair, and the wife talking about the Lord. They shared their testimony, the difficulties raising an autistic child, dealing with ALS and the most difficult of all was raising a teenage daughter. But the overwhelming foundation to their story was the joy of the Lord. The husband used to be a body builder, very fit and proud of his body, he told me it took the Lord breaking down his body for him to truly see what his purpose was, what his joy was. He told me that he never learned to read, left home at 14 after being abuse by his parents and dropped out of school at 16. He had his wife write meeting notes for him for his employees because he didn't know which words to use. He also told me that after being stuck in a wheel chair he taught himself to read by reading the Bible, he would ask his wife what words meant and how to sound them out. He now knows how to read and understands the Word. Something, he said, he wouldn't have done without ALS. The whole time I was talking with them the son kept coming in and out giving and taking another package from under my arm adding more and more material to my next gift. I unwrapped it when I got home and found more junk mail, news papers, and a box of Old Maid playing cards.
We shared back and forth about life, the gospel, and gave each other encouragement. They helped me to see that the Lord is good, always. The Lord was good to them before ALS, before autism, and before teenage rebellion. The Lord is good when he is near death from feeding tube malfunctions, when he found out the hard way that he couldn't swim anymore, when their son has grand-mal-seizures.
I walked away with this. I went through a "dark night" with our infertility. I have seen others around me deal with hard times. I don't want to diminish what I have gone through, or my close friends and family. But I saw something in them that I want to be able to say, to truly know deep down, no matter what I am facing, God is good. I wanted to hug them, thank them, to help them in some way. I wanted to ask the Lord to heal that man. But I know something now after talking to him, this is his joy, ALS is a part of his life but his focus is the Lord and Him glorified. I am amazed at how the Lord speaks into my life, and who he uses to speak, and I pray that I am used that same way.
So I leave you with this challenge: what struggle, trouble, trial are you facing right now? Again, no qualification or comparison to the things listed above, we all face trials that overwhelm us, whether physical, financial, life or death. What is stealing your joy, your focus? Is God good all the time? Will you yet praise Him through your trial?
