People ask us how we cope knowing our two daughters have a terminal disease and how we meet their special needs. The expected human response is that we should be broken down in grief and despair whilst they slowly die. We should experience tremendous heartbreak that leaves us weeping with sorrow. This is what a normal response looks like. Without God, this is how we all react when faced with earthly trials.

With God, we have an escape or refuge from this mourning. When we entirely focus on earthly matters, our situation is perceived as devasting, but when we simply focus on our hope of Heaven, our trials become miniscule. Knowing God must be directing our trial to glorify Himself provides purpose to our lives, reduces the heartache, and eliminates the grief. We believe if we doubted God and began to feel sorry for ourselves, it then would produce a sorrowful bitterness that would cloud the joy our hope should bring. Psalm 73:26 says, “My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.” God is big enough to assist us in overcoming any situation if we surrender it to Him.

When we truly love the Lord, all the treasure on earth should hold little to no significance. We know all earthly things are going to pass away; therefore, we choose not to dwell on nor cherish the earth’s desirable pleasures. When we truly love the Lord with all our heart, it will be easier to surrender all things to Him, even our own children. They weren’t ours to begin with; our daughters are on loan from God to nurture and teach for the time we have them and then relinquish back to God when He ordains it time to take them home. Our prayer is that we can willingly give up everything for God, including our girls, to further His kingdom, accomplish His will, and glorify His name. May we lay aside all our desires in demonstration of our genuine love for God.

We serve the all-powerful God; He is the God of the universe that can makes mountains shake and oceans roar. Even death can’t keep Him down; He defied death and defeated Hell in preparation to save His followers. If we meditate on how big our God is, we should realize how small our problems really are. Do we really think the God that spoke this world into existence can’t help our seemingly impossible trials? Do we really think the God that gave His only begotten Son to die to save us doesn’t care about our lives? Don’t forget that God has a master plan for humanity. We humans seldom prioritize what’s truly important, but God always does.

Let us not fail to remember how big and awesome our God truly is. If He is not the first One we turn to in our time of need, do we really trust Him or just take Him for granted? If we despair in our circumstances, do we really have faith in Him? When our faith in God increases, we are strengthened to handle our trials through Christ. Our sorrow will fade away as joy becomes our strength from God. We can declare with absolute truth that we are truly satisfied in our situation and in our God. We believe that all things are possible with God (Matt 19:26). It is possible to be joyful in our situation, it is possible to rejoice that our daughters are going to Heaven, it is possible to happily care for our girls who are facing death, and it is possible to have strength and hope for tomorrow because God is always good.