Happy New Year, Covid and All

I’ve been distracted over the holiday season and haven’t taken the time to blog recently. I guess I have plenty of time now to do so, as I’m holed up in my office/extra room convalescing with Covid-19. Yep, started feeling off on New Year’s Eve day and the home test was strongly positive yesterday – January 1, 2023. (It’ll be easy to remember the date.)

So far my sinuses aren’t feeling as miserable as they did with my first go-round back in February 2021, but it’s definitely in my throat and I have the familiar tickle cough. Woke this morning with aching pain in the right side of my chest that hurts worse when I take a deep breath or move in certain ways, so I’ll have to keep an eye on things. Bloodwork over the past few years has hinted at inflammatory/auto-immune issues though specific tests for lupus and the like come back negative. At any rate, my body seems to like to go on inflammatory overload and Covid is a known inflammatory.

Gods Plans vs. Ours

I’m praying God will help me get through it without too much difficulty. And yet, I was reminded this morning that His will isn’t always our will as I opened an email from my church informing me Covid took the life of a member of our congregation last night. We’d received a prayer request several days ago, as he was hospitalized and very ill. I have no doubt that many have been praying daily for his recovery. Still, he did not recover. He died. Why didn’t God heal him? I don’t know. But God does.

The heart of man plans his way,
but the LORD establishes his steps.

Proverbs 16:9

It’s moments like these that are hard for me to reconcile. This man was a youth pastor of our church many years ago before becoming a lead pastor at another church in the area. After retiring he and his wife came to attend our church again. He was a man of God from all I can tell. And so, as I pray for his wife and their kids and grandkids in their grief, I think to myself, “Death is horrific, and yet he is likely experiencing a level of joy in seeing Jesus in person right now that none of us can even fathom.”

What’s far more difficult for me to consider is all the people who died without knowing Jesus, who aren’t now experiencing that joyful bliss of being together with their Lord forever. What about those who are still alive but are blinded to their need for a savior to wash away their sins and and open that door for them to eternal life in heaven with the Lord, either because they don’t understand their need for Him or they deny having a need at all?

I am not perfect. I’m not even good a lot of the time. It’s a blessing that God convicts me when I mess up, that He doesn’t just let me go along thinking it’s all okay. I’m glad He gets my attention and that I’m able to come to him and ask for forgiveness. Though I can’t completely comprehend it, I’m so grateful for Jesus’s substitutionary death in my place – that He took on all the sins of the world (past, present and future), including mine, and that His death paid the price for them. That He rose again and conquered death – not as a ghost or a spirit but as a truly living, breathing person.

As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace to you!” But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit. And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate before them.

Luke 24: 36-43

Jesus lives! And we who are trusting in Him will live forever as well, with new resurrection bodies, even though our current bodies will face death (unless Jesus comes again first). That’s the hope we have!

And yet, I find myself struggling from time to time (like now, with Covid) being somewhat down in the dumps with the day-to-day.

So back to the issue at hand. I pray that the Lord will be merciful and gracious and will grant me healing from Covid and that I’ll once again be able to be the wife and mother I desire to be. With God all things are possible – the little things and the big things.

Things to be Thankful For

In the mean time, I’m creating a list of 10 things (in no particular order) that I’m thankful for at the start of this new year:

• I’m thankful that I can still smell and taste my coffee. This may sound like a trivial thing, but I lost my sense of smell last time I had Covid and my left nostril never completely recovered. I’m still early in this infection and it could happen again, but I’m thankful that as of this moment I can still smell things (my coffee, as well as my favorite hand lotion) and that God saw fit to bring most of my sense of smell back within a few weeks last time. Our senses are gifts from God and while it’s maybe not considered as important as sight or earing, our sense of smell (and by association, being able to fully taste things) is a big deal! You realize that when it goes away.
• I’m thankful that I have family here to care for me when I’m ill. (My husband is picking up tacos from Pancharos as I write this, since it’s a holiday and he’s home.) My heart aches for those who are sick and who are trying to do it all by themselves and I pray that God would give them an extra measure of strength and assurance.
• I’m thankful for a roof over my head, and warm blankets, and the relatively comfortable air mattress I’m sleeping on in the spare room. Most of us take these things for granted, yet there are so many in our world who don’t have even these small comforts when they’re ill.
• I’m thankful that God has provided for me for the last 57+ years. Sure, there have been both good times and some really rough times, but there’s never been a day where I lacked what I needed to survive.
• I’m thankful for a Christian husband and other believers in my family (shout out to my wonderful in-laws). Granted, I am praying daily for family members who aren’t yet following Christ, but I’m thankful that God has put me in a situation where I’m not alone as a believer. How difficult it would be to be the only Christian in, say, a family who practiced Islam or Hinduism. We are designed for relationship, and I pray for believers in those situations, that God would bring others into their lives to strengthen and encourage them on their walk.
• I’m thankful for those who loved me enough when I was young to take me to church and Sunday school and Vacation Bible School – to build the foundation, even when they didn’t see any real growth from it for a couple decades.
• I’m thankful that I own a bible (several, actually) and that I possess the ability to read. Again, seems so trivial, and yet there are people in this world who don’t yet have one translated into their language and/or they aren’t able to read it for one reason or another. My desire is to do a better job being in the word this year. The prayer closet and my morning devotion time has helped me to form better habits, but I have never fully read through the bible. If we really want to know someone, we must spend dedicated time with them.
• I’m so very thankful that Jesus called me to himself many years ago when I was doing my best to walk the other way. He didn’t give up. Instead he pursued me! Had my life (and my heart) not changed, I would be in a very different place today. I am so thankful for the hope I now have (an eternity with God) rather than running from one temporary pleasure to the next (and a lot of them weren’t very pleasant the next morning). So never give up on your child, or your spouse, or your friend or loved one. They might come to Jesus at the age of 5, or 25, or 55! Keep praying! And just love them. Again, “…with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26)
• I’m thankful for children…and grandchildren. Yes, they’re a lot of work. They can break your heart. And raising another one in my 50’s is a challenge at times! But from their first tentative steps to watching them walk down the aisle at their wedding, there are blessed memories too numerous to count!
• I am thankful that God has allowed my eyes to see so many of the wonders of His creation in nature, and that I am fortunate enough to own a camera with which to photograph said wonders, since I don’t have a photographic memory. It’s nice to reminisce when I’m sick with Covid and am stuck in a small room and it’s bleak winter outside my window. I don’t worship the natural wonders. I praise the One who created them for our enjoyment! Below are a few of my favorites.

What are you thankful for this new year? Perhaps your life is not quite as you would have imagined it. Maybe things are downright difficult right now. If that’s the case, first I would encourage your to humbly and honestly come to the Lord with your problems, your pains, your disappointments. He wants us to bring everything to Him – both the good and the bad. He wants to be our strength. His word tells us:

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

1 Peter 5:6-7

I challenge you to consider all that the Lord has provided you with up to this point, and come up with a list of 10 reasons to be thankful today. And then focus on those good things, because (and these verses are stuck to my refrigerator in large print so that I see them daily)…

do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Philippians 4:6-8