Thank You Robert

I have known Robert since I was 14 and he was 16 and have had the privilege of being his wife since I was 17yo almost 28 years married. I have seen him walk through all kinds of pain and loss.Years of unspeakable abuse and alcoholic parents and step parents, fighting and struggling to survive even as a teenager never catching a break.The loss of 4 unborn children. Ministry struggles,with the weight of friends that turn their back when you need them the most, the heartache of caring for a mother dying an agonizing death from ALS.The worse is surely this last loss of a father that died without Christ.This has such a palpable finality with the loss of hope that things would change and that his father would want to know him and love him or that he will ever see him again. I am always encouraged to love God more and deeper as I watch him respond to each of these losses. I pray that the suffering would be lighter but I know that God has a reason for all that he brings in our lives. His heart is truly heavy but he has always had a real sense of Gods presence in his life and our need to understand that our suffering is only for a short time and then we will be with Jesus and tears will be wiped away. I know that the last song I have below is one that gives me strength through difficult times because of how Robert used it in my life. When we lost one of our babies he laid next to me and held me so tight and started to lead me in singing this song to the Lord through our tears. I will hope to respond to suffering differently for ever thanks to this wonderful act of godliness and hope in times of despair.Thank you Robert for leading me to praise God in the midst of suffering and pain. May God grant me the ability to soothe your suffering and may we keep praising God together through life's difficulties and through the kinds of suffering that you speak of in the following sermon.