This is part three in an ongoing story. If you’d like to catch yourself up, part one can be found here and part two is here.
The days stretch on. My mind wanders. Probably asking the question everyone in a similar boat asks … did I do something to deserve this? My mom is ever the optimist. “There’s no history of cancer in our family,” she says brightly. “I had out of control fibroids too,” she later admits, hoping that it makes a difference somehow.
I start asking people to pray … “No Cancer.”
But with all the testing another issue has now reared its ugly head. It seems my ECG is abnormal and I need a stress echocardiogram. While my heart has never had an issue other than high blood pressure, there is a history of heart disease in my family. I shudder and remember a scripture the Lord impressed upon me several years ago … it’s become my life verse:
No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses,
so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you. ~ Joshua 1:5
When God gave me that verse I had grabbed it as if it were a lifeline that would pull me through the seas of despair … and it did. I can’t recall how many times since then I’ve had to lean on those promises. Today, I see how important it was that He imparted that message to me then, it gave me necessary strength.
Then a distant recollection struggles to make its way out of the depths of my brain. It was a past dream. A God dream.
I segregate dreams, you see. There are regular nonsense dreams, dreams where the devil invades, and dreams of God. I can remember every single dream of God that I’ve ever had. Truthfully. It’s one way I know they are of God. They stick. The nonsense dreams fade away in the light of morning faster than you can brew a cup of coffee. Any nightmarish nonsense dreams may hang around a little longer because I dwell on them wondering if there is meaning, but they too cannot hold up to the light of day and eventually slip away. The evil dreams usually masquerade as dreams of God until I evaluate them and detect the lie. It’s a given that something in the dream will not hold up to God’s truth.
Shortly the entire warning comes into focus. And it was a warning. I don’t get many of those which is perhaps why this one was so startling. I remember that I received it right before waking, hearing the inaudible voice …
“I needed to alert you of this before it was too late.”
Alert me of what? Too late for what? I didn’t know at the time and wonder if now, this is what He meant. You might think that because it’s a somewhat ominous sentence that it might be from the devil, and that thought crossed my mind. But with this warning, there was no fear. No panic. No angst. Just truth.
I keep the warning in the back of my mind while I take my stress test.
My cell phone rings before I’m even out of the hospital and it’s my cardiologist … ‘there is an abnormality … a slight blockage’. Next stop – a cardiac cath. Which is taking place this morning. The worst case scenario will be that I need a stent and surgery will be delayed. The best case is that they can open whatever is there with the cath and my surgery goes forward next week.
Driving home from the hospital after this bit of news my Mom is understandably disappointed. But I check myself. I am not. I poke myself to see if I’m just numb, but that’s not it at all. I’m at peace. I’m truly under God’s care.
It is good that they found this issue when they did. My father needed a triple bypass at 65. His brother, mother, and father all died of heart disease. Catching this early prolongs the time I have to continue to work for the Kingdom. This glory isn’t lost on me and in fact, doubles my determination to get this first book onto paper and into the hands of an editor.
There will be more to this story.
Do come back.
A Life Sanctified 