Have you ever had someone say to you: “I just want you to be happy!”? I’ve had it said to me on more than one occasion and yes, it’s a good thing to want happiness for people, and it’s ours to have at weddings, births, graduations, in romance, in wonders, in blessings, in new experiences, in marriages, in children, in healings, in accomplishments, in work that we love, in nature’s glory,…. and especially in our relationship with God and the people that are dear to us. Yes, yes, yes, there’s happiness for us in all these,,…. but we’d better brace ourselves with the knowledge that “birthing truth” comes with tribulation, not happiness!

What I want more than happiness for me and for all of us is to become whole. The Bible says there’s a time for everything, and one of those times is a time to wound. We’re not going to be happy then, but suffering and wounds are needed in our lives, especially when there’s something wrong that needs correction. Who is there that doesn’t need correction? All sunshine and no rain means a scorched land, not a paradise.

During a time that I was seeking to know why I was in so much pain, and wanting to know the name/nature of what I was dealing with, the word “new moon” came. A new moon means a new reflection coming in the darkness of our understanding that will gradually become full understanding: It represents the beginning of a development in new thinking. There is a difference between it and the sun which is a revelation that is very clear. We are happy when we see the sun come out, but when we are in darkness of understanding with little light, being happy is not the emotion we experience. However, we do have joy in knowing that we are becoming transformed into His likeness. Like Jacob of old, each one of us has to wrestle with an angel to get the revelation of what supplants the rule of God in our lives. Yay, the blessing shall be ours in the end, but we shall also walk with a limp as did Jacob.

I think of Jesus saying: “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. (Matthew 10: 34-36) How many of us realize that the difficult, even bad relationships we have are for our good? I’ve shared this before, but it’s worth repeating: At a time I was in love with a man who I thought was going to be my mate, God gave me a vision of myself giving birth, and the baby’s head was stuck. People were shouting: “Push! Push!” and I was angry with them. Then the Lord told me: “That baby you’re birthing is a ‘NEW YOU!’” Isn’t this what happens in so many of our relationships? We have great expectations and dreams, and what we think will be our end is very different from what the Lord has planned for us. In every relationship and in every situation, our “Maker” is forming us. We are that woman travailing to give birth to “The Life and Glory of God: Yay! to The Truth”!

So to you who have quadruplets kicking in your belly who have the name of father, mother, son, and daughter on your foreheads, I say “Push! Push! Your time is at hand!”