Onward We Go & Yet We Praise Him Still

In December I went for my regularly scheduled doctor's appointment and knew going in my current treatment wasn't working as well as we need it to. The Nurse Practitioner handed me a couple of brochures on a new treatment which I promptly put in our office and didn't look at them until the day before my appointment this week. I just couldn't bear the thought for several reasons. First, it is by injection and the thought of giving myself an injection creeps me out. Second, the side effects scare the daylights out of me. Third, it's expensive.

Steve read it all within a day or so of when I received it. Knowing I was going back to the doctor Monday, I brought it out and read it. There wasn't a whole lot in there I didn't already know. I compiled a list of questions and took Steve with me for this visit. Certain I would never make it through that visit without tears, I prayed for strength as I never have before. That prayer was answered as I was more rational and composed than I have been in months! I was able to carry on an intelligent conversation rather than a blubbering idiot one. Steve also had a couple of questions I hadn't thought of so all in all, it was a decent appointment.

As expected, the clinical observations were that I was doing more poorly than last time and while I might sustain at the level I am, I will certainly not get better and I am no where near being able to function adequately. The one bright spot in the visit is that the NP remarked on my "exceptional" strength. Totally cracked me up. To be honest, when she asked me to push against her, I sent her and her chair flying backwards, mostly due to the fact that she didn't expect it...I think. Knowing how much strength I've lost, I now long for the days when I was strong for real.

We left there with the decision made to go forward with the first line of biologic treatment. They are hopeful it will work well for me as it does for so many other patients. As soon as insurance approves it, we can begin. I had hoped for this weekend but apparently it can take 5-7 days for approval and then the pharmacy has to get the medication in. So, it looks like next week is a more likely target.

Amazingly, there is a blessing in all of this. I shouldn't be so shocked as we serve an amazing God and I know for certain He is in the midst of this thing. The drug company has a program where they cover what the insurance company does not for 6 months, up to $4,000. By then we should know if it will work or not. This is provision as its best!

Now I am trying very hard not to play the "what-if" game. What if it doesn't work? Then what? The other options are increasingly expensive. What if I am one of the rare individuals with extreme side effects? What if I die? I can drive myself crazy with the "what-ifs". So I must choose to rest in this:

"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." Psalm 139:13-16 (NIV)

and

"Praise the Lord, o my soul, and forget not all His benefits--who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's." Psalm 103:2-5 (NIV)

God knows. He created me, He knows what is wrong and God alone heals. If He does not, I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God.

Two Sides of the Same Psalm

This morning I was in Psalm 13...remember my commitment to plod through the Psalms this year? I was suddenly struck by the stark contrast of emotions contained within the few verses. This actually happens quite a bit in the Psalms but for some reason it just hit me as fresh revelation today. Since it's short, I will put the verses below to help understand my connecting points.

How long O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?

Look on me and answer, O Lord my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death; my enemy will say, "I have overcome him" and my foes will rejoice when I fall.

But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing to the Lord, for He has been good to me.

The Psalm begins with questions and a seemingly confused writer (David). He doesn't understand why it's taking so long for deliverance to come. How long O Lord? Man, I can so relate to that one. Then comes what I see as a beautiful word--but. But what? "I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing to the Lord, for He has been good to me."

Here's what grabbed my attention. It is not an either / or proposition. It is an "and" proposition. What do I mean by that? I don't have to choose the mis-understanding or confusion over the rejoicing and singing. I can have both sides of the same Psalm!! I can be confused as to why God is delaying in my deliverance and at the same time wallow in praise for all the good He has done for me. It is there--I just have to choose to find it.

Last week Steve did a project for one of his classes. He had to write his life story beginning with birth and leading up to how he ended up in ministry and what's going on now. He was instructed to use different colors of sticky notes to delineate the good things and key people in his life from the bad things that have happened in his life. He used green for the good and yellow for the bad. Once he completed it he had to show it to someone and report on their observations. Since I was 12 feet from him when he completed it, he showed it to me. The first thing I noticed was the overwhelming amount of green compared to yellow.

The point? Yes, there are hard, even devastating things that happen in all of our lives. There is death, sickness, failures, not getting a promotion and the list goes on. But there are amazing things that happen to us too. There are births, graduations, influential people, professional success, spiritual victories and so much more. When I saw it all compiled on that poster board it took my breath away.

Yes, I will sing, must sing, to the Lord for He has been GOOD to me!

A Change of Perspective

It's been a really strange week of up and down moments which normally would put me on a wild roller coaster ride. Yet I seem to be leveling out a bit and running on more of an even keel. Obviously that is subjective....Steve runs on an even keel and it is SERIOUSLY even so compared to that, my "even keel" is not exactly even. But compared to where I'm coming from, it is unbelievably even. No doubt this is part of my growth and I am quite pleased.

The week began with me falling at church once again. Everything in me wanted to jump back in the car, drive home, get in bed and sob. Instead, I fought back the tears, took my post and resumed my duties. I spent the afternoon and evening in much pain, sitting in the recliner and napping. Monday was much improved and I was mentally and emotionally the better for having fought against my natural inclination to run and hide. There is no victory in that.

Today I went to the doctor, a much dreaded visit that didn't turn out all that badly. I believe this is due in large part to the friends who were praying for me. Until tonight. I just recovered from tears because I feel so utterly humiliated. It's not that the doctor was unprofessional, rude or rough. She was not. She was compassionate, genuine and had an amazing bedside manner. But medically speaking, some things are just difficult for me to bear even under optimum conditions. This was one of those.

I've realized a couple of things this week. This test of my faith and battle for my health is a place I have to venture alone. Sometimes God brings those things in our lives that are just for us and Him. No one else is permitted in. That doesn't mean people don't walk through it with us but rather they don't get to journey into the innermost places. As a matter of fact, it is critical that I have people surrounding me, walking with me, praying for me and distracting me when possible. But they can't enter in.

Last week's Bible study lesson was on this very thing. At the end of the video as I stood up to teach the portion of the lesson I had prepared, I could barely contain myself. I told the ladies I was about to burst into tears because in my heart I knew "this revelation is for me. It's exactly where I am. It IS me."

The following points are verbatim from session five of "David: Seeking a Heart Like His" by Beth Moore (study distributed by Lifeway); pages 102-103:

1. Further still...when you are overwhelmed with sorrow.

2. Further still...when you desperately need to wrestle with the will of God.

3. Further still...when nobody else gets it.

4. Further still...when the most serious matters of your life need settling.

5. Further still...when life can't be the same but the pain can bring gain.

This season of life is a "further still" for me. I can't possibly say it any better than what has already been said. It is an enormous step for me to realize this.

The second thing I am also coming to terms with is something I've been wrestling with for months. I've been asking difficult questions of God and I don't think that makes me a heretic. Quite the opposite actually. The Psalms are filled with such questions.....how long O Lord? Will you despise me forever? Why O Lord do you stand far off? I haven't verbalized these exactly but definitely versions of them. I don't understand much of the reasoning behind this test. So the questions I must answer are....is God any less good today than he was 16 months ago when all this started? Is He less Holy? Less sovereign? Less...(fill in the blank)?

What exactly am I basing my faith on...who God is or what He does? This came directly out of my lesson for today (the same study indicated above). The exact words I read were: "Basing our faith on who God is rather than what He appears to be doing is crucial to our spiritual health." (page 120)

When a friend asked me a couple of weeks ago how the study was going, I replied "it's amazing. It's tearing my heart apart." That's not bad. On the contrary, this is a good thing.