Faith and Fear

For a couple of weeks now I have felt like I needed to write about "fear". But I just felt like God was telling me it wasn't the right time. Well tonight, while at church, I felt it very clearly laid on my heart to write about fear but also include the faith factor in this as well.

I have been very honest about the fear that Jason and I have felt during this ordeal. I can tell you when the doctor first told me that he thought I had Lymphoma I felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. There was no way this was happening to me. I forced myself to listen to his words and take in as much information as I could. I forced myself not to cry. You see, I have had lots of practice at that throughout my life.

The icing on the cake was when my oldest son was born with some very serious special needs at birth and after going through 6 surgeries with him, I have learned to control my emotions at all cost in order for me to get the information I needed to make the decisions I needed to make. Then I would break down later. This situation was no different. My life's training kicked in.

I remember deliriously walking down the hall to the waiting room and rounding the corner to see my sister and her husband along with two of our closest friends holding my baby girl. I could not hold it in any more. The fear gripped me. I buried my face in my hands and sobbed quietly. At that moment I lived in fear and fear alone. My only prayer over and over again was, "God, please don't let me die."

That night was a rough one to say the least. I was controlled by fear. It consumed me. It owned every thought that went through my mind. Then I began to realize what it was doing. It was robbing me of the faith that I so desperately needed to have at that time in God and God alone. If there was ever a time that I needed to have faith, it was now. So, I changed my prayers. I sought God in all that I did and I surrendered it all to Him. I literally visualized giving Him every last breath in my body, every heartbeat, everything....all to God, no questions asked.

I also remembered a phrase that Maryann, the women's pastor at my church had told me during some coaching that I had done with her. She had told me that FEAR = False. Evidence. Appearing. Real. This may be confusing to some as I was being diagnosed with cancer and that is pretty real. But I wasn't afraid of the cancer. I was afraid of the unknown and my God is the known. I know Him. I know His heart condition for me. I know His love for me. I have said it time and time again, my thoughts would go right to Jeremiah 29:11. Once I began to lay down this fear and think rationally about the things I knew to be true, God was so faithful to me once again and granted me the most intense peace I have ever known in my life. A conviction that I knew I would be okay and I carry that peace with me still today.

The reason that I am talking so openly about this is that when I talk to some people that I am particularly close with, and some that I am not, I can see the fear in their eyes. I can sense it when they talk. I can read it in their actions. I just want to say, don't be fearful for me and my future. I am in the Lord's hands. The true fear would have been if I did not believe in God and had to walk this out alone and faithless. That would have been the true tragedy.