That’s exactly what God says to us when He’s taking us through a trial we don’t understand. Because He knows the resolution. He knows the beauty that will come from it.
In Jesus’ story, His suffering was catastrophic. Hebrews 2:10 says, “For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings.”
Jesus suffered because His character arc included a sacrificial death to take our punishment — the greatest act of love in all of history. Remember all those mistakes and failures I mentioned earlier? The ones you and I have done? Jesus’ story was all about those sins. It was all about taking the punishment that we deserved. He suffered so that we wouldn’t be burdened with sin and shame, but we’d be set free with redemption and grace and an eternity with Him. That can be how our story ends.
Or it can end differently. Some of us decide to get angry at God for the story arc He’s given us. Some of us would rather raise our fists to God than open hands reaching for Him. Some waste all of it. Some of us miss the whole point of our story.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
Can you trust God with your story arc? Can you trust that, as the Author of your life, He is writing in it what needs to be there, and that however it turns out, it’s for your good? Like Jeff’s baby Sophie suffering through the fear of surgeons and abandonment and pain, without knowing they’re just trying to fix her birth defect and heal her, God is doing something in us that we might not be able to see.
God has an eternal future in mind for you. It can be yours if you surrender to His redemption in your life. Whatever regrets you have can be turned into something beautiful … something impactful. Something meaningful. There can be a happily ever after for you if you trust Him no matter what.
I pray that every one reading this will grasp that, and that when the last pages of our lives are written, we’ll each embrace the happily-ever-after that Christ was dying to write into our lives.
Terri Blackstock
ZONDERVAN
Truth-Stained Lies
Copyright © 2013 by Terri Blackstock
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Zondervan.
EPub Edition © MARCH 2013 ISBN: 978-0-310-28933-3
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Blackstock, Terri.
Truth-stained lies / Terri Blackstock.
p. cm. (Moonlighters series; bk. 1)
ISBN 978-0-310-28313-3 (softcover)
1. Sisters — Fiction. 2. Women private investigators — Fiction.
3. Murder — Investigation — Fiction. I. Title.
PS3552.L34285T79 — 2013
813’.54 — dc23 2012027197
* * *
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Terri Blackstock, Truth-Stained Lies
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