Whirlwind
September 20,2017
“This past week has been a whirlwind.” That’s how I started off the texts to several
important people in my life.
This “past week” started last Tuesday morning with an
appointment with a doctor for the first time in 12 years. I had found an abnormality in my left breast
almost 3 weeks prior and was getting an opinion on it. The words I heard were “breast oncologist”
and “possibly Paget’s disease.” I left
the doctor’s office to go do something I enjoy, penning cows with my husband.
We didn’t get home until 7:30 or 8:00. I
can’t remember if I picked something up for supper or threw something together.
I took a shower and laid down in bed, waiting for my husband so we could
discuss what I had learned at the doctor’s office that morning.
He came and
laid down and we began discussing the news I had gotten that morning. Of course, I had googled Paget’s disease… a rare breast
cancer that usually requires a total mastectomy. As I lay in my husband’s arms,
just wanting to be comforted by being near him, I received a call from my
elderly friend’s neighbor. “Mrs. W is very sick and you need to come right
away.” I was tired physically and my emotions were on edge. I did not want to leave the comfort of my bed
or my husband. The tears began as I
started getting dressed. Pat got up too,
so he could go with me. I told him I’d
be ok, but he insisted on coming with me. I was thankful to have him with me
for at least a little longer. When I realized we had to go to the ER, I
sent my husband home. He had to go to work in the morning.
I made it home from the ER
at 5:00 in the morning. My elderly
friend had been admitted with sepsis. I
am the only one she has to be her advocate at the hospital. I have been to doctor appointments and
various treatments with her for about a year and a half. She is like a grandmother to me. She depends on me. The hospital is an hour away from my
home. So, this week was filled with
drives to and from the hospital daily. Hour drives to the hospital and hour
drives from the hospital to my appointments in another town and I reminded
myself constantly that the timing of this illness was part of God’s sovereign
plan. He was in control of this,
too.
Soon after awakening after
just a couple of hours of sleep, I got a call from the breast oncologist’s
office. Because we have no insurance,
they were trying to help me get aid to pay for the inevitable expenses that
would be occurring if this was indeed cancer.
After several calls, we realized that I could not receive the aid they
were wanting me to get because I lived out of county. So, they scheduled me with a mammogram and
doctor’s visit to follow.
The mammogram was
humiliating…all of this is, really, but I’ll write about that later. But God in His Providence, provided an
acquaintance as the mammogram technician.
She made me feel more at ease.
She helped me think about other things.
But the mammogram showed something in my right breast also. Now I’m hearing the word "biopsy."
The following Tuesday, just
over a week from this whirlwind beginning, I am at the breast oncologist’s
office. She is concerned about what she
sees in the right breast. She will do a
biopsy of both breasts the next day.
What else has happened this
week? My washing machine broke prompting
a late evening trip to the laundromat.
My dishwasher broke…but I can hand wash dishes. While waiting in the line to get gas, on the
day of my appointment with the breast oncologist, the drive shaft fell out of
my daughter’s truck which I was driving, requiring a rescue and getting me to
the doctor’s appointment on time. I had
left in my truck that morning, but it was making funny noises, so I went back
home to get my daughter's truck because I knew I didn’t have time for a breakdown. Praise God it happened in a parking lot and
not on the highway. Praise God it didn’t happen when my daughter was driving home
late at night. Blood pressure readings have been high. Once the diastolic number was 98! The systolic number has been in the
170’s. Early mornings and late nights
and little sleep. This has been my whirlwind. All allowed by my good, good Father.
I
was up early Wednesday morning. I start
by texting many people to pray for me.
To each individual I begin, “This past week has been a whirlwind.” I fix my husband’s breakfast and lunch. I take a shower and sit down for the first
time in a week to my First 5 devotion.
It’s from Job 38. I begin reading
Job 38 and the first verse says, “Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm.” And I thought, I WILL hear God answer me in
this storm I’ve been in. And I start
frantically reading the chapter looking for the word whirlwind…but it is not
there. (Often God will give me a word
while I journal that is repeated in the day or days to follow Scripture reading
or devotional.) But what I find is this. Verses 4 and 5 state “Where were you
when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me if you understand, who marked off
it’s dimensions? Verse 10 says, “when I fixed limits for it” and verse 11,
“when I said, ‘this far you may come and no farther.’”
And
as I thought of the boundaries that God has created for His creation, I wrote
this prayer, “Father, You have set boundaries in my life, too. This far you may come and no farther,
satan! This far you may come and no
farther, sickness! This far you may come
and no farther, breakdowns! This far you
may come and no farther, ___________!
Help me to trust You and the boundaries You have set for my life. Thank You, Father, that You continue to speak
and arrange circumstances even in this whirlwind.”
Then
I open the First 5 App. The picture caption says, “God who created
all, is more than capable to care for all.”
God is telling me that He is more than capable to take care of all the
things that have broken and gone “wrong” this week. He is capable of providing peace and strength
and finances. He is capable of providing
healing. He is capable of providing grace to walk through disease. God is telling me that He is fully capable of
being God. Then at the very end of the
devotion, I find the word I’m searching for as a confirmation that God sees me
and my circumstances. “And sometimes it
takes a whirlwind to direct our attention to Him.” Then I do a word search to see where the word
whirlwind is found in Scripture. And
wouldn’t you know it…it was in Job 38 all along. Most of the translations of Job 38:1 state,
“Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind…”
Yes,
Father, I do not believe that it was coincidence that You gave me that word as
a description of my past week and it was not coincidence that it was in the
first verse of Job 38 and in the last sentence of the devotional written for me
today… the day I go for my breast biopsies.
Thank You! You do see me and what I am going through. You are indeed a
good, good Father!!!
What
kind of whirlwind are you going through this week? Your good Father sees
you and He cares.
