Good News

I got the good news yesterday afternoon. I'm OK. The "mass" in my liver turned out to be something with a long name that just means a clump of blood vessels. No treatment necessary. Thank you God!

I am so grateful for all who were praying for me during this week of tests and waiting. I am so grateful to my husband who showed me nothing but strength, support and absolute faith in God. (Okay he now admits he may have been the teensiest bit worried, but kept it under his hat.)

There is a miracle here, but it's not that the mass turned out OK. The mass was always what it was. Oh I don't doubt that God could easily have changed it from cancer to not-cancer, because I believe he can do anything. But I don't think that's what happened here. No, the miracle in all this is that I wasn't scared. I'm not saying I didn't give it a thought. In truth, it was never very far from my mind. But I wasn't really scared. I've been in training for this for quite awhile. I have been exercising my faith muscles through the teaching of the Bible. I've learned from the writing of Norman Vincent Peale and Emmett Fox, among others, how to replace fear thoughts with faith thoughts that come straight from the Bible. When I did think about the unknown thing in my liver, I focused instead on God, and on Christ and on the promises that God will never leave me, and Jesus will be with me "even unto the end of the age." So many lessons I have been learning just jumped right in and became my first defense. This is my real miracle. It wasn't that I was sure the "thing" was nothing. I considered that it might indeed be something. And it was still OK. I slept at night. I thought not only about God's presence and very tangible power within me, I also thought about my grandparents back in 1919 during the deadly flu epidemic. Both deathly ill in bed, people "dropping like flies all around", as Grandma once told me. She was pregnant with my father. Outlook not good. But they both survived and just carried on. My mother with cirrhosis of the liver, just keeping on keeping on. And my husband, through countless cancer treatments, procedures, chemotherapy, and major surgeries, just keeping on living and working and being a man. So many heroes for me to draw strength from. You get what you get, you do what you can about it, and you keep going. And one day God takes you home and that's the best part.

It's really hard to put this into words, but it's words that sustained me. The word of God, and the words of people inspired by God.

So I got good news this time. This particular challenge is over. But there will not always be good news at the end of an ordeal. My miracle was that I was ready to hear bad news and depend on God to sustain me through it. I thank God for all of this. And I pray that he will keep teaching me and help me to let others know that his help is real and immediate. If God be for us, who can be against us? Even illness. Even bad news.

I'm Waiting

I had a cat scan two days ago to help determine the nature of a mass found in my liver. My wonderful husband went with me, and we laughed and joked with each other and with the nurses and technicians. With all that he has been through with his two forms of cancer, we've been here before. Do the tests, one step at a time. We have been praying our way through this and have been surprisingly calm.

But now it's two days later and I still don't know the results. Waiting is more of a challenge than doing something; scheduling tests and getting poked and prodded and stuck with IV needles is actually easier. Waiting is hard. But these words keep coming back to me: "Those who wait upon the Lord will renew their strength. They will mount up with wings as eagles. They will run and not be weary. They will walk and not faint." And also "Be still and know that I am God." And "You have only to be still and the Lord will fight for you."

So my job today is to walk and not faint, and to be still.
With God's help I can do that.

Only Believe

As I sit and pray this morning, giving my life and my mind and my body into God's care, I have a thought: Whatever is in my liver, I will not give it power over me.

Power. Whatever I fear, and conversely whatever I revere, have power over me. So I will take the command of Jesus: "Do not fear. Only believe." The only real Power is God and I gladly and eagerly give Him dominion over every aspect of me.
Thank you God!

Thunder and Lightning

My mother was not afraid of thunder and lightning. In fact she loved it. As a child I remember Mom inviting me to sit with her on the porch during a thunderstorm to enjoy the show. She would sit there with a little smile on her face as the rain came pattering down outside and the thunder boomed, and the lightning flickered and lit up the sky. The more thunder the better. It was entertainment for her. And so it still is for me.

I am sitting right now on our lanai enjoying just such a show. Lots of lovely lightning, rolling thunder, and the occasional exciting big BOOM.

And I think of Mom. I don't think she was afraid of very much. When she was diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver (due to hepatitis) she took it with her usual calm, or so it seemed to me at least. As she got sicker and the illness took its toll, she just kept on truckin'. Kept working, kept going to church, kept going out to eat, kept on going to the grocery store, even when towards the end Dad had to push her in a wheelchair because she was too weak and in too much pain to walk around. She just kept on living until the day she didn't.

Today as I sit here enjoying this first class thunderstorm, I am a few hours away from a doctor appointment which will begin to determine the nature of a mass found on my own liver three days ago. I think of Mom. And I think of my husband, who has moved through all of his cancer journeys with such grace. And most of all I think of God. And I remember the words of Jesus:

"Peace I leave with you. My peace I give unto you.
Not as the world giveth, give I unto you.
Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid."

Thank you God. Thank you Jesus. I know you are here and I feel your peace.