Does God Listen?

My wife is the most amazing person that I have ever met. Strong, strong, strong. She has been through so very much in her life. God has taken those events and used them to make her emotionally solid - steady - like a rock. She has amazing stories about her walk with God and here’s one of them.

Infertility. To a select few that word carries with it pain, almost unfathomable depths of pain and loss. That was our lot in life. It wasn’t as big a deal to me but for my wife, well, it was devastating, heart wrenching.

So one day she’s in the kitchen talking to God about the agony that was present because of her inability to carry life. And in a thought-voice (something else only a select few will understand) God said, “What would you like from Me?”

With tears tracking their way down her cheeks, my wife said, “I’d like someone to tell me that they’re sorry this happened to me.”

Ok, so non believers will be weirded out by this but that’s what went down.

It's important that you know that my wife comes from a family where, to describe it as harsh would be an understatement. Love and caring and emotional support were just not part of the landscape when she was growing up. Compliments were only given if they were meant to bounce right back to the parent. eg. "You look pretty" > [Because I made the dress].

The day after my wife made that request of her Creator, she went to visit her mother.

Getting over that hurdle is a whole other story. Nevertheless, “loving” her mother regardless of her mother's inability to love back resulted in this visit. These visits go on to this day even though dementia has rendered their time together virtually silent.

Anyway, as they were having tea, with nothing about infertility having been said either that day or on any day in the years previous, my mother-in-law said to my wife, her daughter, “I am so sorry that this happened to you.”

“What happened? What are you talking about?” my wife asked.

“I’m so sorry that you’ve had to experience infertility.”

Does God listen?

If you're listening for Him? Always.