The Road Not Chosen

Much Ado

Sometimes I have to remind myself (forcefully) that God is in charge of everything. Take yesterday, for instance. We got to the hospital at 10AM sharp. Evan’s surgery was scheduled for noon. There had been a thunderstorm early in the morning and the power had been out for a couple of hours. When we got Evan checked in, we asked if that would put his surgery behind. They told us it would be about an hour behind, which wasn’t bad.

1PM came and went. The nurse tells us that the power outage had damaged some of their electrical equipment in a couple of the operating rooms so it looked like surgery would be around 3PM. We wrestled with Evan, trying to get an IV in him, always difficult because he has hard to find veins. They finally got one in but it quit working after half an hour. Out that one came. Before trying to go through the process again, they gave him some Valium to try to calm him. It made him sleepy but when it was time to try to get another IV in, his adrenaline overcame the Valium and he was in fighting shape. Finally a good IV was inserted.

Now the surgeon’s nurse comes in. Evan has been bumped to the bottom of the list because his surgery is elective. Do we want to wait or cancel? We decide to wait as we have already spent one night in a hotel and have it booked for another night. The nurse says it might be 6PM or later. We say that’s ok, we just need to get this surgery done. It’s already been postponed twice. Harold & I take turns going back to the hotel to rest as it looks like it will be a long night. Evan dozes and watches cartoons. A saline drip keeps him hydrated and he doesn’t ever ask for anything to eat or drink. Some of the surgery staff wants us to cancel. A nurse named Linda advocates for us saying, “This family and patient have been put through a lot today. We owe it to them to do the procedure.”

It’s nearly 5:30PM. Our surgeon, his resident and surgical nurse have been in Jeff City since noon waiting for an OR to open up. The surgeon comes in and tells us the orthopedic crew he uses at that hospital has gone home. He could use another crew but the equipment they will be using on Evan is brand new and that crew would not be familiar with it. He feels uncomfortable using an inexperienced crew. The surgery is cancelled. He is tremendously apologetic. Evan is tremendously happy. I try not to burst into tears of frustration. We are offered a new date of next Wednesday. Too tired & emotionally spent to even think of doing this again in a few days, we decline and decide to reschedule for October, after school has started and things settle down a bit.

Harold calls the hotel to see if we can cancel the room. We just want to go home and sleep. The person at the front desk says they will have to charge us anyway. Who cares? We decide to leave and make the 2 ½ hour drive home. Getting to the hotel, we pack in about 5 minutes, lugging food & clothes we had just unpacked the night before back out to the car. Harold goes to the front desk where the clerk feels bad and just charges us for Thursday night. We are grateful and head for home, stopping at McDonald’s to feed our son who hasn’t eaten since the night before.

My mom tells me that it must not have been God’s will for the surgery to happen that day. This is what the surgeon has said also. So I remind myself that is true, even if I can’t see the big picture at the moment.

So today we have turned the phones off, slept late, and are going to watch a movie and try to get back into a routine that we haven’t had all summer. School starts Monday and Evan is so over-the-moon happy to be able to be there for the first day of his senior year. He is already planning what to wear and what he will pack for lunch. As always, he is more resilient than Harold or I.

In Other Words

"Salt, when dissolved in water, may disappear, but it does not cease to exist. We can be sure of its presence by tasting the water. Likewise, the indwelling Christ, though unseen, will be made evident to others from the love which He imparts to us."
~Sadhu Sundar Singh~

I will admit that I am conceited enough to think sometimes that God needs my input and direction to get things done. Inserting my self-ish ideas is nothing but a boulder blocking what needs to be done. Everyone knows it's in the way and someone is going to have to go get a crowbar to get rid of it so the path is made clear.

It is a difficult thing to make our selves disappear. Our will and hunger to be acknowledged, to be loved, to be the center of our own universe is a powerful force. How is it then that we can "decrease so Christ may increase"? I have found that when I focus on what God wants to do and go hard after that, my selfishness tends to dissolve. This is not always an easy process by any means. Yet the older I get in age and in the Christian walk, the more I see the value of letting my will melt into His.

I think of the Apostle Paul. He was an extremely educated man, a Roman citizen (which entitled him to lots of perks), well known among the religious elite of his time. One day God knocked him off his high horse (literally) and changed Paul's world view forever. The man who used to boast in his own abilities and pedigree now said:

The very credentials these people are waving around as something special, I'm tearing up and throwing out with the trash--along with everything else I used to take credit for. And why? Because of Christ. Yes, all the things I once thought were so important are gone from my life. Compared to the high privilege of knowing Christ Jesus as my Master, firsthand, everything I once thought I had going for me is insignificant--dog dung. I've dumped it all in the trash so that I could embrace Christ and be embraced by him. I didn't want some petty, inferior brand of righteousness that comes from keeping a list of rules when I could get the robust kind that comes from trusting Christ--God's righteousness. I gave up all that inferior stuff so I could know Christ personally, experience his resurrection power, be a partner in his suffering, and go all the way with him to death itself. (Phil 3:7-10 MSG)

Oh, and not to mention this:

Christ's life showed me how, and enabled me to do it. I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not "mine," but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Gal 2:20 MSG)

I can't say it any better than Paul, who spent the rest of his life living as one with Christ to the point of his own martyr's death. May it be that I can let my own personality dissolve into Christ's so that my true purpose can be known by those whose lives I touch each day.

Mush Melon

What have I been doing these past days that makes my brain so mushy and unwilling to be creative? School starts in a week and a half. Teachers came back to work Monday so that brings me lots of payroll paperwork. Oh, and on Tuesday I got to work early only to find that we had 3 computers crashed in the office. By the afternoon, mine was finally working so I stayed late to try to catch up. There is something about crunching numbers all, all, all day long that sucks every bit of creative juice out of me.

The good news of the week is that Evan’s second hip surgery has finally been scheduled for next Friday. We’re glad to have a date but it’s so late in the summer that he will miss the first week of school. He seems pretty ready for this surgery & not too worried about it. We are trying to prepare him for the fact that he will be much more sore this time. My hope is that he might be spared some pain because of his loose muscle tone. It seems to me that when they take his leg out of the hip socket & put it back in, the hypotonia will mean that the muscles are more flexible and less given to being sore because of this.

I want to sit here and write something brilliant and awe-inspiring. Wait…. Ummmm….. Nope, not going to happen tonight. I am reading “Eat This Book” by Eugene Peterson which is helping me to see reading my Bible in a whole different light. It’s not a very long book and interesting to read. Pick it up if you get a chance, but be ready to be challenged!

Off I go to start doing some lesson plans for the World Lit class I am teaching this year. I am very excited about it and have some hopefully fun ideas to teach critical thinking skills to my students. I hope everyone is having a great week. Talk to ya later!

Right Now

I don't feel very creative. My doctor put me on a new medication Tuesday & it gives me headaches. At first I thought "No biggie. I get migraines. I can handle a mild headache for a week or two as my body adjusts." Well forget it! This stuff has thrown me into a 4 day migraine! I'm going to call her tomorrow and ask to be put on something else. So I've been kind of a slug this week.

We still have NO SURGERY DATE! Arrrggghhh! I know God is trying (yet again) to teach me patience. So I am trying not to fixate on the fact that school starts in 2 weeks & we really wanted this all to be over with by then.

In other medical news (which seems to be the theme of my week) the hematologist has decided she needs to see Evan and do some very specific blood tests to further investigate his very elevated red cell count. It is higher than ever. She wants to make absolutely sure he is not heading into some sort of cancer. Harold & I are kind of assuming that Evan will have to have a bone marrow draw, as that is what the doctor has been saying will be the most accurate test. We go to see her the first week of September.

My dad continues to make progress each day. He is now eating regular food and will probably have his feeding tube taken out any day now. He will probably head home in about 10 days or so. We have had some very interesting discussions of what he went through when he was in the coma. All I can say is that God is so merciful and wonderful. Dad feels strengthened and invigorated spiritually, which is awesome!

Well, I'm going to go play with my blog template. I'm bored with how it looks. Talk to you later!

In Other Words

"Remember, we all stumble, every one of us. That's why it's a comfort to go hand in hand."
~ Emily Kimbrough ~

This quote reminded me of Proverbs 17:17 “A friend loves at all times and a (sister) is born for adversity.” How awful it is to be alone when we fall into times of temptation or fear or sadness! There have been times in my life when I felt like I was utterly alone with no person to turn to. I would worry a problem or situation over and over in my mind, trying desperately to figure out what to do. Those times were downright scary! The devil had me so convinced that no one cared for me that I would nearly give up hope. Yet God has always been faithful to send someone along to pull me out of the ditch, brush me off, and take my hand to help me down the path.

One of those times was when Harold, Evan and I moved to the small town we live in now. I was a big city girl moving to a rural town, not knowing hardly a soul. Our marriage of 7 years had been battered and torn by the circumstances of life and by the stress of caring for a baby who not only had special needs, but a heart defect also. Harold really felt we needed to move here because the only 2 or 3 people we could really talk to (I mean in a way that was deep) were in a small church in this community. I could choose either to divorce my husband (which I did seriously consider at the time) or follow him to what seemed to be the end of the earth.

I don’t remember much from those first few months except that the people at our new church were friendly and caring. We lived in a small guest house on some property owned by Larry & Sherry S. They let us live there rent free until we got on our feet. It took a couple of months for Harold & I to find jobs. In the meantime, nearly each day Sherry would come by, push me into her car, and take me with her on whatever errands she was running. Driving down country roads, she would ask me questions no one had ever asked me before. She dug down deep into the barren dirt of my life, turning over the soil, picking out the hard rocks, and watering me with the Word of God, prayer and many tears of love.

After a time strange things began to happen. I began to love my husband again, a sense of peace about my son and his life eased its way into my heart, and once more I knew that God really did love me unconditionally. I saw the sin in my anger and hard heartedness and repented. Sherry had taken my hand, pulled me up, putting her arm around me as we walked the road together.

It’s been 15 years since that happened. My friend and I still walk this road together. There are times when I have had the privilege of taking Sherry’s hand and helping her. I have also made many more friends in this small and lovely town and we all try to help each other along this path the Lord has set us on. Do you know someone who needs help? If so, go to them today and stretch out your hand, knowing that it’s not only you who reaches out to them, but Jesus does also through you.

                     

My Father’s Voice

I haven’t really written anything about my Dad for a month or so. It’s been quite a journey for him: aortic valve replacement followed by lung & blood infections, close to death 2 or 3 times. His surgery was on May 14^th. After many physical battles his health improved enough to be moved from a Cardiac ICU to a pulmonary rehab hospital where he has been for about 3 or 4 weeks. (I’ve lost track!)

He has been on a ventilator for a couple of months & they weaned him completely off of that last week. Last night they took the tracheotomy out of his throat. Today I listened to him talk for nearly 5 minutes. Words cannot describe how awesome that was! I’ve been wondering for weeks what he experienced while in the 6 week long drug induced coma. Now I’ll get to find out.

This was part of our conversation today:

Dad: “I don’t remember you & Harold coming out here (California). Mom said it was for a week. I’m sorry I don’t remember.”

Me: “I was going to paint your toenails red so you would know I was here but Mom wouldn’t let me. It wasn’t a very exciting time so it’s just as well you don’t remember.”

Dad: “Lots of weird things happened when I was out. I tell them to you and you can write them down and make a book. You’re the writer after all. ”

It is the mundane conversations that I have missed the most. When they first put in a trach Dad could talk with (about 2 weeks ago) he called & said, “Hi, just wanted to tell you I love you cuz I haven’t said it in 2 months.” God really is so wonderful!

It has been such a dry spell, not being able to talk to my Dad & hear what he’s thinking about or talk about what book we are each reading. I’ve almost felt a drift in a way. This makes me think of 2 things. First, I truly treasure each moment & conversation with him. Second, that is how I feel when I don’t talk to God. I feel at loose ends, just bumping around life with no sense of what my Heavenly Father is thinking or wanting me to do.

This season had made me appreciate both my father’s more than ever!

 

In Other Words…

"There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.'"~ C.S. Lewis ~

Does anyone remember the Burger King ad with the catchy tune “Have it your way, have it your way at Burger King today”? Too often it seems that is the slogan we have adopted as American Christians. We want to have church our way: a beautiful building, cutting edge children’s ministry, youth group with a terminally hip & cool leader, a sermon with a dynamic Power Point presentation that lasts no longer than 30 minutes. Oh and don’t forget a worship team that is so kickin’ they should have record labels fighting over them!

The Bible should be our guide book for every aspect of our lives. When examining the New Testament scriptures does any of the above fit in? Is that what the Church should look like? There is nothing wrong with a nice building, etc. but what motivates the leaders and people of that local body makes all the difference. The focus should be on building the Kingdom of God with all the sacrifice and work that may entail, not creating our own little church kingdom on the earth.

Harold & I were watching a Christian talk show last night where a pastor from a rural area was being put on the spot by someone with a large ministry because he had turned down offers to be “promoted” to a larger city. This pastor loved his rural region, felt called there, and was having a great impact there. Yet it made no sense to the “city pastor”. “Doesn’t God show His approval by moving you on to a bigger work?” he asked.

We often think bigger is better, more influential, more “blessed”. One of the basic facts of Jesus ministry on earth was that it was small. He had 12 (well, really 11) committed disciples and a larger group of 70 followers. To many, a church of 83 people would not be considered successful. Yet there were enough committed people to change the world. Enduring persecution, they held church services in caves. They shed blood, were tortured, and often died for their faith. There is nothing glamorous in earthly terms about that kind of Christian life, yet it is the kind of life experienced by millions of our brothers & sisters even to this day.

I wonder what would happen if the church in America stopped wanting it their way and started asking God how He wants the church to look in this nation. Is it right for the church to spend more time & resources on themselves than caring for those who desperately need to see and feel the touch of Jesus in their lives? Our children would learn more about real life and about God by spending time volunteering in a soup kitchen or nursing home than on youth group trips with no Christ focus.

I want to invest my life and train my child in the things that really count for something, things that will last for eternity. When the day comes that I stand before God and He judges my actions, I want more gold accumulated than hay. To that end may I wake up each morning and say “God, thy will be done. Lord, have it your way.”