Dec 18
If only I hadn’t missed that one little step on the deck, fallen and broken my wrist fourteen months ago. If only that tumble didn’t cause a nerve injury, greatly impeding my recovery and still needing prescription pain relief. If only all the trauma didn’t bring on tachycardia, requiring a complete cardiac workup and lifestyle …
Dec 04
Guest blog by Julie Coleman author/speaker/teacher/cancer survivor http://juliecoleman.org Is God more moved to answer our requests by persistence? If we pray hard enough or long enough will that increase our chance of getting the answer we are hoping for? How persistent is enough? Praying for something 20 times? Fifty times? Five times a day? Ten? The …
Nov 13
Illness helps you sort out who your real friends are. Often people you never realized cared for you step up and provide incredible support. And then there are those on whom you counted but they fail to come through for you. My friend Kristie expected to get some words of healing and blessing when she …
Oct 30
I know many of you have suspected this about me for quite some time. Certainly my husband has. But now it’s confirmed in black-and-white. I have a screw loose. In the interest of full disclosure, I must tell you that this is not an x-ray of my loose screw. There wasn’t time to get a copy …
Sep 25
Have the trials of life caused you to doubt God? Are you wondering why He hasn’t shown up in answer to your fervent prayers? “Doubt rises up to obscure His presence and disillusionment settles into despair,” writes Dr. James Dobson in When God Doesn’t Make Sense. “The greatest frustration is knowing that (God) created the …
Sep 11
I distinctly remember the last time my family and I went tent camping…and why we never did again after that experience. It was the summer of 1983 and my pastor-husband convinced me that it would be fun for our daughters and me to join him on the youth group camping trip. So I packed up …
Aug 28
When you believe in God, it can be hard to come to terms with the fact that He has allowed adversity to come into your life or your loved one’s. Author David Biebel talks about this fact in his book If God Is So Good, Why Do I Hurt So Bad? Biebel says there are …
Aug 14
As I was reading in the book of Hosea about how God promised to “transform the Valley of Trouble into a gateway of hope,” I couldn’t help but think of my friend Lauren. His cancer journey has been an incredible roller coaster with hopes dashed one minute and unexpected new hopes found the next. I hope the …
Jul 31
In those nerve-wracking few days between my diagnosis and my surgery, I announced to my husband, “We need a pastor—and I don’t mean you!” I think he could tell by the distraught look on my face that I was serious, so he called our good friend David Dunn, pastor of a sister church in …
Jul 03
Twenty-nine years ago if I had heeded this quote from the creator of Peanuts, I could have saved myself many sleepless nights. I was pretty consumed back then with trying to figure out how a healthy-eating-and-exercising-mom in her thirties could get cancer. Especially colon cancer for crying out loud! Colonoscopies aren’t even recommended for the …
