Against The Wind

Mark 6:47-48 (NIV) "Later that night, the boat was in the middle of the 

lake, and he was alone on land. He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them.” 

Against the Wind

When you’re in as much pain as me, you have a lot of time to just sit and think. Sitting is not good for me because the longer I sit the harder it is to get back up. But lo and behold, I’ve had time to think.

I have a dear friend who worries about me. I love that anyone thinks of me but this friend goes above and beyond in caring for me and well yes, he’s concerned about my progress, understandably so. 

I was moving along so nicely, appeared to be healing at record speed then BAM! It seemed to halt. What on earth happened? I tried analyzing and over analyzing but in time (God's time) I figured it out. A raging wind came that’s what happened, tossing me about to and fro.

Mark 6:48 “And he saw them toiling in rowing; for the wind was contrary unto them: and about the fourth watch of the night he cometh unto them, walking upon the sea, and would have passed by them.”

Did you ever notice that when you pray, you sometimes (mostly all the time) have to wait for an answer? Some of the time we don’t get the answer we want because we hastily let our minds go to work instead of allowing God to do His job. Yup, that was me. As much as I say I’m listening to God, I strayed off course because I wanted things done in my time!

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Nebraska doesn’t have the tumultuous waters but it does have the horrendous gusting winds to either push or halt me in its path. I was sailing along enjoying my journey, patting myself on the back, admiring my own strength, and could actually see and feel a healing taking place as I soared. Then the winds came and stopped me and my ego in its tracks.

Well, it was morning when I tried writing, it is now afternoon and the zone has closed. I hope I can get back to the point I was trying to make if this gives me a chance. I notice whenever I try saying how good God is, something causes this to crash and it was crashing like mad this morning but now I’ve gotten more than five sentences in without a crash. I know as soon as I get in the zone it will crash, or some higher force in the realm of my computer's insides is fixing the little hidden bugs that are trying to keep me from writing.

Okay, where was I? Oh yeah…getting the wind knocked out of me by the gusty winds. I was soaring along in my healing when I suddenly got the wind knocked out of me but the unseen force was more my arrogance, in hindsight. I’ve been trying to figure out what went wrong and I can blame the wheat bread, the gluten, the one time cheat but I knew deep down none of that was the cause. 

I prayed. For months I prayed and while I wanted an answer pronto as I kept writing, and my concerned friend kept asking, I was at a loss why I was not getting the response I wanted or the time frame I wanted. Well, because GOD IS IN CONTROL, not me and He’ll respond when HE is good and ready. I need to learn patience! And it would do good if my friends knew patience as well. [winkwink]

Last week when I had my mowing spree and I even weed whacked; my underarm started hurting, quite specifically my lymph node on the side of the tumor. It had been showing signs of swelling and I just thought oh great add a thunderstorm to the mix of pain. As the sea swelled and I was being tossed around, pain, cane, back, everything swirled and swirled around me and I was just ready to give up and eat whatever I want and give up on this whole protocol thing. Put me in a hospice and let me go. 

I didn’t bail on my protocol, or on the rough seas churning about, I continued to paddle against the wind. I looked up on google ‘pain in lymph nodes' the other night and was reminded (I covered this when I was first diagnosed) that the lymph nodes are our defense mechanism. If they are swelled then they are in there kicking butt against an invading illness.

Google response: “Lymph nodes become swollen in response to illness, infection, or stress. Swollen lymph nodes are one sign that your lymphatic system is working to rid your body of the responsible agents.”

Last year upon diagnosis, I was told they were going to slice this tumor out of my breast and take some lymph nodes with it. Can you imagine? Had they taken my lymph nodes, I have nothing in my immune system fighting FOR me, they would destroy a portion of me that I NEEDED to heal!

Did you ever notice that when you pray, you sometimes (mostly all the time) have to wait for an answer? Some of the time we don’t get the answer we want because we hastily let our minds go to work instead of allowing God to do His job. Yup, that was me. As much as I say I’m listening to God, I strayed off course because I wanted things done in my time!

When I checked out lymph nodes on google and as I already knew, lymph nodes are a defense mechanism. My swelled nodes had me concerned and my husband of course worries with every pain I have so I try not to tell anyone anything because they read too much into it and want a hasty healing, not the slow one that the CANCER seas are going to take a person on. It is what it is, my friends, cancer is ugly no matter what route you take on the healing journey. This illness can't just be prayed away, or expected to miraculously disappear.

What causes lymph nodes to swell? I repeat! Google says: "Lymph nodes become swollen in response to illness, infection, or stress. Swollen lymph nodes are one sign that your lymphatic system is working to rid your body of the responsible agents." 

Read that people! LYMPHATIC SYSTEM WORKING TO RID THE BODY of [FOREIGN AGENTS]. My lymph nodes that doctors wanted to take away are in there FIGHTING FOR ME! Had they taken them away, I'd have nothing to defend me against this crud. My immune system would be shot, my nodes gone, and I'd be disfigured, more than the forty-seven pounds of weight loss has granted me. 

My Bible Gateway email this [yesterday]morning spoke directly to me! I was carried away by the storm not seeing the full picture.

Mind you that all this week the emails were about college or kids getting out of school etc. etc, but this [yesterday] morning it was targeted RIGHT AT ME! While I'm out here in the midst of a storm, Jesus hasn't forgotten about me, no not at all, He's right here WITH me! Imagine how foolish I felt when I'm always telling everyone else to have patience then realize I wasn't being patient myself! I was just as eager as you to see this crud OVER and DONE WITH! 

My prayers were answered in this little email and in prayer. God is still with me and has been all along! No, the crud is not over and done with, we still have a long way to go but the one thing I can say is that through the back-breaking daily pain, through every step with my cane, I know God is with me as I heal! The first half of my journey, when I was walking and soaring, was what the finished product will look like. Now, this half of the journey is the pain and suffering I must endure, the cross I must carry. Imagine if the first leg of the journey was all pain and suffering. I may have never made it to the second or third part of the journey. I would've given up! Allowed fear and negativity to show me the way. Now that I know what I'll look like healed I am all the more determined to see this through to the end. 

God works in mysterious ways, my friends. Trust and patience are the tools to see you through. I am no longer sailing against the winds. I'm riding along with them, and am at a place where I am SUPPOSED to be; not where everyone thinks I should be, or where I WANT to be, but where God has positioned me, in His time! 

All praise and Glory to God! 

 Isaiah 41:10 (NIV), “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” 

His Time

Pss. 103:3 “Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;”

In His time, not my time!

All of last year I seemed to be soaring in the healing department. I was walking with no pain, a copious amount of sleep and nary a bout of muscle pain. I had always heard the term ‘no pain, no gain’ in the world of fitness meaning you have to feel the pain to gain the insight and strength to lose the pounds (or in my case the dis-ease) you want. But here I was exuberant because I got the chance to forgo the pain and soar right onto healing. That’s not how it works, my friends. 

It’s ironic that had I gone the chemo route I would have been expected to suffer, for a year or more of treatment, surgery and draining negative talks with doctors, slice, dice, pokes and prods all leading to an insane amount of pain and non-healing. Did you know that the ancient Greek word for "pharmacy" means "witch" or "witchcraft"? I have read that the root meaning can also mean "poison". Why is this an acceptable form of so-called healing?

But when you go the route of God and natural healing you’re expected to heal in the genies blink of an eye and show the world how almighty powerful He is against sorcery and witchcraft. I honestly think too many people live in a fantasy world when living the life of a Christian. They read but don’t understand. They listen but never hear. They ignore the truth and expect – yes expect --  a miracle to take place instantaneously!

2 Cor. 12:9 (NIV) “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” 

Yes, God has the power to instantaneously heal, but where is the learning, where is the understanding, where is the weakness? This day and age as we look out at the world, we can see that God is at a standstill when it comes to the humans and their disobedience. He has allowed us to learn from the mistakes we’ve made over the years but instead of learning, we are stomping on all that we were taught. People think they can do what they want and handle things the way they do and go to God as let’s say, the ‘backup’.

God does not take lightly to being the backup plan when things go wrong. When he says ‘trust in Me’, ‘have faith’, He means just that but today people don’t know what that means and so they use Him as the backup if things go wrong. They never really trust or have faith and that is the very thing that has made the condition of the world what it is because of lack of faith.

All action is dependent on belief. When you don’t fully rely on God you are leaning on your own understanding and building up walls of anxiety, worry, and stress. The Lord says we’re to be anxious for nothing. God expects us to not go to ‘people’ for truth. Did Jesus follow people or did people follow Jesus? Was He one of many or one of a few?

1Thess. 2:13 “For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.”

Wisdom cannot come from man it can only come from GOD! So here is what I’ve taken on when refusing the chemo route. I’m walking with God and working to rebuild my immune system. Disease and illness is not something God does to you. He did not give me cancer, I and my lack of caring for my health gave me cancer. I’ll say it again, DNA is only a small portion of the reason I have what I have. Unhealthy eating is the very reasons we will ALL experience illness in our lifetime.

1 Cor. 3:18-21 “Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness. And again, The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain. Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are yours;”

God created all of the scientific principles that science wants us to adhere to but when we turn to God, science wants us to toss God out of the equation. That is just wrong to me. Do you realize that the American Cancer Society would have to disband if ever there was a cure? Billions of dollars would fall out of the hands of 'pharma', 'witchery', 'poison' plan. I'll use God’s health plan. And as such, the alternative treatment and headway are tossed out as quackery never giving healthy living a chance in the trial-n-error stage because we’re taught that food and nutrition have nothing to do with your health and imminent illness.

When I seemingly had a setback in December, boy did people expect me just to bounce back with a tweak to my diet. What they don’t realize is that my trials are not that snappy and that is not how God works. I have to have PAIN and SUFFERING to be FREED from this disease. Just soaring into healing with no pain will gain me nothing but an ego. I’ll feel accomplished and above all others and THAT is not what I’m here to learn and gain. That is not God's plan!

Deut. 7:15 “And the LORD will take away from thee all sickness, and will put none of the evil diseases of Egypt, which thou knowest, upon thee; but will lay them upon all them that hate thee.”

Your disease is as much spiritual as it is physical. YOU and your thoughts are the cause of your anxiety and illnesses. You began early on in life on a path of fear and anxiousness (stress) and no drug is going to take away what you spiritually placed on your path. We keep treating the symptoms of these diseases and never take on treating the underlying CAUSE. I chose God’s natural health plan for myself. In my quest, I study, research, learn and grow but not without PAIN and struggle.

I need you all to know that impatience and doubt is not what I carry. I don’t expect instantaneous results when healing. I don’t want this to be a journey of ease. I want it to be the journey that He’s led me to; a journey of FAITH and TRUST. Is the walk easy? By no means! His time is not our time and we need to have the utmost faith in that, if you don’t then your journey may get a little more painful than mine, imagine that.

Prov. 31:26 "She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness."

Quotation Saturday ~ Quotes of Billy Graham

Pss. 50:5 “Gather my saints together unto me; those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.”

The picture above was taken on a day filled with gray skies and snow. The sun was setting and popped out long enough for me to capture this image on February 21.

On February 21, 2018  the world lost a great man on a mission to do God’s work, Billy Graham. He preached the Word of God for over 60 years! He ministered to presidents and children, the rich and the poor, the sick and the healthy.
He was born on November 7, 1918 and passed away one year shy of 100 years old. 
When I was a child, my dad, a Catholic, used to watch Billy Graham Ministries on Sundays. He admired him from afar and that made me respect my dad even more. When I became a born-again Christian, converting from Catholicism, I felt safe walking toward the Light of Christ because I knew I always had one man whose word I could turn to and trust the Word of God from, Mr. Graham. Rest in the arms of the Lord, kind sir.

On Suffering:

“Comfort and prosperity have never enriched the world as much as adversity has.”

"Mountaintops are for views and inspiration, but fruit is grown in the valleys."

“When we come to the end of ourselves, we come to the beginning of God."

“Someone asked me recently if I didn’t think God was unfair, allowing me to have Parkinson’s and other medical problems when I have tried to serve him faithfully. I replied that I did not see it that way at all. Suffering is part of the human condition, and it comes to us all. The key is how we react to it, either turning away from God in anger and bitterness or growing closer to him in trust and confidence.”

“Believers, look up – take courage. The angels are nearer than you think.”

“Quit beating yourself up. We all live under grace and do the best we can.”

On his Home - Heaven

“My home is in Heaven. I'm just traveling through this world.”

 “Heaven is full of answers for which nobody ever bothered to ask.”

“God will prepare everything for our perfect happiness in heaven, and if it takes my dog being there, I believe he'll be there.”

“The moment we take our last breath on earth, we take our first in heaven.”

“He lives in the hearts of those who trust in Him. Our confidence in life after death comes from these very truths.” 

On Jesus:

“God proved his love on the Cross. When Christ hung, and bled, and died, it was God saying to the world, ‘I love you.’”

“Christ not only died for all: he died for each.”

“We say to our children, 'Act like grown-ups,' but Jesus said to the grown-ups, 'Be like children.'

"The only hope for enduring peace is Jesus Christ."

“Without the resurrection, the cross is meaningless.”

“The cross shows us the seriousness of our sin—but it also shows us the immeasurable love of God.”

“It is the Holy Spirit's job to convict, God's job to judge and my job to love.” 

“Courage is contagious. When a brave man takes a stand, the spines of others are often stiffened."

On God's Purpose for Us:

“The will of God will not take us where the grace of God cannot sustain us.”

“God never takes away something from your life without replacing it with something better.”

“Take one day at a time. Today, after all, is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.”

"God has given us two hands, one to receive with and the other to give with.We are not cisterns made for hoarding; we are channels made for sharing.”

“The happiness which brings enduring worth to life is not the superficial happiness that is dependent on circumstances. It is the happiness and contentment that fills the soul even in the midst of the most distressing circumstances and the most bitter environment. It is the kind of happiness that grins when things go wrong and smiles through the tears. The happiness for which our souls' ache is one undisturbed by success or failure, one which will deeply root inside us and give us inward relaxation, peace, and contentment, no matter what the surface problems may be. That kind of happiness stands in need of no outward stimulus.” 

On Living with Eyes Fixed on Eternity:

“I've read the last page of the Bible, it's all going to turn out all right.”

“There is nothing wrong with men possessing riches. The wrong comes when riches possess men.”

“If a person gets his attitude toward money straight, it will help straighten out almost every other area in his life.”

“The only time my prayers are never answered is on the golf course.”

“When wealth is lost, nothing is lost; when health is lost, something is lost; when character is lost, all is lost.”

“Knowing we will be with Christ forever far outweighs our burdens today! Keep your eyes on eternity!”

“World events are moving very rapidly now. I pick up the Bible in one hand, and I pick up the newspaper in the other. And I read almost the same words in the newspaper as I read in the Bible. It’s being fulfilled every day round about us.”

On Loving God and Others:

“It is the Holy Spirit's job to convict, God's job to judge and my job to love.”

“A real Christian is the one who can give his pet parrot to the town gossip.”

“Sin is the second most powerful force in the universe, for it sent Jesus to the cross. Only one force is greater—the love of God.”

“The framers of our Constitution meant we were to have freedom of religion, not freedom from religion.”

“They asked her (Ruth Graham) did she ever think about divorce and she said, ‘No, I’ve never thought of divorce in all these 35 years of marriage, but,’ she said, ‘I did think of murder a few times.’”

“Our society strives to avoid any possibility of offending anyone – except God.”

On Preaching

“We are the Bibles the world is reading; we are the creeds the world is needing; we are the sermons the world is heeding.”

“I have never known anyone to accept Christ’s redemption and later regret it.”

“Tears shed for self are tears of weakness, but tears shed for others are a sign of strength.”

“Being a Christian is more than just an instantaneous conversion – it is a daily process whereby you grow to be more and more like Christ.”

"The message I preach hasn't changed. Circumstances have changed. Problems have changed, but deep inside man has not changed, and the gospel hasn't changed."

The story does not end with the cross, for Easter points us beyond the tragedy of the cross to the empty tomb. It tells us that there is hope for eternal life, for Christ has conquered evil and death and hell. Yes, there is hope.”

“Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and to seek your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, 'Woe to those who call evil good,' but that is exactly what we have done. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values. We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery. We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare. We have killed our unborn and called it choice. We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable. We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self-esteem. We have abused power and called it politics. We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition. We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression. We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment. Search us, Oh God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and set us free. Amen!” 

Rev. Billy Graham

2 Cor. 13:13 "All the saints salute you."

God Is Not Silent

Pss. 28:1 “Unto thee will I cry, O LORD my rock; be not silent to me: lest, if thou be silent to me, I become like them that go down into the pit.”

God Is Not Silent

It is so easy to see God as the silent type when suffering is at your doorstep and you’re begging for help that never seems to arrive. You ask for prayers to be answered, you’re pleading for compassion for your cause, you implore Him to come and relieve your stress but all seems lost and broken. Prayers are hanging in the balance as you impatiently wait for a response.

It is during this time when you begin to doubt and fear whether God even exists and hears you. It is during these times of slow-moving molasses you let fear trickle into your thoughts. Sometimes you see me as a strong woman barreling through doubts and fears but let me tell you, I have days when I too say, My God my God why hast though forsaken me?

Zech. 2:13 “Be silent, O all flesh, before the LORD: for he is raised up out of his holy habitation.”

Let me just say up front, I never doubt that God exists or fear that He’s not hearing me. I know He exists and hears me but for brief moments like when you’re waiting for honey to drip, by the time the drop makes it to the intended place, there’s a smidgen of Him just seemingly letting you fall on your face.

I know it seems like He’s silent but I also know from experience this is when He is doing His finest work. It’s me who feels I’m not patient enough, or I feel insignificant but rest assured, with every breathtaking sunrise He lets me know He’s there, listening and working for the greater good.

Job 4:16 “It stood still, but I could not discern the form thereof: an image was before mine eyes, there was silence, and I heard a voice, saying,”

When I was first diagnosed with the disease of a lifetime, I prayed like never before. I begged and pleaded for a miracle that never came and I know full well because I was praying for a whoosh of a magical wand and the reappearance of a normal looking breast and all of this would be whisked away and put into the bad memory box.

God is NOT Merlin the magician! Did He just whoosh Jesus’ suffering away? And here He was God in the flesh suffering bleeding, begging, pleading. Jesus died. While this very well could be my fate, I don’t believe for one minute God is silently planning my demise. He could have had me go the slice, dice, chemo method but that song was not my dance. That was the dance for millions of other people.

He also could’ve just taken me right away, why give me a warning and a chance to change? God works in mysterious ways and while we’re straggling along in a world of distractions, He’s not being silent. He is busy at work preparing the entry of billions of souls to His banquet, in His time, not our time. A legion of Angel’s awaits our arrival and the song of the choir will ring out for us to dance among the stars.

God was not silent when Valentine was imprisoned then beheaded. He allowed such a horrendous physical act to take place because it would one day be a day cherished for all of the love that Valentine brought to the world. Valentine would be remembered for hundreds of years for his earthly love! God is LOVE!

My hope is that God is not preparing me for such a horrible death but for a wonderful life of endurance, patience and beauty that will be carried into the future of those who remember my time here. My prayer is no longer for myself, it’s for the people who need to see, this day and age, that God is never silent. Oh no, He is very much alive and busy at work!

He could’ve given me an instant miracle but what would I or anyone learn from that? He needs the world to see that there are steps to take, patience that is needed, endurance and unfathomable strength to make it to His bountiful banquet. 

He has me writing, teaching and learning at the same time as you. Although He could at any given moment pretend to be a magician for those who need instant gratification, once again, God is not of the fantasy world and He most definitely is not a magician.

Do I paint a grim picture of a punishing God? A God who wants to see you suffer? You’re wrong. Like your very own mother and father, do you see them as the punishing, child-reprimanding beasts that you saw as a child? I know children of an abusive background might see their parents as demons incarnate but the majority of people reading this right now all have been chastised as a child. We were not created as instant all-knowing adults, no, we had to grow and learn from our mother, father, and our surroundings to be who we are today.

If you look at the grand picture, we were once seeds! Watered and nurtured, pruned and snipped, given the right non-toxic fertilizer to bloom and grow. There were times in our life where we didn’t receive enough sun, we were stunted by toxins, and left to learn before growing again. I can’t paint a more poignant picture than that. 

God was not silent then and He most certainly is not silent now! As I endure another day filled with supplements, a disfigured image in the mirror, and a strict diet that will save my life, you might ask, is all of this worth it? And I will say to you now as I did in the beginning, every day I get to see another sunrise is worth every step I take in the ballroom dance of life as I head to the eternal banquet of souls waiting to greet me. YES! Every struggling pain-filled step is worth the enormous abundance of LOVE that I have the pleasure to partake of!

All Glory to God in the Highest! 

I Had A Bad Day...

Job 7:14 “Then thou scarest me with dreams, and terrifiest me through visions:”

I had a bad day

When a nightmare wakes me throughout the night, this title should really be, I had a bad night. The other day I woke early in the morning not my usual chipper self. I woke in tears and tears defined the greater part of my day. I guess I'm allowed a bad day/night on occasion. Glad they're not frequent.

We usually wake and go shopping, but this day I woke grumpy with two inches of snow on the ground and heavy stuff still falling from the sky. This winter has been a temperature roller coaster ride as well as the ups and downs of emotions. Normally I have my emotions in check but here lately everything is triggering a reaction in me.

My nightmare began with a doctor visit located in a hospital room not much different than the room I was in last year when I received my diagnosis before being forced into test after detrimental test. 

In my nightmare the nurse squeaked into the room, tearing off linens on the bed across from me. She was running off in the mouth. I asked her what she was doing and she quickly spits out, “We’re prepping you for surgery. That breast is nasty looking and the doctor needs to remove it, or you’re gonna die, gonna die, gonna die.” The sound was echoing over and over.

“Wait, I’m not going to have surgery. I have a choice!” My voice didn’t echo like hers, it sounded more like a soft whisper.  

“But if you’re gonna die, gonna die, gonna die,” my husbands says with the echo now in his voice. His face was really close to mine as the echo made his face look like the wicked House of Mirrors.

“I am NOT having surgery,” I screamed that one pretty loud but still no one could hear me. It was like my lips were moving but everything went on, movements in the room heads nodding in disagreement as if I wasn’t there. I was seriously expecting Pennywise from the King book ‘It’ to just pop out and start cackling but instead…

“But you’re gonna die, gonna die, gonna die! It looks nasty, nasty, nasty,” the nurse cackled with an eerie looking grin.

You get the gist of the nightmare. Fear, laughing, taunting all in line before I forced the blankets off of me and battled the cold reality of the morning. Tears still streaming down my face, when my husband said something to me, I snapped at him. That is so unlike me! I said, “I just had a terrible nightmare, please don’t do this to me today!”

He shrugged and mimicked me until I looked at him with wet eyes and started bawling my eyes out. He realized it really had to be a bad dream for me to wake in tears.

He went on with his routine to start his day; I could see his mind wandering. He ventured outside to start his truck and brush away the snow on there from the windblown covering that blanketed his truck; only a total whiteout hindered any chance of venturing off to the store at this time. I was adamant about not going with him and carrying this negative crud through the store. My son was at work and heading home in the whiteout at this very time, so that added to my stress of the early morning.

When my son arrived home, he could see I had been crying, “What’s the matter?” 

“A nightmare! I had a bad nightmare!” I know I was snappy in my reply.

“It was just a bad dream,” he says downplaying my pain. He was just returning from an eight-hour overnight shift, drove through whiteout conditions and here I was snapping at him. 

There it was, the truth of the matter, everyone is so used to seeing me as the pillar of strength that when I’m in a serious bit of stressful turmoil they don’t recognize it; they downplay my pain and shrug it off. She’ll get over it, they figure to themselves. I couldn’t get over this, not quickly anyway.

I carried throughout the day a heavy chip on my shoulder and an old time movie projector in my mind, the nightmare kept playing over and over like a broken record, “you’re gonna die, you’re gonna die, you’re gonna die.” There was just no shaking the feeling or the nightmare. This gives night terrors new meaning.

I tried venturing onto Facebook, bad idea. I felt like everyone was laughing at me, taunting me, mocking me, and disagreeing with everything I’ve worked so hard for. They were not doing any such thing, but the nightmare had my paranoia levels up and shaking this was not going to just go away with a few passing smiles for the day.

Super Bowl Sunday was then spent napping and anticipating my long-awaited arrival on Monday, our new mattress! My back has been a problem for years now and I knew it was the fifteen-year-old mattress but I also knew we couldn’t afford a new one, but with the expectancy of an income tax check, I made the suggestion to my husband of a new mattress. We thought of the costs of a chiropractor for me and the mattress was much cheaper by far. With enough supplements for two more months, I was anxiously looking forward to a comfortable nights rest on a new mattress!

I didn’t put myself through the anxiety of a football game and my husband was kind enough to sit through a Disney movie with me instead of the year’s ending of the football show. Neither one of us watched football this year as it has become its own little world. No longer an enjoyable sport-like football game, it’s now added fluff and frufru make it a waste of MY precious time. He did catch the second half (he’s a man, whatcha expect) *wink-wink* and he enjoyed watching someone else win the Super Bowl this year. 

With the Philadelphia Eagles winning the Super Bowl it just reaffirms my hope that the underdog DOES WIN on occasion! It signifies that the underdog has a chance against the powers that be, the winners of society, the boasters, and braggarts, we little folk DO win! 

James 1:12 (NIV) “Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.”

Monday, the mattress came…

Pss.3:5 “I laid me down and slept; I awaked; for the LORD sustained me.”

Endurance

The wheel... has endured the test of time

2 Cor. 4:16 "For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day."

Endurance

This post was going to be titled I’m Done, had it been written and posted yesterday. Instead, I chose to close down, go inside my head and feel the angst that I was being asked to endure. 

I had an extremely stressed filled month with my son seeking a job, the death in the family from chemo no less (I’m from the school cancer doesn’t kill, chemo does), and then there was hubby and his needed eye doctor appointment and a dental visit. Then there was me tossed in the middle with my illness and need to pick a new doctor. 

All of this came flurrying around my face like confetti from the sky. I blew it away as a wayward strand of hair falling in my face, but the stress had mounted and I could feel the shift, the pain, the hurt. I was trying so hard but it all came crashing around me and I was about ready to give up. I’m done, I said, I’m just done!

My thoughts and feelings were getting hard to catalog. I could not compartmentalize them, I had to face each one head on, I had to endure. I woke this morning with a swift slap in the face with a God moment. My Encouragement For The Day came via my Bible Gateway message. 

This is what greeted me today, first thing in the quiet of the morning:

“Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” Romans 5:3-5 (ESV)

Wow, this is one not to be scanned over real quick; I was forced to read it after that intro. I went through word after word, the writer was a twenty-five-year breast cancer survivor and now after all of these years she’s faced with her daughter having to go through the same exact illness. She couldn’t protect her daughter from this event, they would just have to endure it, together. I’ll hit the high points of the email: Suffering produces endurance, Endurance produces character, character produces hope. 

There it is in a nutshell HOPE! I woke to hope! Yesterday I was done, I was giving up, I was just ready to shove a slice of pizza in my face, stop all supplements, have everyone laugh at me and say I told ya so, and I was making plans in my head to go home, to my Heavenly Home, that is. And I woke to this message of hope. What am I supposed to do with that? Endure and have continued hope is what!

2 Cor. 4:17-18 (KJV) “For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.”

Stress level on a scale of one to ten – nine! let’s go over it:

Me- In need of finding a doctor for this serious illness invading my body. (more on that in later posts)

My son – He found a really good job making good money and a week after he started, he asked for a week vacation at the end of July; a vacation to go to Kentucky to meet online friends. That’s what I taught him, run off and meet your online friends. He’s twenty-one and I cannot stop this train from going down the track, I have my own stress and seriously don’t need this, but it is what it is. He has a hard-as-a-rock head on his shoulders and I can’t say anything. (wow, he’s just like his mother!)

My hubby - An eye doctor’s appointment went well, but the eye doctor of eight years told us this would be the last time we’d see him. Shock, hurt, memories, everything came through the floodgates!

A funeral – Need I say more? His aunt succumbed to chemo.

The dentist – No insurance and a filling it wasn’t meant to be. I won’t say any more than that. This was the tip of the iceberg of a stressful month. Especially when the (doctor’s wife, hygienist) looked at me and asked if I was my husbands' mother. Insult after insult (my brother-in-law writes too, as a hobby, she says.) “Good thing you weren’t working so you could drive your husband to all of the doctor’s appointments.”  Slice after slice, cut, chop, throw me to the wolves. The wolf being a gray-haired, forty-five-year-old overworked mother. I was her target for the day and wonder how she even has the job she has.

I left in tears, wanting to just go home to the Lord. I’m done, I can’t handle this. I can’t handle all of the doubts coming through via my screen from people who say they support me but are really living Doubting Thomas’! The message of what to eat vs. what not to eat, what to take and what not to take, email after email asking to buy this cure in a bottle. No money has me deleting the majority of the supplement spiel.

I woke to find the email telling me to endure. To be filled with hope during a most trying time. To have faith where others wane. To stand tall and muddle through this thickened mire. It is my job to give hope and here I was being filled. I need a break from stress and worry. I need to stand in a downpour and release all that ails me. I need to embrace the journey and walk with hope in my hand.

The Holy Spirit flowing through us is God and His earthly blood/waters running through our veins. There is no doubting in the floodwaters. There may be pain, there sure will be stress, you’ll face trials of ignorance from the outside world but you’ll find the strength in God to endure, whatever it is you have to endure to get through another day.

Isa. 26:4 (KJV) “Trust ye in the LORD for ever: for in the LORD JEHOVAH is everlasting strength:”

I give all praise and Glory to God! 

Alleluia AMEN!

Seeing The Light

Eph. 5:26 "That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,"

Seeing the Light

After many days of rain and no sunshine, I finally saw the light the other day and I ran and got my camera. I took a couple of pictures just to prove I knew the orb was still out there in the universe spinning! Without it, I lack Vit. D in a big way and leaves me with stress in trying to bring vibrancy and the vitamin into my world via supplementation. For what seems like months, the sun has been a rare event as well as warmth which can sadden anyone in what is supposed to be Spring! 

Out here in Nebraska, we had such a warm and mild winter, the farmers thought they’d start early with tilling the fields and planting. That turned out to be a bad idea since we’ve had freezing temps and many of the fields need to be redone. Also, we’ve had so much rain the fields flooded out making the farmers well aware that no matter what they do, He is still in charge! 

Recently I read the sad news that I shouldn’t be eating the nightshade vegetables. The ones that are more than likely causing me inflammation are peppers (red and green), cayenne pepper, and tomatoes! I’m going to try and cut back on these. I know I overindulge in these but only because I read they were on the non-acidic list or the alkaline list. I didn’t look into what was causing the flare up of my arthritis and while my Boswellia has a remarkable effect I still have some back pain and I now KNOW it is from my overindulgence in red bell peppers and tomato everything!

Goodness, what things we need to learn to regain our health! This is the nightshade list and while I don’t have a problem with many, the peppers (cayenne, hot, and bell) and tomatoes jumped out at me as my over indulgence lay glaring in my face like the once hidden sunshine.  

Ashwagandha
Bell peppers (a.k.a. sweet peppers)
Bush tomato
Cape gooseberry (also known as ground cherries—not to be confused with regular cherries)
Cocona
Eggplant
Garden huckleberry (not to be confused with regular huckleberries)
Goji berries (a.k.a. wolfberry)
Hot peppers (such as chili peppers, jalapenos, habaneros, chili-based spices, red pepper, cayenne)
Kutjera
Naranjillas
Paprika
Pepinos
Pimentos
Potatoes (but not sweet potatoes)
Tamarillos
Tomatillos
Tomatoes

Like I said in my 5 25 17 post, four things cancer finds comfort in and snuggles up to is a virus, inflammation, bacteria, and fungus; all four of which I’ve battled throughout my life with and I realize NOW as the root cause of this disease eating away at me. No, I wasn’t sent to battle ONE illness, I have three or four, yay me! I AM a warrior! 

With Memorial Day approaching as the call to honor war veterans who have died in battle, I think of the ones who lived with the battle circling around them as they fought, trying to survive the killing war. I guess that would be what Veterans Day is for. I also think of all of the people who lighten the somber weekend with a cookout and have the day off of work rejoicing in a three-day weekend, giving nary a thought of the men who died in battle.

While I respect the Armed Forces and all of the government holidays celebrating them, my Memorial Day will be filled with thoughts of all of the family members I lost to the Battle of Cancer. There is no national holiday memorializing their loss and cancer has wiped out millions! 

I am not minimizing the Veterans of war; I have many members of my family who have served. I salute them for their service. But I have every right to memorialize my family members who lost the battle of their disease because there will be no government holiday remembering those victims. 

This week has been a somber week as I try and maintain my optimism. While I see the Light at the end of this tunnel and continue to wake thanking the Lord for being allowed to be a voice to the people, I have my days where optimism wanes. Four months in and it is quite difficult to daily wake up and be the pep who can’t eat peppers, the zip with a zing, the life amid so much death.

Hubby’s family will have another get-together next week and it will be yet another one I miss. I will be ready to celebrate with them by Christmas I hope, but I am still not ready yet for questions, unhealthy food, and celebration. I’m still in the early stages of acceptance of this disease, which is more earth-shattering than my psoriasis or arthritis, that’s for sure. They only know I’m battling the ‘C’ and arthritis and while they love me, they still have questions as to my choice in this path. I can hear everyone’s thoughts, “What, no drugs? Is she insane?” I can assure you I’m not, I’m saved!

Prov. 17:22 (NIV) “A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.” 

As I move forward and accept the fact that some ‘friends’ have given me the cold shoulder, I move forward into the Light and pray for their wounded souls. I don’t pray for myself as often as I should because there seem to be so many more people out there in the world worse off than me and they need my prayer.

As I seek and find the source of my optimism I stay in touch via my writing as often as I’m led to the words that fill me, I offer them to you. Remember, we are all members of one body. As you unknowingly hurt one, you hurt the other members and as you knowingly seek out to hurt one, you hurt the many. 

From my morning devotional from Bible Gateway: “Solomon assures us a cheerful heart is good medicine for the soul, the mind, and the body. Positive thoughts lead to a positive outlook which leads to a positive heart and a positive life. Negative thoughts lead to a broken spirit which impacts our minds, emotions and our lives.” Life in the flesh is another toxin invading the battlegrounds.

May God bless you all this weekend with loving memories of Veterans who have passed as well as family members who have passed. May your heart and soul be filled with love.

Romans 12:3-5 (NIV) "For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ, we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others."

Fort McHenry

Locust Point, Baltimore, Maryland

My hometown

Love!

1 John 4:8 “He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.”

I LOVE YOU!

Three simple words can change someone’s day, make their life feel worthwhile, send out positive signals of endorphins to move you and motivate you to go and have a positive productive day. 

I found this interpretation of love extraordinarily spot on! A good read on understanding the different levels of love. 

While love seems hard to define, my simplest explanation is this; God is love! If you can feel an intense compassion for everyone and everything in this world without being wrapped up in hate and finger pointing, you have found God and know all that He is! He IS love!

2 Tim 1:7  “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”

When someone asks me how I’m doing, I’m thinking to myself, ‘well, I’m getting through every day and every single moment in love.’ Love is my emotional blanket and the one thing I will carry with me to my death. God is my love. This might sound weird but Jesus is the first man I fell in love with and to this day I still love all that He is to me. 

God is not anger, God is not frustration, so when you feel these things toward people you are not feeling God or displaying all that He is. The past couple of days feeling those emotions sent me into a repentance phase. Anger and frustration are not me and if any of my friends know one thing about me is I’m all about love. They see God in me through the love I emit.

Angry and bitter people say, ‘I have a right to be angry’ and maybe they do but it is not of God. I understand being angry some of the time but to consistently every day spew hate, anger, and frustration is a negative aspect that really hurts innocent people. Is that the intention of the grumpy angry person? It is certainly not who I am! When I feel that way I feel utterly remorseful and feel a need to repent and search my soul.

Just like this disease I’m carrying around, I didn’t see what my bad eating habits were doing to my body until it was too late and inside smothering me. This is the same effect that anger and hatred have on the people around you, you won’t know the damage you’ve caused until it is too late.

This isn’t just about food and what I can and cannot eat. I may come off as being consumed with telling you all of my eating woes. It has some to do with the Season of Family gatherings. When you say very clearly I can’t go to a restaurant or a reception where meat, booze, and more unhealthy stuff abounds because I don’t eat meat, I only eat organic veggies and fruit. They say oh, I understand, but then turn around and ask if they’ll see me at the Memorial Day cookout they have (every year). Well, the answer is NO, but then I’m explaining myself all over again! And no, booze is never ever served at their family gatherings.

I don’t want people to change for me, I want them to change for themselves. But please don’t expect me to be the same person I was a year ago because guess what, my life HAS CHANGED DRASTICALLY! I am not the same and I am all the better for it, too!

People don’t understand when a person is consumed with love and trying everything in their power and the Higher Power to bask in a healing waterfall. They only understand love when the need arises or when it fits their life. Can you imagine if God only loved you some of the time because He has a right not to love you ALL of the time? How unrealistic is it to feel that way? Well God does love you ALL of the time so what is so hard for people to love all of the time? I know... they're human. 

The enemy is out there lurking, trying to turn the love in the world into hate. I strive every single day to bring forth love and when I can’t, I close myself off from the world until I can come forth in the Light of Love once again to share a positive reflection of God in me. 

This week I lost an uncle, in April his ex-wife (my aunt) passed, and in December his son (my cousin) passed. Their deaths, three in the same family, have left me wondering, why has God taken them and left me alive? In the thirteen years that I’ve been away from my hometown I have lost seven family members that I can remember, it seems they just keep going. I know we all must go but seriously, why keep me alive? Is this the reason He brought me out here?

Mortality is not what I’m consumed with, I’m drinking in LIFE and LOVE and if you’re of the life and love portion of my life, I LOVE YOU; three words that can mean the world to someone. If you’re reading this, I THANK YOU for being on this journey, accepting me unconditionally and truly understanding what I’m going through! 

Thank you for reading. I’m healing and loving the world and embracing LIFE! Praise be to God! 

1 John 3: 22 “And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.”

Abandoning The Seed Within

Jer. 2:21 “Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me?”

Have you ever felt like just giving up on God, tossing your faith and all that you’ve built with your faith right out the door? You know, because of all the pain he allows you to go through doesn’t seem worth the trials that you have to endure on a daily basis? Yeah, me neither.

I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior when I was a young teen and life has never been the same, it’s been a roller coaster ride, going up and down ever since. There have been times when I thought (briefly) that this fight just wasn’t worth the suffering. The time, the dedication, the daily nurturing; accepting the Lord felt more like having a full-time job, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, just like having a child.

What? Accepting the Lord felt like having a child? Yes! What, do you think, you just get to utter words like ‘I accept you Lord’ and everything goes smoothly from there on out? I’m sorry friends, but if you think that then no wonder your life is all fun and games, no worries, no commitment, just playtime all the time. Be honest, that isn’t your life at all is it?

If you want Jesus in your life there is a commitment just like having a child, which you don’t get to toss away whenever you feel like. Just like when you find out your pregnant (or your wife), you make a commitment to taking on the responsibility of that child, raising him or her in an upright manner, feeding his soul and nurturing his spirit or just toss the life away via an abortion. With free will, the CHOICE is yours. If you’ve never married or know what having a child is like, the seed of God is in you also. He doesn’t abandon anyone for anything just because He feels like it and doesn’t have the time for you.

Many parents take on the responsibility of keeping the child, whether planned or unplanned but many are not seriously ready for the time and commitment that it takes to raise a child. That’s why so many births are met with abandonment after the baby is born, left in dumpsters, thrown off bridges, just disposed of because they were too hard to take care of and didn’t realize that this one time of lustful pleasure was going to turn out to be a lifetime commitment. Note: Pleasures cost.

John 15:5 “I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.”

The God cell is inside you at birth, a seed that you dispose of or tend and allow to grow through nurturing. Some people feel the seed and know it is there, others don’t know what the origin festering inside is and don’t want to know so they try and abort the kernel by putting chemicals in their body that will destroy the tiny bud or they ignore the seed completely allowing the weeds to smother the grain as it grows. We all know what happens when a weed grows, right? It takes a long time people to annihilate the seed that God planted in you at birth. You can try to rid yourself of the essence burning inside but the root is never dead.

When you accept God, it is like having a child, an embryo within you. You recognize the spirit that God planted as a blooming cluster of flowers not the false covering of weeds. You nurture the seedling with the Word of God until the foundation, with time, endurance, patience and love has become rooted, and slowly painstakingly allowed to climb the vine to flourish into a blossoming stem that grows along the Vine of the Lord. We were all meant to be flowers in the garden of life. Some allowed the weeds (satan) to strangle our beautiful bud but know this, the flower is still inside of you waiting to grow and become the beauty you see in a botanical garden. You can never abandon the seed within.

Luke 22:18 “For I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come.”

Feeling Hopeful Through the Pain

1 John 4:18 (NIV) “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”

*Hopeful*

Well, it’s been a pretty exhausting week for me. No, I haven’t been working myself too hard and I learned something really early in this disability and that is to 'know my limits'!!!

I go out early in the cool morning hours and water my garden and fill my birdbath. I pull any weeds I can without hurting my back and then I come inside to do the inside chores of washing clothes, ironing hubby’s work shirts, planning the meal for dinner (preferably not one that consists of the use of the oven) more times than not, in the summer months I use my slow cooker or make a nice refreshing pasta salad, or a tossed salad and some turkey wraps. 

After my chores, I start my writing, usually an inspirational blog post or something of that nature. Today is a hopeful day. I was so encouraged by my friends I woke yesterday feeling hopeful in my future of writing, blogging and just being alive. I got out early to water my plants, was enjoying the breeze so much I decided to wash my car, then when I finished I went inside to wash two loads of laundry. Hubby had gone food shopping at seven a.m to beat the heat, then he came home and sprayed for weeds, and as I washed the car, he whacked the weeds with a weed-whacker! He was on a weed killing mission, I can tell you that much. 

I came inside as it started to heat up outside washed some clothes and then began the afternoon by writing in the nicely air-conditioned house. I would every once in a while peek my head outside just to see how hot it was and by 5:30 it was 99 degrees with a heat index of 108!!! Wow, after living in Texas for six years you think I’d be used to the heat but this is an airless hot where you try to breathe and are reminded of what hell potentially feels like. 

I made a mistake in the midst of my euphoria and that was to try and get a fly off the back of my right leg using my pained left leg, not a good idea! I lifted my left leg backwards and used my foot to swat the blood-sucking varmint. It rendered me practically immobile when my left leg dropped by the inability to place any weight on my left foot and I was forced to stagger painstakingly inside to the heating pad. Yeah, how exciting is that to have to sit on a heating pad when you’re trying to get cool? And amid such a good day!

I often wonder why. Why me? Those thoughts often discourage me and my friend told me recently that it’s to bring you closer to God. You see, the people out there that just soar through life with nary a problem turn to God when they NEED Him and some people find that they don’t need him at all, they have their egos and they’re good with their not-a-care-in-the-world- life, but us who are always seeking God and want to be so close to Him that we fall asleep at night in His arms are usually the ones with the heaviest load to carry.

My daily pain brings me that much closer to God himself. No deed, no selfless act, no not-committing-all-ten of the commandments is going to bring me closer to God than my pain. 

When you’re suffering, the first thing you do, and yes even atheist have been known to do, is cry out dear God help me please, or dear sweet Jesus. Only because in some sense we know, that is the only comfort we’re going to get.

Now a lot of people have turned away from Christ because either they really don’t care if He exists, need PROOF that He exists, or don’t like the non-answer they get from Him. Allow me to tell you this, He has always answered me! Maybe not in the way I expected him to but yes, He has always answered me. Sometimes he tells me to be patient and wait, sometimes he says how about this instead? Yes, He always gives ME an answer.

So as I sit here literally crying in pain that my leg renders me, and asking God why? He gently nods – because you need me. Ahh… that was sweet. 

Jer. 15:18 “Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuseth to be healed? wilt thou be altogether unto me as a liar, and as waters that fail?” < I question

He answers >Jer. 15:20 “And I will make thee unto this people a fenced brasen wall: and they shall fight against thee, but they shall not prevail against thee: for I am with thee to save thee and to deliver thee, saith the LORD.”

PRAISE BE TO GOD!

Lent: Day Seventeen ~ Never Fear the End

Prov. 14:27 The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, to depart from the snares of death.

Never Fear the End

This post was going to be about the end times but you know, when God places something on my heart to write, I have to write it not caring about what it is ‘I’ wanted to write. He is such an amazing and powerful God.

My own hand when writing these Lent post does not guide me and sometimes I’m even amazed at what I wrote. I hope you’re feeling the tingling chills that I’m feeling as I write and you read this post.

Yesterday was March 20 and all over I read it was the first day of spring (due to the vernal equinox) and while I await spring, my mind drifted back to forty years ago when cancer took my grandmother’s life. I was about to turn eight years old in three days, and that would be the day my grandmother was ‘laid to rest’ as they say. Placed gently in her grave on my 8^th birthday.

For three days I watched as we the family cried from heartache and stood around a once vibrant woman who succumbed to cancer and now we looked on at her lifeless body. Can you imagine a small child trying to drink in the reality of death? Her beautiful pale blue gown can still be seen in my mind today as I write, like it was just yesterday that it had happened.

Then death struck again just two months after my grandmother’s death, her husband died, in his sleep, mourning her loss, watching a Lawrence Welk show I imagine; the tomato juice still fresh on his lips when his daughter found him. There were two deaths, two months apart, she on the 20th and he on the 22nd. Death, the finality of it all scared me for a while in those years but when I became a born again Christian, God placed something on my heart, Never Fear the End. Not a lot to go on, but I carry it with me to this day.

I imagine on the crux of death The Comforter is there watching over you, when you fear, He relieves that fear and the still small part of you clinging to life knows there is something beautiful awaiting you with no more pain, where only Light and beauty abounds.

On Monday we received a message that Steven’s cousin, Mary, was in the hospital with fluid on her lungs. She had been battling an extremely painful cancer privately for four and a half years now and was now in the hospital requesting prayer. For the years of battle, she never let on to anyone that she was suffering in so much pain. She spared her family and friends pain, and suffered alone. I know words can’t convey fear, but for her to be asking for prayer, I knew she was at the point where she knew she was dying and was now lying in fear.

I immediately went to prayer for her. You see, this family is such a close knit Christian family, it is not hard for you to meet someone once or twice and feel a bond with them. Mary and I bonded. Maybe the rest of the family never knew, but we did. Mary had a way of connecting with anyone and everyone.

We had returned to Nebraska, coming from Texas, to attend Steven’s grandmother’s funeral. Mary and I had only met a few times but as soon as our eyes met, we knew each other and went immediately for an embrace. She was happy to see me as I her. A beautiful young lady with brunette bouncy pixie cut hair circling her angelic face.

I mean really, she had flawless skin; perfect sparkling eyes and her smile could light the world. I think I was drawn to her because of the Light she emitted. I was off crying and she seen me, came over to me, put her arm around me and asked me if I needed to talk.

I told her how I had just met her brother Christopher for the first time. He was born in 1982, the same year I lost my son Christopher. I was crying because it was like seeing my son in him, alive and aging.

She said, “I guess that is our connection, and the fact you share my mother’s birthday.” We giggled like schoolgirls through tears. I told her how I was born on my mother’s birthday and she said, “That’s funny, I was born three days before my mom’s birthday, on the 20^th!” More giggles, more tears. Giggling schoolgirls who were years apart in age but bonding as if we were the very same age.

I looked at her wide-eyed and said, “That’s the day my grandmother passed away.” More bonding through tears and when we parted her last words to me were, “You better be here when I come back home to visit.” I assured her I would.

As she clings to life in Chicago, I’m here waiting for her to come home. She did. The words ring in my ear and reach out as I whisper to her as she lay dying…Never Fear the End.

*update: I wrote this yesterday. This morning Mary is home, with her Heavenly Father.

She is no longer suffering in pain and I am comforted in knowing she is at peace. The day He sent her into this world is the day she parted this world. Thirty years old.

Rest In Peace, Mary.

Pss. 23:1-6 The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.

He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.

Lent: Day Fourteen ~ Suffering

2 Cor. 1: 6 And whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer: or whether we be comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation.

Lent: Day Fourteen ~ Suffering

Some say I turn a blind eye to suffering and strife in the world. Well let me tell you, I lived with a blind man for two and a half years so I know literally what it is like. I make no apologies for the way I am. God made me this way as He made you the way you are. Some SEE and some turn a blind eye to Him.

People are so full of hate for their fellow man that I’d say they are the ones consumed with turning the blind eye because they don’t see through the beautiful picture window, all they see is a small portal of the bigger picture. Whatever that portal feeds them, they believe it to be so.

Since I was born and long before I was born there has been suffering in the world. Turning a blind eye is assuming I don’t care but unlike you, instead of allowing hatred to fester in my soul I see the suffering as salvageable. No, I’m not on a mission to save the world, no I can’t spew hate because I disagree with someone, and I definitely don’t have the power within me to change the world and the way it spins.

Suffering is part of the Christ journey. If we don’t suffer than how are we to know the joy behind prayer? A lot of people won’t accept Christ or a God that causes suffering. I’m not naïve in actually thinking that God CAUSES suffering, MAN causes suffering and God cleans up the mess.

I also hear many times, if God is so great, how can He let people die, like children who were enjoying a wonderful day at school and a shooter comes in and takes away their very breath in life?

The problem I have with that thinking is they missed something along the way. God gave us free will so to blame HIM for the shooters choice (sin) is to blame God for HIS choice in creating. Doesn’t make sense does it? Why didn’t He save the children? Why didn’t He reach right in and stop the bullets? If he can ‘part the sea’ surely He can do that. Well, yes He could. He can stop all the suffering in the world but the real question is, why doesn’t He?

Tom W wrote: “Because of SIN in the world, God sent His Son, who in turn, gave His life that we might have a path to forgiveness. This, to as many as would believe. It did not eliminate Sin, but instead provided us a way out of the life of sin and the body of death. God does not form the actions nor decisions of Man, for if that were the case, it would be saying God caused man to sin. It was because of sin that man was separated from God, and given parameters to return to Him, and even offered His own Son as the necessary sacrifice. Even then, it is up to man to accept; actions derogatory to that end are against the Will of God, and will be dealt with as described in The Revelation. As a result, I take exception to senseless killing being called "God's master plan." It IS POSSIBLE, however, to disagree with people, humans, and not hate- This is what all God's people are called to. Destruction of the creation at the hands of the creation is simply sin in action.”

Let me try and make some sense out of this. I think I use the term God’s Master plan too loosely and to some it is misunderstood as me turning a blind eye to the suffering because I say it is all just a part of God’s Master plan. Clarity: God did not create us to sin. We were perfect in His eyes but when woman and man sinned, He didn’t just kill what He created right then and there, He gave us a chance to work our way back to Him, and I believe, to ME, that suffering is just one of the ways our spirit comes closer to God.

He sent His Son into this destructive world to suffer and die for us, our sin. Now I know a lot of folk who think this is a cruel God, they are not shy in expressing WHY they don’t believe and most of the time it has to do with SUFFERING that they think God causes.

Have you ever lost someone close to you? Have you ever suffered and just wish all suffering would go away? Why doesn’t God END all suffering? Why do we continue to suffer? I have lost two children and I KNOW suffering firsthand. I CHOSE to turn to God in my suffering instead of AWAY from God.

A majority of the time, when we’re in the midst of suffering, we pray, to whatever God or spirit you believe in, you pray. When there is the heinous crime of shooting and killing of innocent people, or when planes fly into buildings causing thousands to die, what is it we do in the pangs of our suffering, we pray. We call to God and pray.

God’s master plan is not the action of the sin, and I don’t claim to KNOW His plan, but I feel that through our suffering, we both call on God and come closer to Him or we shun and blame Him! As a note, my suffering has pulled me closer and closer to God. To me, I think people are blaming Him for creating the sinner more than the sin that man commits.

When I say God’s master plan, I only mean that He knows every hair on our head and calls us by our name; I’m not Joni the sinner, I’m just Joni but He already knows my sin as well as the mass destruction man is causing on the earth. No they are not, I REPEAT, the sins of man are NOT His master plan. Free will wasn’t even His plan for us but it IS our saving grace through the SUFFERING of His Son.

I do not turn a blind eye to suffering; as a matter of fact I’m focused on the suffering of many and am in prayer many hours for the suffering that goes on. Whether it is people, trees, animals, or the earth, I pray! I am connected to ALL of God's creation, not just what I pick and choose.

I disagree with a lot going on in the world today but instead of name calling, flinging mud in the faces of men and women and belittling God’s CREATION, I pray. My true colors are worn on my sleeve, I love and I pray while many would rather, in their disagreement of the world’s condition, they’d rather spew hateful words. THAT is showing THEIR true colors.

Which leads me to my next post…

Heb. 2:10 For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.