Of Lyme Disease and 20 years...

Nearly Twenty years ago, 

this young lady joined our home 

and made me a mother. For twenty years, 

God has faithfully kept me desperate for Him as I 

navigated the trail of bringing my children up

 in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

In a few weeks, this lady will turn 20,

 and we will have our first child

leave the teen years behind.

It is pure joy to me to watch my daughter choosing

the way of Life, and ask the hard things

so that she can find the answers to the important things.

As I have watched Angela walk thru the hardship of a chronic disease

the past 4 years, admiration grows in my heart daily

 for how she has gracefully

found a way to deal with the disappointment of giving the last half

of her teen years to Lyme Disease and co-infections.

She has had to face the huge hurdle of neurological issues

(outlandish fears, depression, worry and anxiety, and

foggy brain, 

buzzing brain that gets overstimulated in

 bright light or at social functions) 

off and on for 4 years, and has learned

how to keep going in spite of it, in the capacity 

in which she is able to do it.

She doesn't get as much done in 'activity' as 

many young people do, but it blesses me to

watch her determinedly tackle at least basic

homemaking on most any day, and on the days she

feels well, we see glimpses of who she used to be

as she digs into cleaning projects and other things

around the home, her voice like a songbird

singing beautiful hymns to our Maker.

When if feels like she has yet 'another down day',

we have to pause and remember that 

this woman has been able to do two consecutive years

of chorus with a local youth group including tours,

besides the daily round of duties she actually

does including tending parts of our vegetable garden,

the chickens, sometimes doing chores for her dad, etc.

And even if she would not 'get anything done', we would still love her.

I just share that because satan wants to steal our gratitude,

so I fight back by 'remembering'.

I am delighted to walk past the living room door

many afternoons where she busily fills capsules

with the herbs our family uses on a regular basis,

sometimes also I hear a sermon playing while she works.

It has been a deeply painful journey to watch

our daughter walk thru this disease,

and there have been moments when I have hidden in my room

sobbing into my bedspread or pillow because

it was just too painful to experience,

lifting my daughter up to the One who

never leaves us or forsakes us.

But one thing we have learned to know...

God never makes mistakes.

He tailor makes our circumstances for us,

and we  have learned amazing things

thru this one!

It is sometimes a lonely journey, too,

because Lyme disease is an 'unseen'

struggle, for the most part.

We still are learning how to share with 

friends and relatives honestly without

causing them to feel awkward or unsure

how to relate to it all.

Happy birthday, dear Angela.

We love you and look forward

to seeing what God has in store

for you in the days He gives you.

This oldest daughter of mine is blessed beyond measure

with a sister who spent all of her teen years learning

how to sometimes be 'oldest sister' instead of middle child...

who has stepped up and filled in countless times when her

sister was unable to meet the need of the hour.

Her sister has become her best friend, and it is a delight to my heart

to hear them holding 'adult' conversations, having found a way

to celebrate their differences and blend their 'night and day' differences

to make a beautiful friendship that comforts our hearts.

PS

I am grateful to look back thru the past 4 years

and see the healing she has already experienced.

I believe that one day she will be completely healed,

if not in this life, then in eternity.

We are grateful for God's amazing grace

all photo credits go to the talented and lovely

Janelle Eby at Joy Focused Photography

Sixteen Years Ago...

Sixteen years ago...There was a young woman who wanted so desperately to know Jesus. Her heart was crushed deeply from abuse and sinfulness that she had vowed she would never repeat/get involved in and yet she found herself so helplessly doing exactly what she said she would never. Her heart was like a stone, emotionally she was spent and cold, from years of stuffing sorrow and keeping up appearances, as she had been taught, and from years of living without the life of Jesus in her heart.

At 24 years old, this young woman, who had been raised in a Mennonite home and saturated with the Word of God at every turn in church, school, reading material, etc prayed a prayer to God one day that changed her life forever, altho it would be another whole year til she would encounter an event that broke the heavens open to pour out light into her heart.

That woman was me. The prayer I prayed was this: "God, if you even exist, I need to know who you are and what you require of me." Imagine that, a girl brought up 'in the church' asking such a question? Obviously, I believed there was a God if I was praying to Him, but I do think that we all need to come to grips with that 'walking in faith' for ourselves for it ever to stick.

I kept asking, seeking, knocking. I kept wondering if I was going to go to heaven or hell when I died. I kept watching those close to me who had something I didn't have and I so desperately wanted it.

One day, my dear sister-in-law, who was newly born of Him  herself, gave me some CD sermons preached by Zac Poonen. I had never heard of him in my life but I wanted to know the truth. If she said that this helped her, and she was changed, then I wanted to know what it was myself!

I had always been taught to be cautious of who I listen to or whose material I read. I actually believe this is true, and still employ that counsel today. That is what I 'heard in my ear' as I put the first sermon into the player that day. I wondered, how will I know that what I hear is true or not? But from the moment I heard him speak, the Holy Spirit witnessed to my heart that this was truth.

In about 3 CD's, I knew that I had never been converted. I was actually relieved to know the answer to my problems. I was convicted but I wasn't condemned. I know some people struggle with condemnation, and I did before I heard Zac explain who God is and what He requires of me. I did not wait to hear the rest of the sermons in that series (I think there were 9 altogether). I knelt down on that plum colored carpet in the single-wide house trailer we lived in on some of the best prairie land I have ever seen in MO, and I got my life aligned with God. I was radically converted, I feel looking back like I was sort of like Paul on the road to Damascus. A lightning bolt came and struck me and I KNEW that I had found the answer that my soul so long had craved to know.

In the years that have followed, I have listened to many of Zac Poonen's sermons. He has been used of God in that way to disciple me and instruct my on true brokenness, living in the fellowship of God, and observing all that Jesus taught. I have never been the same. I have learned so much and I am so delighted that God has answered the cry of my heart.

For 13 of those 16 years, we have lived within 5 hours of where Zac comes to preach in PA every summer. I have longed many times to go hear him in person and thank him for being instrumental in my life, but every year came and went, and I was disappointed but resigned to the will of God.

This year, I got an unexpected surprise. I casually mentioned that Zac would be preaching in a few weeks, not even thinking about going. A few days later, my darling Farmer came to me and said he'll take me to PA to hear Zac preach. I was so shocked and overjoyed.

So this past Friday afternoon, my Farmer and I left our children, who are old enough to stay home alone (circumstances had us decide that they would stay behind), and literally drove through 'deep waters' to get out of NY to go to the meetings, with flash floods like we have never seen in all our 30 plus years of living in NY.

The meetings were wonderful. I came home feeling refreshed in my soul. Lamar found some answers to deep soul searching he has been walking through, and I got to fulfill my 16 year dream of hearing Zac preach in person (He's from India), and shake his hand and tell him the story of God used him to rescue me from eternal death. His face glowed with joy as I told him the story of my conversion and how he helped me to know so much how to 'live in the presence of God'. He humbly said, "That is wonderful, sister! Now go keep doing that!"

I wanted to share this story on here to say that God's timing can be trusted. If you are his child, then he tailor makes your circumstances for you. There is nothing that you wait for that he is too late or too early to fulfill. I have learned this lesson over and over and over again in my short life of being his servant. I sometimes have to still remind myself of this when I am walking thru a circumstance where I think that something just HAS to change soon and I find myself feeling frustrated that it seems God is being a bit lax in doing his job.

The Lord is mighty to save. He will keep us always. Let us be faithful in walking in close fellowship with him every day that He gives us breath.

If you are interested in hearing any of Zac's preaching, he has over a thousand sermons on youtube alone, I think and also many articles, books and sermons on his church's website. I'll post links below.

www.cfcindia.com

Allow God to Break You

How "We" Came to Be...

I love how Google photos shows me memories each day from the same day in years gone by. Wow, the things we did, the places we went, the moments we experienced that I would forget if I didn't have a reminder... This picture from last year of Lamar and I at the farewell party of a dear friend made me glow with warm memories of that day. Upon a second glance at this picture today, tho, I saw the baseball glove in Lamar's hand and my mind went all the 'way back to 1989 or 1990 when I was a girl of 13 in the 7th grade. I was a newbie to the high school room that year, and felt a little awkward inside, altho I hid that very well behind the protective veneer or confident superiority. But I did feel very awkward around all the upper graders in that room. Especially when we went out to play softball at recess time. Until a certain gentlemanly gesture melted that scared feeling and ultimately changed my life to date.

Mr. Lamar was in the 9th grade and well liked by many and had already turned the heads of a few of the girls. Why he chose me that day, I don't know, but in my memory, I can still see him shyly handing me his dark red baseball glove, offering it to me to use when his team was up to bat. And that is how our 'love story' began. To this day, that memory serves to remind me how this man of mine has always protected me and cared for me well. He has most always been the steady one in our relationship, holding me up through many a day of grief as I walked through deep heart pain. He has been the one person in my life that has provided continuous safety as I stood on wobbly feet as a newborn Christian five years into our marriage and then stepped aside as I learned to fly, letting me find my sure footing in Jesus.

My heart weeps as I think of how incredibly blessed I have been. I do not deserve such a gift, but I certainly receive it with thanksgiving and gratitude to the One who gave it, even tho I started out in this 'love story' backwards, with me at the center instead of Jesus.

Tho my husband is a man and certainly has his faults like any other man in this world, I am so happy to do life with him and I bless him in whatever way I can for rescuing me and for all the 'red baseball glove moments' he has gifted me with over the years through his quiet selfless acts of service to me and his family.