In Every Teardrop

In every teardrop, God's rainbow of promise shines through.
He holds our tears in a bottle,
and our tears will reap joy;
For all God's promises have His ' yea' and ' amen' in them;
He has given us His Spirit as a guarantee.

In God's right hand; He lovingly holds us.
In His left hand; the bottle of tears is held.
The Lord will never leave us nor forsake us.
He has not forgotten, ~ ONE ~ promise!

Written by Linda Kostin

It's hard to believe that the Lord blessed me with this teardrop prose 18 years ago already! I won't get into the " why" in depth, pertaining to that deep valley I was in so many years ago. However, I couldn't stop crying way back then, day after day, - morning, noon and night. It was such a heartwrenching time! The worse heartbreak I had ever gone through; and I had gone through a lot of sorrow off and on for years before that. However, I just wanted to die at that particular time as the pain emotionally that I was feeling, seemed worse then anything I had ever suffered before then!

I loved the Lord so much, as I still do, that He had used me for so many things pertaining to life way back when this story took place, that I was very honoured while serving the Lord. I helped others in need as well and I was constanltly blessed as I wrote poetry, songs, stories, and ministered in song. I was more then willing to serve the Lord for whatever the purpose was; but there is a high price one pays when he or she says, " Here I am Lord. Use me so that You will be glorified. "

Being a poet since a child as well as a singer/ song writer in my early thirties, I always kept my binder full of paper under my couch so that when the Holy Spirit would gently speak to me, I was ready to write, often hearing that still small voice of our sweet Holy Spirit whisper, " Linda, write."

I will never forget that night, just a short while before I wrote the teardrop piece. I had been peering out of my bedroom window, actually at three in the morning with tears pouring down my face. The street lights were casting a golden glow upon the side walk outside of my apartment, where my teenage daughter would get off the bus, heading up the side walk to our home, since the year before, when we first moved into such a beautiful new apartment building. " Oh Lord, I can't stop crying, I miss Heather so much! " I sobbed out. "How I wish I could see my daughter coming home! I want my baby back! She's my only child that you blessed me with Lord! Please!" I begged Him." I know you have Your protective shield around her Lord, but my heart is so broken, that I never thought anyone could cry so long, day after day. Each day feels like an eternity, as I cry so much! It is written that You hold our tears in a bottle Lord," I cried, " but surely by now, You must have a shelf of bottles in your storage room with my name written on them! Please good Shepherd, go get Your stray. I miss Heather so much!" I spoke through my tears, that I had no control over as far as stopping them went.

I walked into my bathroom to wash my face seeing that I had been crying so much, that my eyes appeared like frog eyes, swollen and red. I had lost at least ten pounds and being only five feet four inches tall and very small boned, I was the last person on earth who needed to lose weight! I was full of sorrow, skin and bone and felt so ugly, so very lost; and I actually had felt as if Jesus had let me down regardless of how I had put Him first in my life, as my first love. I had promised God since Heather was a small child; I would raise her in the Lord, and did so, as He desires a parent to do; especially a single parent such as I was. Yet, there I was, after all the years I took such delight in serving Christ with all of my heart, feeling as if I had been slapped right across the face by the one referred to as a husband to the husbandless and a father to the fatherless; Who had blessed me so much while raising Heather! I had felt I was pleasing in God's sight for many years; only to feel the complete opposite when Heather had gone astray, taking up with the wildest teens in town! I felt as if the Lord had forsaken me as well as my only child that I had given God thanks for while pregnant, saying, " Please Lord. Let this baby be a baby girl as I know that I will not just be a mother to her but we will be like best friends as well." Heather and I were, ... just like best friends.

My daughter and I had a loving relationship that was well balanced and I had compliments from pastors, married couples, teens as well as young adults pertaining to what a wonderful mother I was and what a well adjusted daughter Heather was; as mentioned by Heather herself when only fourteen years old, when she said, " Mom, I love you so much! You have been such a good mother that all my friends wish that you could have been their mother. I am so proud of you! I love you Mom! " she complimented me sincerely. " You have been strict where it matters and so much fun too; and I know that if you were not a Christian mother, that my homelife would not have been as good as it has been since I was just a little girl with so many good memories. I know this Mom, and I would never want to change a single thing since I was born if I had the chance to! I have a mother like you that loves me and a wonderful father too. I am so lucky!" she said. " I am so happy! Thank you Mom. I love you so much!"

Well, no wonder it is said, to never say never! It wasn't too long after my daughter's words of love and honour toward me, that everything changed! A year passed by so quickly and with it my daughter was swept away by the worldly friends she had taken up with behind the scenes.

It got to the point that Heather did not want any healthy boundary lines drawn as far as her age went and would not abide by any rules. Therefore, she lost respect for Jesus who she had loved with all of her heart since a child, losing self-respect as well as respect toward any adults, not just me. It was as if my Heather had died! My real Heather was, ... gone. I was living with a complete stranger compared to the young teen I had only the year before, before she had gone wild. She was an honour student with good morals and so absolutely beautiful inside and out. It was shocking that only within a year Heather had been so deceived by non-believers, that she deceived herself as each month passed by, going from bad to worse! Therefore, with things having changed so drastically for the worse, sadly, the time came, when Heather left. I didn't see the picture of herself, until hours later that terrible day, that she had placed in my bedroom on the night table beside my bed, right before she left. It was as if Heather left it there on purpose; knowing deep down inside, that she was so lost, and didn't want me to forget her regardless that she had ventured out, in the wrong direction. When I saw the picture, I picked it up and held it close to my chest as I cried my heart out, while rocking back and forth sitting on my bed, for hours that day, ... all alone.

By the end of that first week when Heather was gone, I had lost so much weight, felt sick to my stomach, couldn't eat, couldn't sleep, and I could not stop crying, no matter how hard I tried! Oh, what a sad sight to see as I stood before my bathroom mirror, that one early morning when I stopped peering out of my bedroom window crying, praying, wishing and hoping that I would have seen her, walking up that side walk toward our home!

I trembled from my head to my feet as I left the bathroom and made my way to the living - room. I had Total Christian Television on morning noon and night that first week that Heather was gone; and that particular night ( morning I should say), Karen Wheaton sang: "Coming up that Dusty Road." and I burst into tears again, when all of a sudden I felt a warmth come over me. " Write." I heard that soft familiar voice say. I grabbed my binder of paper out from beneath my couch, and said, " Give me the words Holy Spirit. "

In every teardrop, God's rainbow of promise shines through ... was birthed through my labour of love I had for the Lord as His willing servant, no matter what I had said so confused at the time about His love toward me, and my thoughts about how I had felt so betrayed by my first love Jesus.

" Never the less, I will serve the Lord under all circumstances!" I had said so often over the years. Christ did not judge me in accordance to the outward appearence of things but knew my heart that He daily searched deep from within. He saw that it was pure but broken; and that I was pouring out my words of pain, as a release. He sent the comforter as promised to me; the Holy Spirit, to strenghten me during the weakest time of my life, to speak to me as I wrote through my tears; In every teardrop God's rainbow of promise shines through. A short piece of literature, yet so very annointed by the Lord of all; that it helped men, women and teens, further on up the road who were in deep valleys, who wept.

Oh what an honour to have first received such an edifying message from the Lord that strengthend me the wee hours of the morning while in such a dark place when, I wept.

Jesus understood my tears as He does everyones. After all, the shortest line in all of the Bible is:
'Jesus wept.' Two words.

Tears are a language, God understands.