I don’t know about you, but I love a good “feel-good” verse. You know the kind, the one we receive or say to someone else when we don’t know what else to say? Maybe we even recite these verses to ourselves in an attempt to find some semblance of peace, when really it feels like a holy band-aid over a gaping wound. While it’s great that our knee-jerk reaction is to share or recite Scripture, are we doing ourselves a disservice by not actually believing the words we are reciting? We must ask, are we going beyond knowledge of the truth and wading into belief?

Romans 8:28 is this scripture for me – “and we know that God works all things together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.” Every time a situation or circumstance bumps up against me in weird ways, I begin to remind myself of this verse. The bad news? My impatience while waiting on the “working all things together” causes me to lose every ounce of perspective.

The fact is, when life goes sideways and nothing makes sense in the moment, it’s hard to truly trust it as a stepping stone to your purpose. This is why we say hindsight is 20/20. My personality runs feelings-oriented and logic is something for which I have to tangibly fight. So when praying for my One Word challenge and receiving the word “perspective”, I admit, I freaked out a little bit. The past three years were full of action, doing, trusting words that pulled me out of my comfort zone. Instantly I could see what God wanted for me in 2019.

I have waited five years to become a mama. Infertility and loss were never supposed to be a part of my story, and yet this season is proof to me that Romans 8:28 is true. I am in the middle of the “working all things together” and without a doubt this season is incredibly important to my purpose, despite what my own perspective tells me.

In the waiting, I have found what true hope looks like; God’s revealed what true community looks like and why it’s necessary; I can now see His love cover all things – my mistakes, my doubts, my failures, my fear. The fact is, without infertility, without waiting, I wouldn’t have experienced what surrendering looked like in this way as the only thing I have been sure about my entire life was being a mother; none of this looks the way I hoped it would.

It’s so easy to let my feelings run rampant and believe that because He has not given me children, He does not love me or that I am a flawed, faithless believer unfit to be a mother. And while I know deep down that this is just not truth, doubt attempts to poke holes in my perspective. Colossians 3:2 says to set your mind on things above, not on things that are on the earth — I believe a huge part of setting your mind on things above is not just knowing the truth, but believing it. How can one ever gain perspective if we don’t believe the truth?

This next year is a year of stretching for me – growing beyond my feelings and really sinking into truth. I believe God is asking His children to not just know His word, but to believe it, and He is going to give each of us brilliant and bold opportunities in 2019 to put this into action. Our purpose is so much bigger than any struggle we encounter, because God is weaving all of this heartache into more. Teaching us how to better love one another, how to trust Him in new ways, and how to see that each disappointment has fingerprints of His glory.

I don’t want infertility to be my only story, and I don’t want your painful season to be your only story either – I want God’s grace and love to be the whole story. This can only happen when we begin to believe that He is working this together for good, working it seamlessly into our purpose. Every plot twist in our plans means something to God, and I don’t know about you, but that is a source of great peace. Our heartbreak and loss of dreams can feel like a stomping ground, but they can also be the birthplace of something so much greater. We are all in this together, although the circumstances may be different, none of us are immune to wonky perspectives. Let God surprise you this year,  and may you have peace in the middle of His work.

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Brittney is a married, 30-something, laid down lover of Jesus. She writes at www.brittneyclosner.com and is full of book recommendations, recipes, and laughter, she chases the things that bring her joy in the margin. Married for 6 years, trying to conceive for 4, Brittney has found herself passionate about encouraging women on the infertility journey through raw transparency and clinging to Jesus. Always seeking laughter and purpose in the pain, Brittney jumps at the chance to do the wild things Jesus asks her to do.