With the season of spring upon us, we are encouraged and look forward to a new time in our lives; a time that includes renewal, new hope and a new beginning. As we reflect back over the last six months, we are awed at how the Lord has worked in our lives. From those early, dark days of a frightening and horrifying diagnosis to the last few weeks of hearing the word “remission”, anticipating spring and a new beginning in our lives, we have seen the hand of God over and over again. We have learned to trust in Him on a whole different level. We have learned the lessons of patience as we waited on Him to provide. We have experienced His great love for us in so many ways. Our family has been drawn closer together as we weathered the effects of this illness and trusted in God for his goodness to us. We have been overwhelmed by those people who were sent our way to help us through this ordeal in so many practical ways, from providing meals and child care to help with yard work and housework. We have a new sense of compassion for those in difficult times and have been given wonderful examples of how to help others. The number of people who interceded on our behalf was amazing, and it is difficult to describe the encouragement that brought us. Thank you for all your support and care.
Over the last few Sundays at church, we have been studying the life of David, “a man after God’s own heart.” Just as David fought the giant, Goliath, we have giants in our lives that we must also fight. They might be things such as addictions, loneliness, grief or fear. In fighting our giants, we were reminded that we need to put forth effort and action, but we must wholly lean on God for courage, and His completion in killing our giants. In preparation for a Sunday service, Jim was asked if he would be willing to share with our congregation, through videotape, how he handled his fears as he faced the diagnosis of Acute Myeloid Leukemia. If you would like to hear that sermon, you can find it here: http://www.emmanuelcommunity.org/resources.html. The title of the sermon is "The People of the Battle" dated March 22, 2009. As a closing post to this blog, we want to share Jim’s testimony with you which was presented at the end of that sermon.
