Bourge Bridge: Chemo #10 +1 day!!

All this week, I have been asking God that I would like to have the energy to do daily prayer and just be available for the boys (I missed them in other chemos when I would spend days sleeping/resting).

I can say 100% that He answered this prayer.

I didn't spend all day sleeping yesterday (I slept through all of the chemo, though). I rested a lot but I was able to talk with the boys and hear about their days. I didn't feel totally sick when I was awake and the side-effects are similar to all previous treatments but - somehow - I have energy.

Last night, the boys crowded around Shawn and I on our bed and we read Luke 5 (we are reading 1 chapter from Luke all through Lent. There are 24 chapters, so it will end just in time). It was a grace that it was a shorter, readable chapter and each of the boys offered to read a section.

I was totally struck by verses 12 & 13:

Now there was a man full of leprosy in one of the towns where he was; and when he saw Jesus, he fell prostrate, pleaded with him, and said, "Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean." Jesus stretched out his hand, touched him, and said, "I do will it. Be made clean." And the leprosy left him immediately.

"Coincidentally", I read about 30 short Bible verses about healing every day. They are printed out on filing cards and I flip through then and hope to memorize them eventually. It's how I begin my prayer time. Two of these verses are Luke 5: 13 &14 and I have a note underneath the verses that says, "Jesus has never changed. He is the same Jesus who healed this man. He will heal me too."

I think we start to imagine that Jesus is a story book character, like Peter Pan, Tom Sawyer, or Harry Potter (if we think about Jesus at all). He was this nice guy a long time ago who loved everyone, said some pretty good things and was crucified and then we're just not sure. Even many Catholics and Christians I know live as though Jesus is a character in their life story...but not that He is a living supernatural being who is still acting powerfully in our world. I know that I had fallen a bit into this thinking. Or, I was just not really thinking about it at all... Doing the best I could, living a busy life, expecting it to just keep going the way it was.

I think Jesus wants much more from me. He wants me to know that He is ALIVE. That my last post was that I would just "lay at the feet of Jesus" and trust and then, the next day the verse was a leper who "fell prostrate" (at the feet of Jesus) and was cured. I can't make this stuff up. It is my lived reality.

Jesus is the same. Always. We are the ones changing, ignoring, choosing not to believe in miracles. But the best part is that Jesus doesn't care about our weaknesses. He keeps after us. He did not cause my cancer (all evil is from the devil or people cooperating with that evil), but I believe Jesus allowed this cancer so that I can proclaim miracles and love and that He wants to live forever with everyone. And as long as I lay at His feet and plead with him, He will grant what I ask out of love.

And I get the bonus of making dinner for my family and energy for things like this.

Thank you for everyone who reached out yesterday. I think that this love and care is as healing to me as everything else.

I love blog pictures, so here are a few from this last week