United States of America
My story begins with the time when I faced hopelessness, true hopelessness, for the first time in my life.
I lost a son when I was 58 years old. I did not question God because I believe in His sovereignty. But there were his children to consider. Their mother was very unstable. I was so scared for them.
Erin, my son, wasn’t with their mother, and the relationship was pretty tumultuous. I had invited him to move back home with his dad and I, to get on his feet. He desperately wanted to get custody of the children. Well, after nine months of living in Savannah, he was hit by a car. His children were adopted by their mother‘s first cousin.
I thought we had a good relationship, and I went to visit once. All was well for a few months, and then the new mom stopped speaking to me and would not let the girls speak to me anymore. I lost it. All I ever wanted to be was a mom and grandmother. I questioned God,” Why am I here? I have no purpose. No legacy.” Yes, I had other two other sons and other grandchildren, but I’ve been so invested in the girls.
My other grandchildren were well and that’s another story. I ended up in an inpatient mental hospital and 12 weeks of outpatient services. Even with the therapy, I was sad. I was lost for about two years. I retired early, hoping to heal.
There is a series of God leading me to new places, and I am now free indeed. I live in His light. No more darkness. I have a new job, I so enjoy. I’m a little tired, but I love it. I love that at age 65, I found work that I feel gives me purpose.
Amanda W.
United States of America
There was a time my husband told me he didn’t believe in God. This broke my heart and brought tears to my eyes. He was brought up in a church his grandfather was a Methodist minister, yet he still didn’t believe in God.
He used to believe, but through misfortune we lost everything and he turned from God. He allowed the enemy to put thoughts in his head that if there was a God, we wouldn’t have lost everything.
His straying from God, led him to stray from his family and our marriage. At this time, I grew closer to God. What satan meant for harm, God turned into good.
In my journey with God, He out many wonderful God-fearing people in my life. There was much healing and growing that I needed to do. I needed to get closer to God. In this journey I learned to release my husband to God through prayer.
Not only was I praying, but as I shared my story, others prayer for my husband, our marriage and family. These prayers were heard and answered by God. He chased after my husband’s heart.
After many years of running, my husband accepted the Lord and was baptized. We were baptized together.
There are still many struggles, but little by little, much healing is occurring and a relationship is being built by my husband’s choice, not by pressure from me. A miracle!
Jennifer
United States of America
Life doesn’t always go as you expect, especially when you have faced an illness, disease, or difficult report. You think it’s over but the enemy says no, it’s not.
After the loss of my mom and husband early in 2020, I was diagnosed with cancer. Going through treatment, etc., it seemed I was in the clear until the early days of 2025 when my oncologist found a ladybug-sized random spot in my armpit.
A ladybug with poor direction skills.
Ladybugs are supposed to be good luck – not this one!
I kept hearing the children’s song, “Ladybug, ladybug, fly away home!
This ladybug wasn’t moving.
Did I want to face surgery again? No!
Did I believe God could heal me? Absolutely Yes!
The Lord decided surgery was the way the ladybug would be removed. There were those who needed to be blessed and to see the joy of the Lord in me.
My heavenly Father carried me to and through a place I didn’t want to go. As I spoke hope and joy to the medical team, the Lord blessed me, too.
With words of scripture, the promises of God, He reassured me that I was exactly where I was supposed to be.
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your path” (Proverbs 3:5-6).
A year later, the doctors declared me cancer-free!
WON & DONE is the Lord’s battle cry! It can be your battle cry, too.
Barbara Hollace
United States of America
I don’t think I have ever truly known absolute forgiveness. My head has known it, and a corner of my heart has known it. But full forgiveness?
Only recently, I have truly experienced this – complete forgiveness.
With this comes respect for differences, acceptance of who the other person is, and an overwhelming, pure love. God’s kind of love.
During my 27 years with Craig (my ex, who was laid to rest 1 year ago), we deeply hurt each other, and we ended our 25-year marriage many years ago. In time, we could say we forgave one another, yet never sat around the same tables. We had minimal connection and only concerning our challenged daughter, Candice.
I truly thought I had forgiven, as there have been no ugly feelings in my heart for many years now. I only wished him well, and I felt the same from him.
Yet, at his death, being fully excluded from it in his last days and burial, I had to accept from a distance that he was gone. As I sat in the car at the hospital, waiting for my girls as they visited him those final days of his life, I felt anger rise, and had to sit with God amongst my many questions. But those are lessons learned for another day.
Processing the grief and loss these months since January, the Holy Spirit this past month has gently tapped me on the shoulder and whispered, “There are still a few roots of unforgiveness in your heart.”
As we sat together, digging, listening, and conversing, I saw it. Saw it in my humor, “Well now, Craigy, you wouldn’t sit at a meal table with our girls and me, well – in heaven I’ll just build my house right next to yours!” Really – humor? Or grief with a touch of latent anger? The more I pondered and let the Holy Spirit unveil my deepest roots, it all surfaced.
“Lord, heal me. I forgive him. Forgive me for harboring, judging his actions, how we did life differently.”
As the raw honesty rolled down my cheeks, room was made for the healing salve from Jesus who made healing possible. We cried together as He showed me how He loved us both as we each did life differently from one another. It was all good with Him. We loved and valued different things, but our hearts were for Him.
A warmth flooded my soul. A weight I didn’t know I carried fled from my being. A lightness enveloped me. AND I felt this warmth of pure love fill Craig’s space in my heart. I saw myself running to him in heaven, embracing him. Now I know the lightness of forgiveness. The purity of it.
No judgement. Acceptance of the other person. Just as they are. Only wanting good for them. No jokes needed. No anger, irritation.
Quiet. Peace. Love.
The gift of God’s Grace for each of us, waiting for us to allow Him to reveal the heart, to release, to fully forgive.
Then we move forward in strength, receiving joy, with thanks for each day of life.
True freedom lies in absolute forgiveness.
Emra
United States of America
Trusting God’s Timing Through the Tears
“To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven… a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance.”
— Ecclesiastes 3:1,4
Grief doesn’t wait for an invitation. It crashes into our lives like a wave, often without warning—and in my case, it came with a phone call that shattered my world. My father, my hero, had been killed in a car accident. Just like that, the man who had once jumped out of airplanes with the 101st Airborne, graduated college against the odds, walked the halls of political power as a lobbyist, and rose to become a top salesman, and a family man was gone.
I remember the funeral vividly. As I stood over his coffin, I leaned in to look at him one last time. I studied his face, trying to memorize it, afraid to forget any detail. My heart ached with questions. Why now, Lord? Why him?
But grief, while cruel, has a strange way of leading us back to grace.
Fast forward to 2007. I was working at the White House—a dream I carried in part because of my father’s belief in me. One day, I received an email from one of his former clients. He invited me to lunch. Sitting across the table from this man, I was taken aback when he said, “I feel like I’m sitting across from your father.”
Goosebumps rose on my arms. I felt a warmth, a closeness to my dad that I hadn’t felt since the day we buried him. It was as if God reached down through the years and reminded me: He’s not forgotten. And neither are you.
After lunch, I walked back to the White House gate, my heart full in a way that surprised me. My boss noticed the tears on my face and asked if I was okay. I nodded slowly and said, “I just had the best day of my life.”
The pain of grief had not vanished—but it was now pierced with purpose.
I don’t pretend to understand why God allows our hearts to break. But I know this: His timing is perfect, even when it feels unbearable. He sees the end from the beginning. The seeds of sorrow planted in the soil of faith will one day bloom into joy.
God used my father’s legacy to touch me even years after his passing. He orchestrated a moment that reminded me that who my dad was still matters—and so do I.
If you’re grieving, don’t rush the process. Don’t minimize the ache. Instead, bring it to God. He knows the weight of loss. After all, He gave His only Son for us.
But also—wait. Watch. Trust.
God’s timing rarely makes sense in the moment. But one day, when the pieces come together, you’ll see the fingerprints of grace all over your story. Just like I did.
Heather S. Wolf
