A Day to Fast and Pray

I participated in "A Day to Fast and Pray" on April 4, 2020; an event put together by The Gospel Coalition.

Morning prayer - This was time to pray alone and reflect on Psalm 27.
Midday prayer - This was time to pray together with others; either family, neighbors, and/or friends.
Evening prayer - This segment was streamed live online so that the entire world could share this time together in prayer.

The morning prayer.
     I was really excited about setting this time aside to spend alone with God, my Heavenly Father. Although I realize that I can do this anytime I just felt like it was scheduled and therefore I would definitely use that time period for that purpose. I usually spend the drive to and from work with God, telling Him about me, praying for others, asking questions, but since I'm home now, I haven't gotten into a daily routine of doing that and it needs to be a priority. So my hope was that this would jumpstart my prayer time at home. This whole week is going to be an experiment in how best to accomplish things each day and how to schedule and prioritize while I'm stuck at home. I do like all of this time at home, but I just feel the need to make the most out of it before I have to go back to the way things were (if that's even going to happen; I believe everything will be very different after this). Unfortunately, that's putting a lot of unnecessary pressure on myself and that gives me anxiety which leads to a whole bunch of other stuff. So, I need to find a balance.
     So, back to what I was intending to write here...my morning prayer time was wonderful and my big takeaway from this was love and compassion for others. This wasn't the time to talk to Him about me. This was a time to talk to Him about everybody. One of the topics was to pray for specific fears and the first thing that came to me was that this very well could be the end times and so my fear is for my loved ones who aren't saved. I can't imagine them spending eternity in hell. It worries me so much; I just plead with the Father that He chooses them for salvation and send someone to them who will be able to lift the veil.
     I'm also fearful for those who are persecuted. Times like these can bring out the worst in people.
Lastly, I fear for those who have no money right now who are waiting for unemployment to work out the glitches and for the stimulus checks to be distributed.
     I also prayed and thought about, if these are the end times (and we might as well imagine they are) what's most important in our lives? Money and possessions aren't important except to provide necessities for life. Like I read once, you never see a U-Haul hitched to the back of a Hearst. (In other words, you can't take it with you). Therefore, what's most important? If you knew that today was our last day on Earth, what would you do? Personally, I'd spend that time with my loved ones, emphatically preaching that Jesus is our Lord and Savior, that if they had any inkling of the great sacrifice Jesus made for each and every one of us, they would fall to their knees and cry out to Him.
     Only God our Father knows the time of Jesus' return and so we need to treat each day as if it could be our last one here. We should be all about gathering more souls for heaven.
     I wrote at the end of my personal prayer time:
Being isolated, it's easy to focus on me. Through prayer, devotionals, being in His Word, I've worked through my anxieties (not completely) and anger/frustration and am turning outward to focus on others and to deepen my relationship with the Lord.

The midday prayer
     I was able to join with some of my church family through Zoom. We talked about what's going on in our lives, how all of this world stuff has affected each of us. We laughed together and cried together. We prayed.
     What I took away from this experience is that no matter what we're going through, we as Christians see all of this struggle as an opportunity to draw closer to Him. We see it as a time when our Father is pulling His children closer to Him; He's holding onto us, loving us. He's also tightening relationships among His Church as we reach out to one another and try to meet needs. He's allowing the world to see His character through us by allowing us to reside in this difficult situation and yet we share messages of hope and love and trust in Him.

The evening prayer
     My husband and I watched the simulcast along with millions of other Christians around the globe. I felt a connection to the church body. The people who prayed shared heartfelt desires and pleas and praises trusting in the sovereignty of the one true Living God. We know we'll get through this. We know that God is using this for His purposes and it will end in His time. He is good and just. He loves His children deeply and wants us to love Him with every fiber of our being. We need to hold onto each other, hold onto Him. He is our hope.

Challenge
     At the end of the evening prayer segment, Jeremy Treat encouraged everyone to make a video with the hashtag #JesusChangedMyLife to share during Holy Week. Jesus is constantly working in my life and constantly changing my life as I grow in Him. So, this may seem like it's full of rabbit trails, and I'm sorry it's so long, but here goes (you may have already seen it since I posted it alone on social media):

If you want to talk to me, you can reach-out through any of my social media accounts or email me at archadia7@yahoo.com and we'll set up a way to talk either on the phone or WhatsApp or Zoom, etc...
Or you can reach out to our church's helpline: 937-770-9875. Leave a message and one of our Pastors will call you back.
If you're in search of a church service for this upcoming Resurrection Sunday, visit TheRidgeChurch.net

Updates

I've been away for the last several months (hopefully, someone has noticed), but now I'm back, barring any other life-altering, shattering, overwhelming-ness events in the near future.
Sometime in May, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was a whole lot of hurry up and wait which is very draining on the entire family, but in the end, we realize that everyone we've talked to, dealt with, seen, within the healthcare community has been absolutely wonderful. I'm partial to Kettering Health Network in Kettering, Ohio because that's where I received such excellent care when I had breast cancer. I think they are absolutely the best! I have yet to meet even one person there who didn't give 110% all the time!

While all of this was going on, I had a breast MRI as a follow-up with my cancer care and it showed something suspicious. In the end, it was nothing, but I had to go back for an MRI guided needle biopsy which is double horrible for a person who is claustrophobic, like me. So, there's scheduling, waiting for the results, and a million things racing through my mind. It's really difficult to just "wait". Waiting is an unintentional cruelty that must be endured when it comes to testing and diagnosing. I knew from past experience that the best thing I could do for myself was to keep busy and try not to dwell on it, but that was just impossible. At the same time trying to be there for my mom and what she was going through often meant trying to minimize what I was really thinking and feeling. Everything else just got put on the back burner and I finally feel like I can start moving forward again.

My mom is doing great and is currently in her first week of estrogen blockers, so we'll see how that goes. So far, she's been getting headaches from it, but I'm hoping she gives it a couple of weeks before giving up on it since some side effects do lessen over time.

Anyway, this is a short, and probably dis-connected little post about what I've been up to. There's so much to write about all of this...breast cancer touches so many families. So, hopefully I will stick with following through on writing about my experiences and my mother's because our two cancers were completely different from one another.

Pelotonia

From their facebook page:

"Pelotonia is a grass roots bike tour with One Goal: End Cancer. 100% of all Rider raised donations support innovative and life saving cancer research."

A client of mine, who is also a breast cancer survivor, is participating in the Pelotonia Aug. 8th - 10th. Her goal is to bicycle 50 miles to raise money for cancer research. 100% of every dollar raised goes directly toward Cancer Research. Their goal is to END CANCER.

Click the link for information about her, the ride, and to donate:  Cassandra's Pelotonia Page

Please share this link with others who might be able to help.

Cancer sucks.  Let's annihilate it!

Thank you.

I had a lump

I wrote the other day that one of the things that happened within the past year is that 2 of my new mother-in-laws passed away.  The first one, DH's real mom, was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer just a few days before our wedding.  When she went to the hospital, it was obvious that the cancer had spread to her bones because she broke a bone in her arm (or maybe it was her shoulder) just by climbing into bed.  Within a week and a half, she past away.  No one will ever know if she knew she had breast cancer, and for how long, but she never said anything about it to anyone.  My thought is that she didn't want to do anything about it, and if she told her family, she would be pressured to go through chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

After my first husband died of colon cancer, I had made up my mind that if I ever got cancer, I wouldn't go through all of that.  His quality of life didn't seem very good, and although it gave him an extra year of life, he went through so much.  But, things I say "I'll never" to, usually change very quickly under the right circumstances.  A couple of weeks after my wedding, and after my mother-in-law passed away, I found a lump.  I was pretty sure that it was nothing because I was very good about going for yearly mammograms, but I immediately made an appointment with my gynecologist, just to be safe.  I didn't want to wait another 2 to 3 months until my yearly exam.  I know so many people who are of the mindset that if they ignore it, maybe it will go away.  Knowing me, I would be out of my mind with worry, because, not knowing is so much harder than knowing - no matter what the outcome.

First, I went to my gynecologist, who confirmed there were a few lumps, actually, and she set up an appointment for me to have a mammogram and an ultrasound.  She said, chances were that it was just some cysts, so not to worry.  I went through the mammogram and the technician said that I was full of cysts.  I went from there to the ultrasound where the technician said the same thing.  She didn't see any cancer, just cysts.  After the appointment, I was to wait while she sent the film to a radiologist to look over.  They discussed it briefly over the phone.  She came out to the waiting room and told me the radiologist thought they looked like cysts, also.  I took that as the final word on the matter and didn't think any more about it.

To be continued ...

(This is the first post in a series about my breast cancer.  I hope they are helpful to others going through the same thing.  To find additional posts I've written on breast cancer, click here.)

Whatta Year!

Actually, it should be "whatta year and a half!"  My last post was January, 2013, and I think that must have been my last "normal" day.  The short and sweet version is that in the past year & a half, I have:  traveled to Romania, Switzerland, Virginia, and Hawaii, bought a new house, got married in it the day after closing, lost 2 mother-in-laws, the first one was 5 days after we got married.  Within a month of getting married, found out I had breast cancer.  Since then, I've had internal radiation, chemotherapy, and external radiation.  The chemotherapy wraps up this coming October.  Because of all of this, I had to drop out of school (again!)  And, I just found out Friday, that my 13 1/2 year old beagle has kidney disease' oh, and an eye and ear infection.

Those are just the highlights, and although they may sound mostly negative, they really aren't.  I have been very blessed through all of this, and have come through it all a much better person.  I'll elaborate on all of these things bit by bit.  I really miss writing, and although I still write in my journal/diary frequently, I miss the interaction of a blog.