If Only

In her deep anguish Hannah prayed to the Lord, weeping bitterly. And she made a vow, saying, “Lord Almighty, if you will only look on your servants misery and remember me, and not forget your servant but give her a son, then I will give him to the Lord for all the days of his life, and no razor will ever be used on his head.”

1 Samuel 1:10-11

In life we will all have ‘if only’ moments.

I am sure at some point or another the hurt you’ve experienced has caused you to think, if only God would __________(fill in the blank).

If only God would heal my son, if only God would give me a child, if only God would change my circumstances, if only God would provide for my family, if only God would take this disease away, if only God would take me out of this situation, if only God would bring me a husband, if only God would change my husband’s heart, if only God would turn my child to him, if only God would make her clean, if only…

Hannah prayed this prayer after years of being barren and being made fun of and being harassed by the other woman. But Hannah, in her hurt and anguish took her prayer before the Lord with her ‘if only’ an added ‘then’. She made a vow to God that would bring healing to her heart, but hard in the healing. She wanted this child so much that she was willing to give him back to the Lord to be raised in the temple away from her if she could just hold him in her womb and in her arms for a short time.

‘If only… Then’, fulfilled by God, becomes a vow you must fulfill yourself.

Some of us keep our ‘if only‘s’ as that alone; maybe we think it, maybe we scream it, and maybe we pray it. But some of us, like Hannah, take it to the next level and make our ‘if only’ an ‘if only, then’.

I know I did. I remember the words like it was yesterday. Sitting in my downstairs bathroom on my knees, getting ready to take a pregnancy test the third month after my miscarriage, and I said, “God, if only you would let me be pregnant, then I will do whatever you ask of me the rest of my life.” My ‘if only’ had a ‘then’, and if my if only was I fulfilled so was my then.

Seven months later, twin Girls were laid in my arms and 14 years later I’m still saying yes to every call from God. Some of my ‘then’s’ have been the hardest times I’ve had to walk through. Some, I believe, have been tests to see if I was really willing to say yes to everything. And then some have been the most rewarding (even though difficult) periods of my life.

But you know, if my “if only” had not been fulfilled I would have turned my ‘If only’ into an ‘even if’. Even if God chose not to give me another child I would have still worshiped him. And I know this to be true because even when God chose not to heal my youngest son this side of heaven, I still raised my arms, my heart, and my prayers and worshipped Him.

We all will have “if only” moments, some of us will even have “if only, then”, but in all of these “even if” God doesn’t fulfill our “if only”, let us all worship Him.