Thank you God, you make me Brave

So tomorrow is the big surgery day.  Amazing all the little things we do throughout the week. Then
when you know you will be out of commission for a while you can take care of it in 3 days.  I had to vote, shop for a few things to take with me.  By the way, have you tried to shop for a light weight mid length robe? Sure, if I was going away for a romantic weekend or buying something for my 80 year old mother in law I could find plenty... but I don't think I want the hospital staff looking at me that way and I am not feeling 80 just yet.  But I digress, I paid bills, answered volumes of Facebook posts, emails and phone calls from well wishers  and I treasured every single one.  All the while working to keep my mind occupied.  Today I stopped, and took it all in; for the first time; all the people praying, people sharing my storm with others so they could pray in Uganda, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and across the United States. So many praying, seeking God on my behalf; I am overwhelmed by the love I feel.
I know that God could heal me before the first cut, walk with me through this painful storm, or take me home to see Jesus. But I can tell you that I have an unexplainable peace about the outcome, in my heart I feel God is not done with me yet,  no matter what I will Praise God through it all.

I give you peace only I can give, so don't be worried or afraid.   John 14:27

I remember hearing when I was a child that the bible says "Count yourselves as blessed for the trials you go through".  What?  How could bad things be a blessing?

 Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. James 1:2

I now understand that.  Though I do not want to go through the surgery, recovery and treatments, I know God is with me and God loves me.  My "trial" will be a testimony in some way to someone else. 

So today my prayer is in thanks. 
Thank you God for being bigger than my fears, my cancer and all my circumstances.  Thank you God for being my healer and restorer. Thank you God for always being with me.  Thank you God for your peace, peace I can only get from you.  Thank you God for guiding the surgeons hands and walking with me through yet another storm.  Thank you God for surrounding me with family & friends around the world willing to pray, ask and seek you on my behalf.   Thank you God for everything because You make me BRAVE!

  

I have WHAT?

What a long strange trip this week has been.  Beginning on Monday with a trip to the Doctor's office ending on Friday at Moffitt Cancer Center scheduling surgery for this week.  It was a whirlwind of tests and blood draws. Not to mention all the new words and medical terms that are thrown around.
Still reeling from hearing "you have a tumor in your right kidney"  I then hear unfamiliar medical jargon like, nephrectomy, IVC thrombectomy, metastasized, what does it all mean?  Bottom line is I have cancer in my right kidney and in the large artery (Inferior Vena Cava)  to which the kidney is attached  and the cancer has traveled to my lungs.  Wow....yes it was one heck of a field trip this last week. 

If you have read my past blogs you know that the last two years have been turbulent to say the least. After moving to Missouri for 14months and back to Florida only to have cataract surgery, lose my job, lose our house, a sever case of depression lasting 13 months, a trip to Washington to visit family that didn't go well to say the least, strep throat on return and now I have cancer. And not just any cancer, major surgery cancer.  I admit feeling a little like Job when God allowed him to be tested by Satan. Job lost everything -wealth, housing land, friends, family.  Even his wife told him he should curse God, but still Job praised God. 

21 Naked I came from my mother’s womb,

naked I’ll return to the womb of the earth.

God gives, God takes.

God’s name be ever blessed.

22 Not once through all this did Job sin; not once did he blame God.
Job 1:21-22

But what happens in the end of the story?  Job 42:12 begins-

Then the Lord blessed Job’s latter days

 more than his former ones.....

 

 

That's what I'm talking about!  Look, no pity party for me.  God has got this, God has my back on all this; He told me so.....  He could heal me before they even start surgery, or not, either way I will praise him with all I have. I will count myself as blessed by the many treasured prayers that go up to Him on my behalf.  I do not believe God is finished with me yet.  So I will not ask "why God?" ,  but "What"?  What are you up to God?  What is it God that you have so great coming for me that Satan desperately wants to separate me from it? 


Stay posted with me to travel my latest field trip... it's going to be a crazy ride.