Discombobulation

I'm sick. Be forewarned, this post has no rhyme or reason whatsoever. Just my thoughts in all their randomness.

We took the boys bowling for a special birthday treat this past weekend. We had gone one other time with Josh's family, and it wasn't a big deal to them. For some reason this time, ALL of the kids loved it! Amazingly, the youngest consecutively scored the highest! Nathan especially seems to be a natural born bowler. It runs in my side of the family. Ha ha!

I forgot the camera, and I could kick myself. Isaac was SO. CUTE. After he would roll the ball he'd turn around and run away, turn sideways, then with hands clasped excitedly under his chin, he's watch the ball roll the rest of the way. If he got a spare or a strike (which was ridiculously often) he'd go around giving everybody "five" putting his whole body into it. It was adorable. He's got his Daddy's competitive streak.

{I got my house all cleaned up yesterday so that I could share pictures of the great room, and the new kitchen floor, and then forgot to take the pictures. Go me! Maybe later today, if this feeling of my head being stuffed with cotton goes away.}

After rereading my previous post on answers to prayer I realized that I forgot to share one of the most important ones. My mother-in-love was diagnosed with breast cancer in the fall of 2007. She had known since the first part of the year that she had it, but because of her mother's painful death from it did not want to face an official diagnosis. It's one thing to think you have cancer and quite another to KNOW that you do.

After the biopsy they did to determine whether it was malignant or benign, the cancer rapidly spread to other organs. By the time they had made the decision to treat it naturally and had found a doctor, it was apparent in her stomach, pancreas, lungs, small intestine, and liver. The prognosis was devastating.

She commenced a special diet, sleeps under a special light every night, and takes numerous nutritional supplements. I so appreciate her level of self-discipline. She has never once acted in any way deprived as all of us have indulged in things she is forbidden to have. By the grace of God, she is only seeing her doctor once every three months instead of monthly, and her numbers are the best they have ever been and continue to improve. Because she has lost so much weight, she looks younger and fit. Just beautiful.

Her diagnosis and my mom and dad's trial directly coincided with Josh rededicating his life to the LORD. We were extremely busy with church and family life, and there were times when we felt utterly overwhelmed. It seemed that God had removed His hand from our life, and let the devil reek havoc on us.

But God is faithful. He promises He will never leave nor forsake us, and so many other things of comfort ~ and He never breaks a promise. Even then, we would have poignant moments of clarity, as if really seeing life from God's perspective, and those moments were worth everything we were going through and more. I can testify that even in the valley, God is good, faithful, and true. We knew it at the time, and we know it even better now. We don't have to fear anything. Not the past, present or future. He knows it all! We can trust Him with it. He holds our hand; even carries us through it all for His glory and our good.

God says 365 times in the Bible "do not fear". I think He means it.