When your husband dies, your dreams with him die as well. For me, some of those simple dreams were seeing Michael hold our little baby for the first time and telling him how good fatherhood looked on him. Sadly, dreams of sharing the love of Christ together, raising our son together, having even more children, buying our first house, traveling together, seeing our grandchildren, and doing all of the highs and lows of life together all ended in a moment. New good things would still come, but it would be without him. Most of us have broken dreams, but what are we supposed to do with them? And is there even anything we can do with them?
As you may imagine, there came a point in grief where I was fairly angry about all of these broken dreams. Even though I trusted God, I was still upset about everything I had lost along with Michael. I didn’t like the drastic, sudden change that had occurred in my life. I was severely rattled and trying to come to grips with minor things, like not being able to send him a text throughout the day or making him breakfast and packing his lunches. I was struggling with the fact that I didn’t have uniforms and nasty, sweaty P.T. clothes to wash, let alone the fact that we wouldn’t have any more children together after the sweet, little one that was in my womb at the time of his death. I knew I had to trust that God knew what He was doing, but I didn’t want to let go of those now dead dreams.
I held onto all of my broken dreams, I wept over them, and I was angry about them. I think a lot of my anger sprouted from fear. I was struggling with a lie that said my future was going to be hopeless. At times, I was even thinking that my plan for my life was better than God’s plan. I had forgotten that God had dreams for my life, too. And since God is God and I am not, He knows and sees what I don’t, so His plan for my life is very obviously different than my own. When I began to fully trust God for that in the midst of my pain, I began to give up my broken dreams to Him.
The dreams were dead, and clenching them tightly in my fists was only digging my wounds deeper and wider. With clenched fists full of my own dead dreams, I couldn’t make room and take grasp of what God was offering to me as His dreams for my life. As I continued to hand over my own dreams to God, I began to realize He was taking my heart’s desire off of them and towards His dreams for me. This wasn’t just something that happened in a day, it was a process, and continues to be as life goes on and more broken dreams surface. When my son blew out his candles for his second birthday, and I thought, I wish his earthly daddy was here to celebrate him, I had to immediately follow up with, Here, Lord take this broken dream, and fill it with more of You. Nevertheless, the healing process had begun and the pangs of broken dreams were no longer destructive because my desire for God’s dreams for my life was greater than my own.
If we allow Jesus to do it, our broken dreams break way for blessing. In early widowhood, I used to just beg God to let me have some glimpse of what my life would look like a year or three out from then. I was so afraid of surprises and I just wanted to know so I could be prepared for what was up ahead. I remember telling my mom about how I felt and she asked me, “A year ago would you have wanted God to show you what your life would be like today?” I said, “Ummm, NO!” I thank God He didn’t tell me as a new widow what my life would be like today because I would’ve been mortified! The funny thing is, I love my life today. Yes, it’s not easy and there is pain, but that doesn’t take away from the good. I get to raise a precious little boy and I get the opportunity to be a part of God’s plan in others’ lives, as well. However, a year or two ago, my life now would have looked scary and unstable. The life I live today is very different from the dreams I once had for my future, but I know God’s dreams for me are beyond greater than my own. Even still, in this broken, sin-filled world we live in, yes, life will include heartache.
Our Heavenly Father truly wants good for our lives. I have tended to say, “Good is not easy,” and when I look back on my short life and all the good that has come, I’ve realized that nothing good in my life was led by easiness (or painlessness). If we are equating good with easy, then we’ll find ourselves running away from God’s good plan for our lives. We’ll end up taking the easy route thinking we’re headed towards good things, but end up in harmful things rather than just painful things. The more broken dreams we have, the more opportunity we have to see God move in our lives. We just need to hand it over to God and trust Him through the pain; He will provide the grace.
