Stitched With Hope: Seeing the Pattern God Is Forming

Have You Ever Watched Someone Quilt?

Have you ever sat in awe as pieces of fabric are woven together - simple scraps that don’t look like much, rough edges and all - suddenly becoming something beautiful? Something treasured?

I’ve always been creative and crafty. I took up quilting a while back and instantly fell in love with the art. I could sit for hours, happy as a clam, cutting, stitching, sewing - watching with excitement as the pieces began to shift into something more. As I reflect back now, I realize it wasn’t just the finished product that mattered most. It was the process that held the greatest lessons.

While the gift of giving will probably always be my favorite part, it’s the process of refinement that strikes me most now.

It begins with a design concept. Then comes the search for the right fabrics - textures, colors, patterns - each chosen to bring that vision to life. And then the real work begins. Cutting each individual piece. Pressing the fabric to remove creases and align crisp edges. Skipping a step is not an option. Every step matters.

When a step is done half-heartedly, it shows in the final product. It may not be obvious to others, but to the craftsman, it’s unmistakable. That’s the art behind the skill - practice, repetition, pressing in - all creating something cleaner, stronger, more refined. Each step reinforces the next, building upon what came before.

It’s been a while since I’ve sat at my sewing machine. Life got in the way. And yet here I am, reflecting on something I once saw only as a hobby, realizing it quietly held space for a lesson - a pattern, if you will - that I had no idea would shape one of the hardest seasons of my life.

When the Season Unraveled

As we made it through week three and braced for the start of week four, nothing about it felt fair. The air around me was heavy, the joy of Christmas quietly drained from the season. Tears fell easily - from everyone - as life once again stretched us beyond what felt possible.

The car was packed for Andrew and the kids to leave for Boston early Wednesday morning. Two whole weeks together. A break in the extended time apart. After Addie had been sick the week prior, we thought we might have dodged a bullet. But Tuesday night, I could hear it in Andrew’s voice - something was brewing. It would be a wait-and-see night as they prepared to leave in the morning.

That morning never came.

Andrew spiked a 103-degree fever.

There was still a glimmer of hope that maybe it would pass quickly, in time for Christmas. But as the week unfolded and he progressively worsened, tensions rose at home as reality began to settle in. Addie was exhausted, frustrated, and blaming herself. Andrew tested positive for COVID Thursday night - a result that moved Christmas from the possible list straight into the impossible one.

Questions swirled. Gifts waited for the kids in Boston. Our tree back home had already fallen weeks earlier when the stand broke, shattering ornaments in the process. Nothing felt anchored.

Held by the Body of Christ

Saturday morning, the texts and calls started coming in. Members of our church family stepped up in unimaginable ways - caring for us, loving us, carrying the weight alongside us. Neighbors, unaware of the devastation we were navigating, showed up unexpectedly with selfless generosity in a season that could easily leave you feeling forgotten.

The next forty-eight hours would teach me more than I realized at the time.

Through the haze of emotions - disappointment, heartbreak, yet another major setback - one truth became clear: we were not forgotten. God’s family showed up. Breakfasts. Dinners. Popsicles. Groceries. Medications. Meals dropped off without warning. People willing to risk exposure as Jax remained a wild card, recognizing that what was truly at stake was far greater.

They saw the pain in Addie.
They saw the need to love her ... and Jax ...

Even If…

A familiar, steady voice on the other end of the phone helped navigate logistics from eight-plus hours away, stepping in to coordinate care for our family. It was the selfless love of the body of Christ - something I had never fully experienced until now. When our family needed it most… when I needed it most… I couldn’t do anything in the wake of the destruction.

But they could.

No sooner had plans been made to pick up Addie and Jax - and we laughed, half-resigned, about how “man makes plans and God laughs” - than everything unraveled. Jax complained that his stomach really hurt and a fever had already set in. Then came the vomiting.

He was officially the last man down...

His tears fell hardest. He sobbed that Christmas was ruined because he hadn’t stayed away from Dad. Addie chimed in through her own tears, blaming herself for getting Dad sick in the first place. Before long, everyone was crying as the reality became unavoidable: Boston was no longer an option, and we would remain separated through the holidays, with no clear window for when we might be home - or together again.

What My Daughter Needed Most

What Addie needed most in that moment was her mom. She needed a love I couldn’t provide over the phone or from eight hours away. She needed comfort in ways I simply couldn’t give - but others could.

The true unconditional love of a mom is sacred. And the moms waiting back home had their arms wide open, ready to receive her. Familiar faces. Safe embraces. The kind of comfort you reach for when the world feels anything but safe.

Those moms - my heart will never be able to repay. They understood in a way few ever could.

When Hope Arrived Unexpectedly

Coordination efforts moved into full force as Operation Save Christmas took shape. To say we were blown away by what followed would be an understatement. Families stepped in, not only taking Addie in, but dividing and conquering as one of their own made the long journey to Boston - delivering the medical supplies I needed and retrieving Christmas to bring back to Delaware.

True acts of sacrificial love.
The love of Jesus, lived out in real time.

What a gift to witness.

What a gift to celebrate.

Jesus tells us in the Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” (Matthew 5:4)

A Gift I Didn’t Know I Needed

When we left for Boston, I brought the ornaments made by our church family with me. Each one carried a message, a prayer, a reminder that we were not walking this road alone. I had only made it through about a dozen before my hole punch broke. Frustrated, I set everything aside, planning to wait until Andrew came up with the kids to finish them.

Once again, I imagine God quietly laughing - already knowing there was another plan.

When it became clear Andrew wasn’t coming and the ornaments would remain unfinished, I walked to the grocery store to regulate my nervous system after a long morning of coordination and heartache. And there, in the aisle, it stood out immediately - a hole punch. Purple, of all colors. As if it had been waiting for me.

When I returned to the apartment, I spent the rest of the afternoon finishing those ornaments, preparing them to hang on the tree. One by one, I read each message carefully as I found a place for it.

Words of...

HOPE - JOY - PEACE - LOVE 

everything this season represents, even when it doesn’t feel present.

Soon it became harder to find open space on the tree as each new ornament was added. And in that moment, I realized it was exactly the gift God knew I would need in the storm.

The tree was perfect.
The ornaments were beautiful - reflective, cherished.
The love of Jesus hung there as a quiet, steady reminder.

But He Wasn’t Done

Sunday evening, right on time, Santa showed up - merry and bright, cheerful and full of delight - simply a vessel of God’s love. Just like the stories we tell, it happened quickly. In what felt like the blink of an eye, he had arrived, accomplished what he set out to do, and was already on his way.

I held back tears of immense gratitude as I sent one last hug - from Boston to Delaware - wrapped in love and entrusted to Santa, carrying it home to my daughter.

It took time for the magnitude of that act to fully settle in - and honestly, it still does. I remain in awe of the God we serve. He moved mountains where nothing felt possible. Where even the thought of figuring it out felt too heavy to carry.

By Monday morning, the weight felt different - not lighter exactly, but no longer crushing. Not all was lost. It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t ideal. But it was ours.

Still, the questions lingered.
Why this way, God?
What are You doing here?
What are You refining? 

If I’m honest, I am tired of the refinement. A process I know too well - one I had paid dearly for already. I wanted reprieve, not another lesson.

But He wasn’t done.

The Journal I Didn’t Go Looking For

After my morning meetings, I walked a mile to a small bookshop with a simple intention: to buy a journal for Logan. I wanted him to have a place to document Boston - the hard moments, the wins, the gratitude, the things we needed to surrender to Jesus, and the things we were still asking Him for. A kind of reflective roadmap. A quieter, more direct version of Jax’s Mr. Bear’s Journey to the Well.

And then, almost without thinking, I picked up a second journal - this one for me.

I wasn’t sure why. I didn’t yet know what it was for. But something in me knew it needed to come with me.

That night, I tossed both journals onto the bed - Logan’s with intention, mine with uncertainty. One held structure and purpose. The other held questions I wasn’t sure I was brave enough to ask.

Back home, the lead elf - if you will - reached out to check on everyone, but most especially on Addie. A tender heart. A faithful presence. As we texted back and forth, I found myself wrestling aloud, sharing frustration and questions I suspected wouldn’t have tidy answers. I was grasping - reaching for clarity, relief, something solid to hold onto.

Ye of little faith. 

And yet… God provided.

Before the invitation that would later unfold into something far deeper, this message came through. It mattered. It framed the moment. It steadied my footing.

Words That Caught Like a Thread

“In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said those who mourn will be comforted. So when the pain of life comes your way… you have an option, a greater hope.

As His daughter, you have a chance to experience the deepest, most intimate comfort possible in one of the darker moments of your life. The world can’t give you this kind of hope, and the world can’t take it from you. ❤️

That doesn’t mean it’s easy. No one else can do this for you. 😬🙌🏼 We’d all rather avoid pain and suffering, but God made sure we’d have a greater hope beyond the pain.

What it looks like is a lot of appointments and sickness, but I think along the way, you’re building something into the spiritual fabric of your family. This work is largely unseen, but it sets a direction in ways you have yet to see.

You’re doing this for future daughters-in-law, sons-in-law, grandchildren, great-grandchildren. The battle for freedom from strongholds is one of the hardest journeys.

Evil wants you to believe the walls are closing in, and it will feel like they are. Darkness gets close. Face to face.

But it cannot claim you or your hope.” 

Spiritual Fabric - Hope

I didn’t realize it in that moment how deeply those words would lodge themselves in my spirit - but spiritual fabric caught, like a single thread being gently pulled. Almost imperceptible at first. And once pulled, the pattern began to reveal itself.

There was something holy woven into the heart of that message - hope, threaded through what I could only describe as spiritual fabric. I felt it immediately. Not as clarity, but as invitation. A quiet knowing that the assignment wasn’t to understand yet, but to dig deeper.

That was what the journal was for.
Not answers, but pressing in, especially when nothing made sense.

I opened my Bible and flipped instinctively toward the back, searching for words that felt just out of reach: fabric, tapestry, threads, stitching. My mind raced faster than my hands could write. Thoughts collided. Images formed and dissolved. I had no idea what was about to unfold, only that something was stirring.

Stitches, Patches, Quilt, Tapestry

At the top of the page, I wrote the words that seemed to rise on their own:

Spiritual Fabric - Hope. 

Beneath it, without pausing or editing, four words followed in this exact order:

Stitches.
Patches.
Quilt.
Tapestry. 

At the time, I didn’t question them. I simply wrote. Only later did I realize they weren’t random at all - they were a progression.

Stitches bind fabric together - but only when the tension is right. Too tight, and the fabric puckers, tears, restricts movement. Too loose, and everything unravels into knots and mess. I thought about how often we confuse tension with strength. How we cling to position, authority, control - even money - believing those things will hold us together, when in reality, they distort the very fabric God is trying to form.

Wrong tension breaks what it’s meant to bind.

And yet, God does not discard broken fabric.

He applies patches - not as cover-ups, but as repairs. Patches are placed where something has torn, worn thin, or quietly failed under the weight of years. They strengthen what was weak, but they also interrupt what no longer serves. A patch requires removal - old threads cut away, frayed edges exposed. They tell the truth about damage without shame.

Piece by piece, God repairs - patiently, deliberately - never rushing the process. And in that repair is an undoing: false beliefs we inherited, patterns we normalized, tensions we learned to survive under instead of heal from. The patch doesn’t preserve what was harmful. It replaces it with something stronger, truer, rightly aligned.

Then comes the quilt.

A quilt is not one fabric. It is many - different colors, textures, histories - sewn together with intention. Functional. Warming. Protective. As I thought about building my life alongside Andrew, I realized the quilt we are forming is made not only of what we choose to keep, but also of what we choose to leave behind.

We are stitching together family, faith, children, callings - not perfectly matched, but purposefully joined. Threads from healthier patterns. Beliefs rooted in truth rather than fear. Rhythms formed by grace, not survival. God selecting each piece. God choosing where it belongs. God setting the tension just right.

What we are building is not a repetition of what was handed to us…
it is a redirection.

And in that, the quilt becomes both shelter and testimony.

And finally - the tapestry.

A tapestry is generational. Complex. Often confusing up close. Threads cross in ways that don’t make sense when you’re standing too near. Loose ends appear where you least expect them. But when you step back - when time and trust widen the view - an image begins to emerge.

Not chaos.
Not waste.
But beauty.

Seeing the Pattern

Jesus taught from a mountainside that the Kingdom of God is not position or power or wealth. It is action. Faithful obedience from the heart. Genuine love - for God and for others - that transforms lives, communities, even nations. Cause and effect. Thread by thread.

The Kingdom is not stitched together by force.
It is woven through love.

And suddenly, hope was no longer an abstract idea.

Hope was fabric.
Hope was process.
Hope was God - patiently removing stitches set with the wrong tension…
repairing what had torn…
sewing pieces together we never imagined would belong side by side…
and weaving a tapestry far larger than a single life.

I didn’t know it then - but the page wasn’t just notes.

It was the beginning of seeing the pattern God had been forming through every stitch, every repair, every season.