What I Know For Sure...

             "God has YOU in the palm
                of His Almighty Hand!"

Some days I am left speechless. Speechless as I contemplate God's
love.  Speechless as I contemplate God's glory. Speechless as I experience God's grace.

Speechless as I see so much hurt right in front of me.

Lord, what am I to do?
What would You have me do?
What would You have me say?

I was waiting for the phone call. When it didn't come, I went to my
planner to check the date again. Yes, this was the day. Wednesday,
March 21st. I had written it in red ink in my planner. 

This was the day my dear friend was to get her test results.
The doctor had lovingly issued a warning of sorts.
"You need to have your family here," he said.

We had talked on the phone about the test.
She knew something was very wrong.
After all, she had spend a good part of the last
twenty years in battle. An unseen enemy that had taken a terrific toll. Yet she was still here. Full of faith. Full of belief in Him.

Eileen's faith is like a rock. It is unbending. It is sure. It has held her up through some mighty storms over the last twenty some years that I have known her. It has nourished her in the good times and reassured her in some awful times. I can't tell you how many times she has told me, very simply with such knowing...
                       "Linda, He is with me. I trust Him."

Eileen's faith reminds me of the old song....
          "Oh the deep, deep love of Jesus. Vast unmeasured boundless 
            free. Rolling as a mighty ocean, in it's stillness, over me."
       
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vUhwyjdk8A

When I first got to know Eileen, she was battling breast cancer.
Her son was going to marry my daughter and she wanted to be here for that wedding. She was having chemo and losing her hair and probably feeling a bit vulnerable as the wedding approached. Yet
the deep, deep love of Jesus carried her through, it held her up.
It gave her an unstoppable courage. She was there at that wedding.
She was there for the birthdays and children born. And when cancer came back again. She fought and she fought. Jesus held her up. God gave her strength. She trusted Him.

She trusted Him then and she trusts Him now.

Yet she knew something had changed over the past several years as she lost more and more ability to move her arm. Her body just didn't work like it used to. And then the other arm started to go.
The doctor gave her test after test and threw around some options of what it might be... 

Could the cancer be back? Was it ALS? What was going on?

They did a battery of tests and the results would come in last Wednesday, March 21st. We had talked on the phone and I had been on my knees praying, asking God to spare her. 

"She has been through so much already, Lord. Please, please heal her. Please have this be something fixable."

Yet the words that came next were only a whisper. "No matter what this is God, please be with her."

What came next, with her family surrounding her, was a diagnosis
of ALS. It's hard to know what to say after hearing those ominous three letters. After all, our whole Spokane community embraces 
our very own Steve Gleason who has and is battling ALS. We have seen how this illness has impacted him, has impacted his young family.

We have seen the white flags with Steve's name on them at races like the Coeur de Alene marathon. They say, "No surrender!"

Yet when Eileen heard those letters, I think God just held her in the palm of His almighty hand. She is praying for a miracle, in whatever form God has that take. 

And her faith? Oh, the faith of my dear friend. As the song says...
         
         "Oh the deep, deep love of Jesus. Vast unmeasured, boundless 
           free. Rolling as a mighty ocean, in its fullness over me."

No matter what comes next, and down the road, we are praying for a miracle. A miracle in whatever form God chooses to send it.

What I know for sure is that God will be with her every step of the way. And when she may no longer be able to make those steps, He will carry her. Carry her as He has always done.

Would you please hold up my dear friend Eileen Thompson in your prayers? Thank you.

God Bless!
Love, Linda