Do you ever feel weak? Have you ever felt helpless? Have you experienced an unexpected event in your life that left you on your knees?

My friend, Emily Cook, has written a book titled, “Weak and Loved” about her journey through her daughter’s battle with epilepsy. A parent never feels so weak as they do when their child is very sick. You feel completely helpless to do anything to fix it, relying instead on doctors, tests, and medication. All the time you may wonder, “What is happening?” “Why?” and “What are we going to do?”

Through the process of learning that her daughter had epilepsy, through all the tests and treatments, and even through her daughter’s brain surgery, Emily learned not only how weak she was, but also just how much God loves her.

This book is a personal memoir of a painful time in her life where she struggled to hold on to hope and trust in His promises. As with all trials, hers was a journey of ups and downs, of seeing God at work, of doubt, of fear, and of waiting for Him in the darkness. During this time of suffering in her life, Emily clung to the promise that God is sovereign over all things and that everything will work together for the good of His children. This book doesn’t provide easy answers to life’s trials but points us to the cross and to the One who promises that one day, there will be no more pain or sorrow.

“Yes, death’s threats are everywhere, and death may even take this child of your heart this very night. You no longer can close your eyes to this, daughter. Yet there is great comfort to be found, even in this valley of death. Death would only take her from your care into Mine. Lean on me, daughter, I am faithful and My promises do not fail.”

Her story, while it is her story, is also our story. We all go through dark tunnels in our life where we can’t see what’s ahead, where fear threatens to over take us, and where our faith is put to the test. But He is there, even in the midst of that darkness. In tuning our heart to hear His voice, in trusting in His word, one step at a time, we will leave that tunnel and come out the other side.

Emily and her family have come out the other side. In this book, she shares her deep love for her daughter, the truth about God’s grace, of giving the hard thanks, and her battle with trusting God with her daughter’s illness. She writes with honesty and transparency, taking the reader inside the heart of a mother who suffered as her child suffered.

“God helped me loosen my grip on Aggie, just a little. She was a gift from God, on loan to us for as long as He chose.”

May we all grasp the truth that while we are “weak for now”, we are also “loved forever.”

Emily is offering a free digital copy of the book, July 15-19. Click here to get your copy. To read more about her daughter’s progress, click here.

Disclosure: I was given a free copy of this book in exchange for my review. The opinions are my own.