A Spring of Joy

As the day of my genetic testing draws closer, I find the emotional battle against fear exhausting.

Tomorrow.

Tomorrow they will take vials of blood and send them to a lab to determine whether or not my cancers are genetic… whether or not I will have to test my children… whether or not brain and stomach cancers and bone sarcomas are a likely part of my future.

And the battle rages. Fear ravages and Satan seeks to tear down and destroy joy.

It is overwhelming to think about what could be, so I desperately try to pack every moment full of life so we don’t lose time that I might not have, and it becomes a frantic pace that can steal joy, rather than a resting in the joy of the Lord.

Ultimately, all this fear, it’s about loss of control, because I am under the illusion that I have some control to begin with. I want to feel in control of something in my life, because I am getting ready to go find out if I have mutant genes in my body. They will tell me what this means for my life, my children, my future.

And so I wake in the night, when the darkness seems so oppressive, and the whispered prayers fly furiously.

Frenetic.

Drunken. Like Hannah’s prayer in the temple. Pouring out all bitterness of soul before the Lord.

And I am begging God for mercy for us, for Brian, for our children. But not just for us. For others… stage four cancer in the life of a friend… hurting hearts from painful broken relationships… tragedies striking leaving friends reeling in agony… Every day I hear something new. This doesn’t even touch the ones i am already aching with and for and begging for healing and strength and protection.

Oh, for all of us. I pray.

Mostly I pray to see Him, because this fallen world seems more fallen these days.

I sing to Bella-girl at bedtime as I’m tucking her in.

She is just sad and scared these days. We all are.

But I remind her God is watching us… the angel of the Lord encamps round those who fear His name, to save them and deliver them from harm. Though lions roar with hunger, we lack for no good thing… We picture it together. A whole host of angels watching over us. And I sing…At all times I will bless Him, His praise will be in my mouth. My soul makes it boast in the Lord…”

Even if I learn in the weeks ahead that I have “bad genes” or that my children have inherited those “bad genes”… I remember, we all have bad genes from Adam. This is life in a fallen world.

This is what we do. When it all feels hard and hopeless and out of control.

We acknowledge that it is hard, that we are not in control, and that there is hope… there is always hope.

The Gospel doesn’t stop being true when life is hard.

So I seek to trust.

I seek to dwell on what is rather than on what might be.

And I remember His faithfulness.

This is my dwelling place… my abiding place… my resting place…my refuge.

(I will be at UVA tomorrow–Thursday–for the afternoon for testing. It will be several weeks before we know results. Would you praise God with me that we learned the test will be covered 100% by insurance?! Would you pray for our hearts while we wait for results… that our waiting would not be on results, but on God?)