Kisses from God...again!

I am writing this with my mind going around and around. I have so much joy and yet such a heavy heart. I want to share the powerful experience of Passion 2010. It was so amazing to watch more than 20,000 college students come together for the common purpose of worshipping and seeking our amazing God. The kids were incredible! I was so moved as I had the wonderful experience of interacting with them, they were happy, polite, calm, respectful! I had so much fun just being around them! To watch the passion they have in their worship was such a blessing to me. God responded to them in a special and powerful way, I have never experienced such a thing. I have been so filled by the experience and I had a front row seat to witness living faith and belief that is more than just words. What an inspiring and challenging week for my personal faith in our powerful, loving, and merciful God. I came home Tuesday night and had an appointment with the surgeon on Wednesday afternoon. That was a strong dose of reality. Being so tired, I'm sure, did not help with how I received all that I heard that day. It was difficult. I was painfully reminded that I will never hear a doctor say that this is finished, the battle is won. That is something I know and I thought I had processed, but clearly I am still a work in progress. My surgery is scheduled for February 23. I was told that I cannot have the beginning of my reconstruction at the time of my masectomy, it will probably be close to a year before that happens. The radiation I have to have is very damaging to the tissue and I need to allow time for healing and rebuilding before I do any reconstruction. In the mean time, I have appointments for a consult with the plastic surgeion, an MRI, and a CT scan. All of this is ground work for my surgery and deciding my continued treatment. I keep being shown that God's grace is sufficient and that it is usually for today. Tomorrow's will come tomorrow! So for today, please pray for my chemo treatment on Monday. Pray that I will be strong and ready for it, that it will do what it is supposed to do, kill cancer. Also, I know that my surgery will, at the very least, remove the lymphnodes on the right side. There is a 20% chance that I will have a swollen arm because of this. I don't really understand all of this, but this swollen arm thing is permanent. I am asking for prayer that I am protected from this side effect. The doctor said that there is an 80% chance that this won't happen. I am the lucky one who got the breast cancer that only 15% of breast cancer is, and only 20% of that cancer is in both breasts, me again. I think you see my point, my hope is clearly not in the numbers, but in the mercy of my God. So I am asking for more grace and protection. As always, I am asking for complete healing from this horrible disease. I ask that you continue to pray, with believing, for God to remove every cancer cell from my body, even the most microscopic cell. I am tired and weary, please pray for God to lift me and encourage me. I ask the same for Mason and the kids; when I am down, please pray that they will not be discouraged. The reality of this very short off season has hit us this week. The appointments we made for all of these scans and consults were worked around the NASCAR schedule. Some of them could not be worked out for Mason to be here. Please pray for our peace and contentment as we continue to persevere on this long journey. I called this "Kisses from God...again!" because I was reminded this week of the gift God gave me in experiencing Him so powerfully at Passion 2010 right before I went for such a difficult visit with the surgeon. I was telling one of our college students about a specific intervention of God at Passion when it struck me that the faith and confidence Louie Giglio showed as he trusted God for His provision in this situation, was exactly the confidence I should have in my God and Savior. I have asked for healing and I do not need the doctors to believe in the impossible, I know that God is faithful and powerful, sovereign over all things. I need to confidently believe Him. Isaiah 43:2 "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they will not overflow you; When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, nor will the flame burn you."