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| December 2014 with my brother and his family. My sister-in-law is photographer:) |
‘Thank you Jesus for these clear blood tests’… While pondering
the joy of time I didn’t think I’d have, the Lord took my thoughts back to the
days of chemo. Cancer brought me to the
end of myself. .. to think about the end of my life here on earth. Cancer caused me to think about the reality
of heaven and my Savior, Jesus. It
brought me, and many of my loved ones, to our knees. Yes we asked for healing. But, for me that knealing position became
more of a picture of the challenge of submission… ‘Not my will, but Yours be
done’…
This was easier said on the cancer-free side of cancer, let me tell
youJ Saying that to my God and King, while still
knowing a huge cancer tumor was still in my body… meant I needed to submit my desire to be alive
on earth, under whatever plan He thought best for me… and the people around
me. I had to submit under the knowledge
that great pain could be the result to the people I loved the most.
Life is full of mountain tops, plateaus, gentle plains and deep
valleys. I so wanted to protect my loved
ones from a deep valley,especially caused by meJ.
But, as hard as it was to submit under His will completely, when I did
it, it also brought a deep sense of calm on my ‘inside’. The process of submission, in my experience,
is just that…a process, sometimes easier, sometimes impossible… not always
complete, not the same everyday and certainly not without tears (shed very
privately for my dear hubby and kiddos)…
This was something between me and Jesus.
So here we are with a year of treatment done. 3½ years of tests and scans clear but a ways to go (5 years was the 50:50
prognosis for recurrence I was given – with the warning that I would always be
a cancer patient). Still the Lord
reminds me, in His gentle way, that ‘on my knee’s’ needs to remain the posture
of my heart. ‘On my knee’s’ in
thankfulness maybe at this point. But,
also ‘on my knees’ in continues submission with the quiet prayer of ‘Not my
will but Yours be done” on my lips.
I remember lying on my bed recovering from that weeks treatment and
looking at this picture from my bed. I
had asked Mark to hang it there because it was taken just before we got the
cancer bombshell. All the excitement
over the soccer world cup being in South Africa had been such a wonderful time
for usJ I would look at the three of them and plead
with the Lord to not take me away from them just yet… Then, with tears, I would say…’not my will,
but Yours be done’. As the tears rolled
down my cheeks… a great and unexplainable calm would enter my heart.
Cancer has a way of stripping away the not-so-important things. It is an opportunity to focus on whats most
important. Finding another way of
holding onto His hand.. finding joy in building into the lives of those one
loves and fulfilling my part in His plan for them!
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