Shake It All Off

The people of the island saw it hanging from his hand and said to each other, “A murderer, no doubt! Though he escaped the sea, justice will not permit him to live.” But Paul shook off the snake into the fire and was unharmed. The people waited for him to swell up or suddenly drop dead. But when they had waited a long time and saw that he wasn’t harmed, they changed their minds and decided he was a god.
Acts 28:4-6 NLT

My pastor taught on this passage recently. Paul - a prisoner. Shipwrecked. Cold, wet and now, snake-bit. But Paul had a purpose and it was beyond being snake bit. A total encouragement to me... no kidding.

My life has been something of a parallel recently. The last week of July, I spent four days in the hospital because my doctor thought I was having a heart attack. Long story short - it was a side effect to a medicine. (Is anyone who knows me shocked by this? SOME day they'll listen to me...) My heart is fine, by the way. They were so surprised. They want me to be in shape. I say round is a shape and it works for me.

However, while they were running all the nuclear tests (I glowed in the dark for the 1st two weeks of August!), they found an abnormality on the right clavicle that was "suspect". Found it July 27th - ONE day before I was able to make the official proclamation of having been cancer-free for one full year. I was mad, sad and scared. They'd already done 3 nuclear tests in 4 days, so they scheduled a full body bone scan 3 weeks later. 

I went on a Friday for the whole body bone scan. They wound up doing two additional spot scans and another CT scan that same day. The results were that there was “something” in/on the bone, but they couldn't determine whether or not it was benign or malignant. They wanted to perform an MRI, but I can't do an MRI without full sedation. And that's not normal procedure, so we had to have approval which involved waiting another four weeks before completing the test. 

Four more weeks of not knowing. Four weeks in which Hurricane Harvey came to visit and brought enough water that spiders and frogs and snakes also came to visit - to the point that I was ready to buy an unblemished male lamb and mark the door posts and lintel... Four weeks of experiencing a literal crash course in coming to the stark realization that I am not in control of those things that affect my life.

However, God is. And He is trustworthy. And He is always God and in control, and He is always good whether or not I like what He's doing. When I finally came to that place of understanding and made the choice that I could and would trust God, no matter what, the peace came. I realized I still have purpose. I'm not done yet. So, I made the conscious decision to lay aside the fear that kept trying to creep up, the doubts that tried to grip me. I was determined through Christ to shake it all off.

Today, I went for the results of the MRI, trusting God no matter what. On my way to work, three of the four songs played on the radio were from my Fight Song playlist I created to help battle the first round of cancer. Two hours later, when I left work to go to my appointment, KSBJ played 3 more of the list. Now, how can you help but be encouraged when the Creator of ALL things takes the time to orchestrate your Fight Song list to be played during times you wouldn't normally listen to the radio?

Oh, and I'm thrilled to report. I am CANCER-FREE.

Prayer:

Father,
          Thank You for Your faithfulness. Thank You for loving me enough to get the most mileage out of my crash course in who is truly in control. Thank You for being in control. Help us to continue to recognize and submit to Your authority in all things. In Jesus' Name we pray, Amen