This current pain

This is a new approach to blogging for me. I promised my lovely wife, M, that I would blog alongside her as she starts looking at life in a new way. There have been some very difficult decisions that we have made over the last month or so that I will get more into as this blog changes and time moves forward.
For today however I want to comment on a specific thing my wife is struggling with. Heck, that I am struggling with. Where is God in all of the pain we are going through?

We have been going through infertility for two years. Two years of hopes dashed and tears shed. Two years of negative tests and doctors best guesses. One surgery, countless appointments. Pills. Invasive procedures. In all reality I haven't gone through it at all, my wife has. She has borne the brunt of the pain and the heartache and the loss. I have had to stand on the sidelines with tears in my eyes as she was repeatedly beaten down by the very dreams she holds so closely. What am I supposed to do? How can I try to fight in her place in a battle that is going on in her heart? When she asks me why God isn't answering her prayers, what am I supposed to say?

She doubts God, like Thomas doubted God, like Job doubted God, like I have doubted God. But Thomas felt the scars, Job heard His voice, I saw changes happen. She hasn't. I am left holding the hands of an emotionally battered, fragile, shattered creature that I love with all my heart. And so I look to Him and ask, Why? Why can't this have been easy for us? How can this be something so many people have happen naturally and easily and all to often when they don't even want it to, but we can't when we try to hard and want it so badly? I can't pay for the advanced treatments and the surrogacy options and the things that you read and hear about other couples trying. I feel like I let her down and I rage at God for leaving her there, leaving us there.

I cling to one thing in all of this: That the God I serve will not leave his children alone in their pain. We are not promised a life of happiness and sunshine and daisies. But we are promised a God who will walk through the fire and the flood with us, even when we cannot see Him. So what can I do? What can I say to this wonderful woman I am eternally connected to?

To M: I cannot fix this. I cannot make the sun shine on your heart all the time. But I can hold your heart. I can dry your tears. I can watch over your heart and help you find value and goodness in yourself. I can tell you I will never let you go. I can never stop fighting for you. I can love you until the the nightmares stop and the dreams can be felt again. I can tell you the truths about yourself that the enemy would love for you to disbelieve. I can try to be the hands of God where you cannot hear His voice or see His face. And I will be. Always.