October 28, 2009
Cells Calming Down (Specifics of Treatment)
We are beginning the fourth week after surgery and my surgeon and oncologist say I am healing very well. I have been able to get two tubes out which was a wonderful relief. The right side is still producing more fluid than my body could absorb so they will stay in (for another week or so. My main struggle here is that they do not want to start radiation until two weeks after my tubes come out so it looks like I will not be done before Christmas with all my treatment. Let’s hope for being done before the new year!!!! I found out today that some women have tubes in for three months so I am thankful that will probably not be the case for me as the levels continue to go down. My activity is still limited and will be even for a few weeks after the tubes come out as they want me to resume slowly as fluid can still build up. We met our radiologist and like him very much. He thinks it might be OK for me to swim during radiation which would be a real blessing for me, even if all I can do is jog in the pool it is a great stress reliever for me.
My mom left last Tuesday and my dear friend Janet (Auntie Janet or JB) who is an oncology nurse, came that night and spent five days with us. We met at Multnomah, have been friends for 26 years and she fits right into our family very well. So God has provided some very personal and professional care for us during recovery.
Tim was sick the week before with the flu and seems to have had a relapse starting Sunday night which I am trying not to panic about. Having him be compromised has added to my sense of vulnerability. It has simply been a season of much trial but we feel very blessed by God at the same time.

Before the Face of God (Personal Meditations)

O, Lord, my heart is not proud, nor my eyes haughty;
Nor do I involve myself in great matters,
Or in things too difficult for me.
Surely I have composed and quieted my soul;
Like a weaned child rests against his mother,
My soul is like a weaned child within me.
O Israel, hope in the Lord
From this time forth and forever.
I am memorizing and meditating on Psalm 131. In my forced inactivity I have become aware of much inward “noise”, most of which is not very pleasant. I am so thankful God is committed to our sanctification and growth and in his mercy is shutting me up to be faced with my own heart and attitudes which are not conformed to Him. Mainly I am confessing pride which is at the root of discontent. It is amazing to me how many times I respond to challenging circumstances thinking I know what is best for me and questioning God’s goodness and wisdom. This Psalm has been a quiet place to rest my soul and to pray that God would make it a reality in my heart. How wonderful to be able to get to the place of being like a contented and weaned child even in the midst of unsettling circumstances.
I have been blessed with many great books, one of which is Brave New Family by G.K. Chesterton. His series of essays on Men, Women, Children, Sex, Divorce and the Family contain lucid insights on the sacredness of the family as God ordained it and the modern attacks on it. In one of his essays titled “The True Victorian Hypocrisy” he gave me tools to battle with in my current situation and spoke to a subject dear to my heart; education.
“ The most essential educational product is Imagination. It is a wandering and even wild Imagination that all schools should chiefly instruct all school-children. For Imagination will teach them how to live a quiet and humdrum life.
This simple truth is now much neglected both by the fashionable and the old-fashioned. The way to make people contented is to make them creative, not to make them barren. I have no desire to lock people up in the parlour or the pantry, or deny them excursions and excitements. But it is strictly true that the larger is their Imagination, the less they will mind being locked up in the parlour; or, for that matter, in the coal-cellar. The child who can see the pictures in the fire will need less to see the pictures on the film. The man who can make up stories about the next-door neighbour will be the less dependent upon the next day’s newspaper. So long as the minds of the poor were perpetually stirred and enlivened by ghost-stories, fairy-stories and legends of wild and wonderful things, they remained comparatively contented; possibly too contented, but still contented. The moment modern science and instruction stopped all these things, we had a Labour Question and the huge discontent of today. Both for good and evil, but especially for good, it is Imagination that keeps people quiet.
On the other hand dull people always want excitement. Three quarters of the real luxury or prodigality or profligacy, that is complained of just now, is due to the dullness of people who cannot imagine anything they do not experience. They are so miserably and dismally stupid that they actually have to do things. They are so poor in spirit that they have to have things. They have to have a flying-machine fitted up with every luxury, because they cannot send their souls up while flying a kite. They have to be in a racing car in order to believe that it really races. If this principle of the inner life were understood, we might today restore the sanity of civilization; and especially the poetry of the home.”
Thank you G.K. for showing me the wonderful opportunity this period of my life is giving me to recapture my imagination, to spend an hour gazing into the fire and making up stories, to listen to the Narnia stories on tape, to make up rhymes, to imagine what heaven is going to be like, to picture all the people I know as stars shining in the sky as I pray for them, to use my imagination, not to worry, but to create.

Please join me in Praise and Thanksgiving
*Praise God for His faithful, intimate, personal care
*Praise God for sustaining us by His Word and His Spirit
*Thank you to all who have provided meals, help and who have prayed so faithfully
*Please pray that God would allow good health to reign in our home again for Tim, the boys and myself
*Please pray that we will continue to make God;s word and prayer priorities in our lives as we resume our normal responsibilities
*Please pray for continued healing from surgery, for contentment with the schedule for radiation and for stamina during radiation
*Please pray that faith, hope, love and joy would reign in our hearts

October 13, 2009
Cells Hopefully Behaving Again (Specifics of Treatment)
Wahoo! Surgery is behind us! It went extremely well and I am physically healing very well. I am off all pain medications. I was not prepared for the enormous impact of the procedure on my sense of physical, emotional and spiritual well being. I am bound up very tightly in the chest and it is a very oppressive and claustrophobic feeling. It is hard to relax or feel comfortable but it is important to keep this bandage on until all my drains are out. I feel a huge sense of grief which I think will just take time to get over so I am trying to be patient. Having to keep my arms perfectly quiet means I have no stress relief such as swimming or doing household tasks. Because I don’t do a lot physically during the day it is hard to sleep at night and it is very hard to get comfortable. It feels a bit like post traumatic stress syndrome!!!
In the midst of all this I am being extremely well cared for. Tim remains a most dear and faithful husband. He looks at me lovingly, tells me I am beautiful and says “Now I can hug you even closer!” Sigh! True love beats romanticism any time. My dear friend Sue who is a nurse from Wenatchee came to be with us in the hospital. We realized we have been friends for 26 years and though we have lived apart since our years at Multnomah School of the Bible God has woven our lives together in many ways through the years. Her son got married last year to Amber and my recovery nurse immediately after surgery was Amber’s aunt! She is a Christian and said I was an inspiration to her which goes to show God works best through our weakness because I have no recollection of anything I said or did but I know I was not feeling very chipper!
A friend from church has faithfully come over to help with my dressings, bring us eggs from her chickens and freshly baked healthy bread and muffins. Margaret comes by daily and does whatever needs doing as well as teaching me to play piano. Mom continues to cook and clean daily with an amazingly cheerful attitude. When she filled in to change my dressings I made her promise if I let her take on this task she would let me help her someday if she is ill or infirm. Somehow I don’t think she will be as docile of a patient as I am!!! She agreed though. Dear mothers from the Oaks filled my freezer with casseroles so that has helped a lot with the meals. I know many many others are faithfully praying and are respecting our request to keep things very quiet around here to help me rest and heal.
This forced isolation was not sufficient to keep the flu out of our midst. Tim came down with some form on Thursday night and was in bed for three days straight. This has meant no hugs, keeping far apart and sleeping in separate rooms. In addition to this he started Jury duty on Monday!! As my friend whose son has Leukemia said when I told her this….OF COURSE! It seems she has experienced this same clustering of inconveniences during her son’s treatment.
It is looking like two of my drains will be able to come out in a week but two will probably stay in longer. Until then no showers. UGG!!!

Before the Face of God (Personal Meditations)
In the midst of all this I am still keenly aware of God’s intimate involvement and care. The other night I was asking Him to help me get at the root of my grief. It seems to be much bigger than just the results of surgery. His word came to me with such force it almost seemed to be an audible voice, though it wasn’t. The truth “I came that you might have life and have it more abundantly” resonated through me. I went to sleep meditating on this and asking Him to show me what constitutes this abundant life. I didn’t seem to be experiencing it!!!
The next day as I continued to meditate on the verse and read a pamphlet on suffering by a Christian counselor I realized that many of the losses in life are things which we think are what constitute LIFE. This summer I have had friends who have children with cancer, have lost a son, have had a major heart attack and the list goes on. I also know of people who seem to have everything yet are still despondent, angry, sad and unsatisfied. I began to understand that if we try to find LIFE anywhere outside of Jesus we will be disappointed. If a good gift of God is taken away from us and we thought it was the source of LIFE our grief will be much greater than simply losing something that gave us great pleasure.. My grief has been lifted a bit as I ponder that, in the midst of loss and suffering, I have abundant life.
Yet, how do I appropriate it? By claiming all He has promised me in His word because I am His child. I have started praying the promises daily. I think many times we live as paupers not realizing what a great inheritance has been given us in Christ. I look forward to God opening my spiritual eyes to what this abundant life is I have in Christ. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ (Ephesians1:3)
The other HUGE lesson that seems so hard to learn is just BEING. I don’t realize how much my identity is based on doing until I am forced to BE STILL while others joyfully minister to me and show me such love. It seems humiliating to me yet God wants me to just receive it with joy!!! Human pride is so insidious!! I have never felt as vulnerable as I do when my daughter is helping me with my sponge bath and dressings. I call it my daily humiliation. Yet Christ washed his servant’s feet and said if they did not allow him to do it they had no part in him. This takes huge processing within my soul to enjoy being served for so long by so many. Yet God wants to serve us in this way every minute.

Please join me in Praise and Thanksgiving
* THANK YOU DEAR JULIE FOR YOUR DAILY POSTS TO GET ME THROUGH THE FIRST WEEK AFTER SURGERY. MAY GOD RICHLY BLESS YOU!
*Praise God for a successful surgery and such a skilled surgeon. Also for a pathology report which indicated no cancer on the left, none in the lymph nodes on the right, some residual tumor in the right breast but far from the chest wall and very slow growing. This means the chemo did its job systemically and having the mastectomy was a good decision to get the rest of the tumor out!
*Praise God for His continued unceasing ministry to us through His word, His Spirit and His people.
*please pray that my fluid levels will go down so I can get the drains out soon.
*Please pray for my dear father who will be having surgery to take some cancer out of his bladder and to explore a small tumor in his pancreas
*Please pray for Tim’s mom as she struggles with health issues
*Please pray that I will learn the lessons God has for me from being still, receiving His love unconditionally and believing all He has given me for abundant life.
*Please pray that God continues to strengthen my primary caregivers and all those who have come alongside us
*PLEASE PRAY THAT GOD WILL USE THIS TO FURTHER HIS KINGDOM AND BRING GLORY TO HIS NAME

Cancer Survivors in the Grand Tetons

Enjoying God's creation in Yellowstone

September 29, 2009,
Cells Hopefully Behaving Again (Specifics of Treatment)
I have been enjoying a season of “relative” quiet with more time for reflection and processing all that has happened, all God has done and preparing emotionally for surgery. I went through a time of grieving but God has made my heart much lighter this week and I am confident that come Monday morning I will be experiencing all the grace I need to face surgery and accept whatever the outcome is. We will find out then if the chemo did it’s work and should know in a week the pathology reports. I am told that I can do anything I want after surgery as long as I keep my hands in my pockets! They don’t want any arm movement while the drainage tubes are in so hopefully if I am a good girl the tubes will come out earlier rather than later. It could be anywhere from 1-4 weeks.
God continues to encourage me through His word and His people. Today I met with a woman whose daughter goes to Grove City where Joel goes. She had the same procedure I will be having in a year for reconstruction. She unabashedly showed me the results and it is amazing what nice results they get! So after all of this deconstruction I will be looking forward to reconstruction in a year.

Before the Face of God (Personal Meditations)
I met with ten women last week to begin a study on biblical femininity. I came away realizing that if I had not had breast cancer I would not have met with Stacey Miller this summer who came weekly to help me and wanted to study the word together, I would not have been introduced to the Five Aspects of Womanhood material she wanted to study,. I would not have felt so assaulted in my femininity and been so motivated to continue studying and we would not have our wonderful group!!! Just one example of the many “good things” God has brought out of my trial. We have been studying the Lord’s Prayer in Sunday school and I have been helped by being reminded of the difference in God’s Decreed will and His Declared will. I realized that my struggle is mainly with His Decreed will or His Secret Will which comes to us moment by moment in all the providences He sends our way. I have trouble trusting that ALL is meant for my good. Studying the differences has helped me to pray more in line with God’s will and brought me much peace. Thank you to our brother Dr. Bennett for such clear teaching on this and for the following chart.

Secret Will of God
1. The Decreed Will of God
2. Decrees of God
3. Found in the Mind of God
4. What God is doing
5.God surely performs
6.Absolutely shall be done
7.Done perfectly by God
8. Irresistible
9.Violation is impossible
10.Responsible party is God
11.Object of this will is an event
12. We cannot know
13. We need not know
14. Sinful man wants to know
15. Is for us to accept
16. Unconditional

We pray for grace
To accept whatever God brings

Related scriptures (2 Corinthians 1:1,Ephesians 1:5, John 6:39-40,Psalm 115:3,Isaiah 46:9-11, Romans 8:27)

Revealed Will for Man
1.The Declared will of God
2.Law or Commandments of God
3.Found in the Word of God
4.What man should be doing
5.Man ought to perform
6.Absolutely should be done
7.Done imperfectly by us
8.Resistible
9.Violation is sin
10.Responsible party: man
11.Object of this will is a duty
12.We can know
13.We need to know
14.Sinful man doesn’t want to know
15.Is for us to DO
16.Conditional

We pray for grace
To DO whatever God commands

Related Scriptures (Mark 3:35,Romans 12:1-2,Ephesians 6:6,1 Thessalonians 4:3,1 John 2:17,1 Thessalonians 5:18)
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Pastor Edward Elton describes the revealed will of God and then His secret will this way “By doing God’s will is first signified a yielding of obedience to God in all things that He, in His written Word, requires to be done of us and by us; it is also the submitting of ourselves unto Him willingly, in all things whatsoever he lays upon us to be suffered of us and by us. We are to resolve before such things be laid upon us, to suffer them patiently when they come, whatsoever they shall be and, when they are on us, quieting ourselves, and resting contented in the good will and pleasure of God therein revealed.”

This is where it gets hard, when we suffer illness or tragedy, to rest contented that this is the good will and pleasure of God. But the peaceable fruit of righteousness which comes after we have suffered for awhile is that slowly we begin to realize the deep, rich goodness He brings as His grace is made perfect in our weakness, confusion, pain and feeble attempts at obedience. Our daily battle to exercise faith when we cannot see or feel His presence results in a faith muscle that is big and strong. We also come to know Him more intimately which is one of the greatest blessings we can receive.
I am also struck with how most of our prayers are to change His decreed will to fit our will. I am motivated to pray more that I will obey His revealed will in the midst of suffering under His decreed will that I might bring Him glory and become more like Him.

Please join me in Thanksgiving and Petitions
*Thank God for the opportunity to minister to a friend battling cancer
*Thank God for this season of grieving and healing
*Thank God for keeping us all healthy so far (No swine flu yet!)
*Please pray that God will help us to accept His will as to whether I am cancer free at the end of treatment or not
*Please pray that we would all have a zeal for God, His word and His righteousness and that we would love Him and His will above all else.
*Please pray that He would protect me during and after surgery and that I will use my time well with my hands in my pockets
*Please pray for Tim and my family as they minister to me and we all adjust to the next phase of treatment*Please pray for my sister in law’s extended family who live in the Philippines and who were hard hit by the Typhoon