As spring draws to a close, we can't help but exhale the unexpected breeze of serene restoration that has been wafting so sweetly through our home, its warm gusts felt in each room. For the first time in years, I am down on my prednisone. For the first time in years, I am feeling...well. Is that possible? I had long forgotten how to live a 'normal' day. How to go from one place to the next without having to physically pay for it over the subsequent weeks. For the first time in as long as I can remember, the light behind my husband's eyes has returned. His once furrowed brow has softened, and the tenseness of his posture has relaxed. He is laughing again. And we are...happy.
Happy, while such a fleeting feeling, has been one that I had forgotten how to feel, almost not knowing what to do with what has felt like this new lease on life. Even if short lived, we are so grateful for each moment that passes, each moment that we can be together.
There are still bumps and will likely always be. My hips do still hurt regularly, a frustration I may just need to come to terms with for the long haul. Even so, the heaviness we once knew seems to be fading with each passing day, and with it, the fear that more pain and heartache is cruelly waiting for us around every corner.
Instead, an unexpected rain has showered over the once cracked desert of our lives, its water soaking through to the deepest and most pained places. Once parched and lifeless, our God has brought healing to my body, and even more, to our hearts.
Isaiah 41:18 says, "I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched ground into springs."
That which I had long given up on has been restored. And then some. For with Him, and in Him and through Him is LIFE. Meaningful, painful, gloriously beautiful, unexplainable life.
And because he is the giver of all good gifts, never short-handed but full of grace, he has surprised us once again...with new life. 
