It’s easy to believe in a good outcome when signs indicate victory.
I’m a hockey fan. I get very tense when my team plays and the score is tight. However, if we get a three-goal lead I relax a little because winning seems more likely. (does the word pessimist come to mind?)
However, if my team is down a goal in the third, I am definitely a glass-half-empty person. I lose hope.
Two weeks ago, I felt like victory was within our grasp in regards to Jasmine’s leukaemia battle. She had made it through her second round of chemo, we were officially halfway toward the cure, she was feeling good, and we were celebrating.
Then the other shoe dropped.
I got my second bad cold since her diagnosis two months ago. My first cold kept me from seeing Jasmine for three weeks. My current virus has barred me for a week and it’s far from over.
Meanwhile, Jasmine took a turn for the worse. She is fighting a bacterial infection, a mysterious cough, a reactionary rash, headache, nausea, loss of appetite and all at a time when she has no white blood cells to fight for her.
Once again, my heart was gripped with fear.
Jasmine’s my first grandchild. Her arrival ushered me into a season that completely caught me by surprise. I was 50 and not yet an empty nester when Jasmine was born. Our youngest son was still at home and I had not had the opportunity to “long for” a new season of nurturing. Frankly, I was looking forward to a reprieve!
So when I saw that tiny little face as she was pulled/pushed into my world, I was astonished at my reaction. My heart burst wide open. It was love at first sight. A rare and beautiful gift.
Jasmine has been a huge part of my everyday life. She lives nearby so it’s easy to be together and we enjoy many of the same things.
It was a long and stressful week as I waited for news from a distance.
Early Saturday morning I drove east into the rising sun to attend a women’s conference. I fished out my sunglasses, pulled down the visor and squinted into the glare. It was glorious, as most sunrises are.
And suddenly it occurred to me that the sun does not rise. Nor set. Sunrise and sunset are misnomers. The sun never moves. It sits in place in the heavens while the earth moves toward it or away from it.
It’s an exact replica of the relationship between God and His creation. God, like the sun, is in His heaven. Never moving. We, like the planets, move around Him. Sometimes tilting toward Him and sometimes shying away.
All last week I tilted toward darkness, afraid and alone.
As of today, nothing has changed in Jasmine’s condition. But I have. I am tilting toward the light.
Today’s early morning reading in John 20 caught my attention because in a few verses Jesus said “Peace to you” three times to His disciples. Something twigged in my brain. I looked up “peace” in the concordance at the back of my Bible and found it.
Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Your heart must not be troubled or fearful.
That great big God spoke personally to me. About my pain. He cares. He knows. I can trust Him.
Hope for the Rest of Us 