Yesterday was one of those days: it began with physical discomfort and emotional turmoil. It included an early morning tiff with my dear husband, mostly because of those first two items I mentioned, coupled with my own firm belief that my feelings are the most important in the cosmos. I spent hours struggling with God on account of it all.
Where God eventually led me, through reading and prayer and the songs on the radio, was to reflect on who I am in Christ. I remembered an old prayer notebook where I had recorded once long ago what it meant to be "in Christ". I pulled it out to remind myself of who I am in Him:
I am free of condemnation
I am chosen
I am holy and blameless
I am adopted by grace
I am accepted
I am redeemed
I am forgiven
I am abounding in the riches of wisdom and prudence
I know God's will
I know God's presence and good pleasure
I am gathered to Him
I am obtaining an inheritance
I am predestined according to His perfect purpose
I am praising his glory
I am trusting in Him
I am saved
I am sealed with a promise
I am His
I am beloved
This is the truth of who I am that I had to preach to myself yesterday, because none of it was visible to me. This is how one walks by faith, not sight.
So just in case you need to be reminded, Gentle Reader, of who you are in Christ, or need to be prodded to remember who you might be in Him, ponder the amazing place we have in Jesus today. And below is the song from the radio that encouraged me in my battle yesterday.
When I lose My way,
And I forget my name,
Remind me who I am.
In the mirror all I see,
Is who I don't wanna be,
Remind me who I am.
In the lonliest places,
When I can't remember what grace is.
Tell me once again who I am to you.
Who I am to you.
Tell me lest I forget who I am to you.
That I belong to you.
To you.
When my heart is like a stone,
And I'm running far from home,
Remind me who I am.
When I can't receive your love,
Afraid I'll never be enough,
Remind me who I am.
If I'm your beloved,
Can you help me believe it.
Bridge:
I'm the one you love,
I'm the one you love,
That will be enough,
I'm the one you love.
Tell me once again who I am to you.
Who I am to you.
Tell me lest I forget who I am to you. That I belong to you,
To you.
Dave and I finally finished some projects that were mostly done by the beginning of December, and which were intended to be Christmas gifts. *sigh* Well, now it's March, but they are done. :-)
This is a rocking llama made for Emma by Pampa. All I did was encourage and paint the eye. As soon as a car travels between here and there, Larry Llama will reside in Tucson. He is beautifully made of black walnut.
Above is a quilt for Ada. it's rather large for a baby quilt, but I had fun making it, and somehow missed the size when I was choosing the pattern...It is a little wider than a double-sized bed...
And this is an activity book I made for Emma. Below are a few or the pages.
Take heart, my friend, we'll go together This uncertain road that lies ahead Our faithful God has always gone before And He will lead the way once again
Take heart, my friend, we can walk together And if our burdens become too great We can hold up and help one another In God's love, in God's grace
Take heart my friend, the Lord is with us As He has been all the days of our lives Our assurance every morning Our defender in the night
If we should falter when trouble surrounds us When the wind and the waves are wild and high We will look away to Him who rules the waters; Who speaks His peace into the angry tide
He is our comfort, our sustainer He is our help in time of need When we wander, He is our Shepherd He who watches over us never sleeps
Take heart my friend, the Lord is with us As He has been all the days of our lives Our assurance every morning Our defender every night
Take heart my friend, the Lord is with us As He has been all the days of our lives Our assurance every morning Our defender in the night.
This morning I awoke thinking of the courageous women that fight this disease of breast cancer.
I thought of my friend Paula, who died 20 years ago, leaving two small boys and a loving husband behind. The summer she died, Dave was fighting his battle against stage 4 metastatic melanoma. She told me of her greatest experience of God's grace: that she was ready to say good-bye to her children. "I know it is a hard place to be in," she said, "But where would we rather be than in the center of God's will for us?"
I prayed for Natasha, who has been living with metastatic disease for years, surviving to see her daughter grow. And she gets through every day-- some painful, some excruciatingly joyful-- by and with grace.
And I prayed and cried for L.B., a sweet cyber-friend who has just had to announce to all the people who love her that her cancer is back, and with a wicked vengeance. "Jesus is the real deal," she says as she explains the extent of both her disease and the grace of God.
So this morning, I am clinging to grace, and trusting that the amount of grace God will provide to me will increase as my need for it does. He is able and willing. He is Good. And I am His.
Today I began waking early as I tossed and turned in bed: I was not just hot, but burning up, followed quickly by not just cold but freezing, followed by general uncomfortableness.. By 6 a.m. I was in my comfy chair, with heating pads in place and a cup of tea beside me. After resting and praying, I turned on the light long enough to have my quiet reading time. I read Psalm 87:
On the holy mount stands the city he founded; the Lord loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwelling places of Jacob. Glorious things of you are spoken, O city of God. Selah (vs. 1-3)
And I read Spurgeon as he commented on 1 Samuel 13:20:
Most of our tools want sharpening; we need
quickness of perception, tact, energy, promptness, in a word, complete
adaptation for the Lord's work. Practical common sense is a very scarce
thing among the conductors of Christian enterprises. We might learn from
our enemies if we would, and so make the Philistines sharpen our weapons. This morning let us note enough to sharpen our zeal during this day by the aid of the Holy Spirit.
Direction XVII. If it may be, get some able, faithful guide and
comforter to be with you in your sickness, to counsel you, and
resolve your doubts, and pray with you, and discourse of heavenly
things, when you are disabled by weakness for such exercises yourselves.
Let not carnal persons disturb you with their vain babblings.
Though the difference between good company and bad, be very great
in the time of health, yet now in sickness it will be more discernible.
And though a faithful friend and spiritual pastor be always a
great mercy, yet now especially in your last necessity. Therefore
make use of them as far as your pain and weakness will permit.
Then, I called my faithful husband, asked him to pray with me, and turned off my light and dozed again as I prayed for a view of God's city and for the discipline and wisdom to sharpen my God-given weapons against the day.
Then the attacks of Satan began: I ran into annoyance with the dear folks I live with-- jut annoyance, not problems, and no one's sin but my own. And I began getting a migraine headache (that kind of headache a doctor assured me 20 years ago would leave me once I entered menopause, and the absence of which I had been counting as a side-benefit of medical menopause.) I have now had a string of three migraines this week, and it feels like insult to injury somehow. And then it was time to do what I have been dreading: start my new normonal treatment for fighting breast cancer: Arimidex.
Arimidex is a fairly "safe" cancer drug, really. But I am sobered by reading the list of side effects, and have had an almost irrational fear of starting this drug. But after talking to a new oncologist this week, I am further convinced of its necessity. So, today is "A" day- the day I started Arimidex. So far, so good. My prayer is that it does the job of keeping this weary body from creating new breast cancers.
Thanks for your continued prayers, Gentle Readers. Each day is better, but still a battle in some ways. Fatigue and lack of hormones take their emotional toll. And in the next week I need to decide how much teaching activity to pick up this spring, and how much to let go until next fall. I want to follow the Lord's leading in that decision, and would appreciate your prayers for it!
A homeschool mom-alumni who enjoys teaching and learning about lots of things, including classical education, writing, worldviews, music, and the Bible.
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