My wife was well enough to attend church this past Sunday and walked in without her walker. Her condition has improved greatly, going from nearly dying a couple of weeks back, to slowly turning the corner towards being up and at ‘em once again. She is facing six weeks of radiation beginning this week and then should be good to go with her cancer beaten back. The same holds true with my devastating neck surgery, almost all pain and numbness in my arms and hands are gone now and I can endure the remaining residual pain without it affecting my work. I’m even working out with limited weights again.
Now comes yet another dilemma. Decades ago I contracted Hepatitis C. I’m not sure if I got it when I received numerous blood transfusions after a car wreck, (back then blood was not screened). Or I could have received it from using a dirty needle as an intravenous drug user.
This disease has few symptoms, but slowly attacks your liver and if left unchecked for long enough can and will kill you. So I went and had it checked out several weeks ago, and sure enough the doctor told me it had progressed to stage 3 or 4 and I needed to do something about it.
He recommended the new wonder drug Harvoni. It has a cure rate of 98% and treatment consists of taking one pill per day for 12-24 weeks. It is also very expensive costing nearly $700/pill and quite naturally the insurance companies don’t like to pay for it. It took a while, but I did get on the program and began taking the treatment on Monday.
It’s a form of chemo and the drug has a few side effects consisting primarily of headaches, fatigue, and nausea. I’m already feeling them, but so far it has not really been that bad, and I’m able to function fulltime working on the Jesus Alliance without interruption.
I can only imagine satan telling his minions to throw another log on the fire as his relentless attack on me and my family continues. This has been a tough year, but I’m not complaining. It does no good to get mad when it rains, because it doesn’t change anything. My wife and I are taking the approach of looking towards 2016 as possibly being the year when life returns to some sort of norm. Hopefully by then we will have our health restored, we will have closed the sale of the various properties we have listed, we will be moved into the new home we are building, and most importantly the Jesus Alliance will be much further down the road and helping people all over the world.
Or maybe we will experience more rain and/or get washed away.
There are no guarantees that more logs will not be thrown on the fire, or that the fire might go out. As for me I don’t worry. I know that I’m indestructible until my purpose in this life has been completed and then I will spend my time enjoying God’s rest. I trust in the Lord and whatever He allows in my life I’m up for it. So I concentrate on getting done today what I feel God wants me to accomplish.
Jesus tells us in Matthew 6:34: “So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.”
Yep, that’s what I want to do.
Jesus wants us to focus on Him and eternity. Christ’s kingdom is spiritual, and not of this world. Happiness, comfort, and health do not depend on the wealth of this planet, and the things of the world will not satisfy the desires of a soul. That only comes from Jesus. God wants us to trust Him and focus on building our spiritual wealth. Jesus said fools trust in their riches which can be removed in a heartbeat.
This point was driven home to a friend of mine this past weekend. He got hit by lightning while standing in a prison yard giving his testimony. He survived with little more than soreness, but what if he hadn’t survived? He would have died while serving His Lord and glorifying His name and not by sitting around worrying about everything under the sun, (like maybe getting hit by lightning).
Luke 12:18
Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come; take your ease, eat, drink and be merry.”‘ “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you have prepared?’ . . .
September 16, 2015 – Click here to listen