Updates:
- I unfortunately contracted the stomach bug, and it has been a bumpy ride at times this week! I’m staying away from the family again so they don’t get sick.
- Good news! My chest x-ray is negative for pneumonia and infection.
Prayer Requests and Praises:
- Even though I am sick, I am thankful it has not delayed treatment. I contracted the illness after my last chemo infusion.
- Still no signs of infection with my two incisions from my port surgeries. This is a real blessing!
- My next infusion is on January 16th and is followed by one on the 30th. My final infusion is on February 13th. We are on the home stretch, so please pray all the cancer is killed!
What I am Learning:
- The character of God is astounding. The more we spend time thinking about who God is, the more it shapes who we become. “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” (2 Corinthians 3:18)
- God is infinite. This means that all his attributes are infinite as well. They keep going and going. To say it differently, God’s mercy, grace, love, power, and majesty are always exciting, fresh, and never exhausted. We will forever be discovering new layers and depths of who God is. It will take an eternity to plumb the love of God for us in Christ Jesus.
- The truths about how God’s attributes are forever deep are a help during times of suffering. God’s endless (new morning) mercies mean that I can continually pray to him and ask for deliverance. God’s ever-abounding love means that he will always surround me as the mountains surround Jerusalem – from this time forth and forever more (Psalm 125). God’s matchless and perpetually amazing power means I can trust that he will hold me and protect me perfectly.
“Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable.” (Psalm 145:3)
“To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ…” (Ephesians 3:8)
“So that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:17–19)
What Has Been Encouraging:
- When I am feeling crummy from the chemo, I am typically laid up in my bed. However sometimes I can lie on the couch in our living room. Our kids really like it when I can do this because we get to watch “Planet Earth.”
- We have seen the whole trilogy of Planet Earth. In my opinion, the first one is the best, and the third is the worst.
- We recently watched an entire segment in which a pack of lions was desperate for food. They were so hungry they decided to attack an elephant near a water hole. The whole pack struggled at first but was eventually successful at taking down this one elephant. We don’t typically think of lions as desperate, but they can “suffer want and hunger.”
- While the king of the jungle might go hungry, God tells us that we “lack no good thing.” God always provides for us good things because he himself is good. Look at the connection in Psalm 34 between God’s goodness and how he provides for us even more than the lions. His character and his actions are connected.
Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him! Oh, fear the LORD, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack! The young lions suffer want and hunger; but those who seek the LORD lack no good thing. (Psalm 34:8–10)
- Do you want the assurance that God will provide for every need of yours in Christ Jesus? Call upon his name. He died and rose again so that you might have abundant life. Oh taste and see that he is good!
Unspoken 