When Your Faith Is Tested
This most recent blog has been a few months in the making… as my Mom and I both have been in a season that has shaken us both tremendously, yet in the midst also having seen the hand of GOD sustaining us even to this present time. I hope that as people read the words to follow, that you will find hope and encouragement… and perhaps a little understanding about why you may be facing certain things in your own lives. Please also know that we are still walking this through. I don’t pretend to have all the answers I’ve been searching for, but there are a few points I wanted to share on below. May GOD richly bless you.
A Trial By Fire
My Mom was scheduled for a total right hip replacement on April 29th that was to have been in an outpatient facility setting. The expectation was that she would go in, have what would be a very standard procedure, walk that same evening, then come home. Somewhere around the last week of January, the Surgeon’s office called and stated they were moving Mom’s surgery up to February 5th which was the following week and we urgently needed to begin pre-op formalities. We were both shocked at the time frame change but we got into gear preparing. Days before the surgery was to take place, the Surgeon called again, and this time stated that he was moving the surgery from the outpatient facility to the local hospital. Having worked in a hospital and in the OR, I was accustomed to sudden schedule and location changes. It happens for various reasons but I wanted to know what their specific reasoning was. When I called the office back later that day and spoke with the Surgeon’s nurse, I asked if all of that day’s surgery cases were moved to the hospital or just my Mother’s. When she told me that only my Mother’s had been moved, my heart sank. She explained to me that the Surgeon wrestled to sleep all weekend with my Mom’s case heavily on his mind, for whatever reason, and felt strongly that he should move her surgery just as a precaution. I could understand and appreciate his decision to follow the leading of the LORD in this matter, however unsettling it may have been to me.
So, the morning of February 5th arrived. I made a Facebook post hours ahead of the surgery and asked for prayer as one would and specifically asked that nobody come to the hospital to sit or visit. There was one dear friend of mine that had been asked well in advance to come and be with me in the waiting room during that time. At the final moments, I called her and also asked her not to come. I said to her, “I need to trust Jesus where my Mom is concerned.” By saying that, I meant that I needed to lean on Him more than I ever had, and face my giant of fear. She ultimately honored my request. The surgery got underway that morning and the calls from the OR came to the waiting room with great updates. Everything was moving along according to plan. Mom was taken to recovery and then brought back to Same Day to prepare for discharge, at which point I was allowed to go back and see her. There were a few final hoops Mom had to move through before being allowed to be discharged home. The physical therapist came and checked all her movements. Then she was gotten up and she walked a few paces and back to the bed and was laid back down. As paperwork was being placed for her to come home, the nurse decided to sit her up one final time to do a last minute blood pressure check. When she was shifted to move her into a seated position, the entire ball and socket that had just been implanted broke through her pelvic wall into the inner cavity. The moments that followed are now burned into my memory. It was clear something went very wrong although we immediately did not know what had happened. Physical therapy returned to re-assess and it was clear that she could no longer lift her knees and move as she had minutes before. Scans were immediately completed and the Surgeon was notified. To his horror and to ours, the unthinkable had happened. She was taken up to a room on the third floor to await what would end up being a second surgery just a few days later.
Those three days felt like weeks as we waited for a game plan to be made and a new cup to be ordered from the manufacturer. Skipping over a lot for the sake of time – a second surgery was completed on February 8th and nearing 3 months have since passed as Mom has been slowly recovering.
“But we prayed…”
These last months for me, I say with absolute honesty and humility… have been a struggle. I have battled through cycles of anger at the situation and frustration… and mostly at GOD, for what happened. What I could not understand in the midst of this trial has been how or why this was allowed to happen when we had made it a very specific point to call for prayer ahead of and also during the surgery – and so many had felt “okay” about it. Also, having seen the LORD obviously moving on the Surgeon to move the location of the surgery knowing there was trouble ahead, I found myself asking the LORD, “Why?! If You KNEW it was going to happen, WHY NOT JUST STOP IT?!”
One thing I said many times through this was that in my mind, knowing my Mom’s life and devotion to the LORD, I felt like she in no way deserved this. Me, on the other hand, I felt like if anyone deserved it, I did. And through it all, through some very intensely painful days and through countless uncertainties, she was like a rock. She was to me, the picture of “patience having its perfect work”. It was unreal. Me, on the other hand, not so much. I have been so angry at times through this, I have felt like I could rip the horns off of a rhino bare handed and yet still have felt so utterly helpless in the larger scheme of things. I don’t believe the LORD “did this” to her. I do believe we have an adversary (the devil) who we battle against in this life. I also believe we sometimes make decisions on our own and the LORD ends up navigating us through those, whether good decisions or bad ones.
I know what the Word of GOD says about trials coming to test our faith. I know that Jesus said if we live in this world we will face tribulations. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve read it. But when it hits home, you begin to realize, there are some very real questions that enter your mind and heart. You begin asking yourself questions and making thought bubble statements from the depths of your soul you never would have imagined you’d think. But here you are. And I suppose GOD knows that’s all in there, even when we don’t. Through this and many other situations I’ve faced in my life, I’ve found some comfort in the scripture from Psalms that says:
“For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust.”
– Psalms 103:14 NKJV
As much as I’ve questioned GOD at the “why’s” of all of this… I’ve also seen Him faithfully walking through every one of the needful moments with us on the backside of this. Days when we had real needs, the answers came. One such instance was a particular day when our account was extremely low on funds. Insurance had not been covering anything following the surgery so there was extra added financial weight on us. One particular day when I was absolutely maxed out with stress and worry about how a certain bill was going to get met that day, I walked out to the mailbox and there was a check from a Pastor friend of mine from Mississippi. I had no idea the check was coming but when I called her in tears with check in hand, she told me the LORD had spoken to her the week before and told her to send me the money. The thing that really struck me was that they gave out of their own need, but they were faithful when the LORD spoke and GOD had already had it worked out for me the day I was going to need it. It was in our mailbox. Since then, GOD sent us the help we needed to get the medical needs covered by the insurance provider. Medical equipment that insurance didn’t cover, GOD made a way for us to acquire. We needed help getting some large tasks done in our yard. A group of men were sent to us and spent a day taking care of those tasks we had wanted addressed for so long… and what looked like would cost us a great deal of money before, cost us nothing when GOD got involved. Days when I felt like I had no fight left in me and still had to go to work, He moved ahead of me, arranging things so that it would be a much easier night for me, from the moment I walked in the door. Nobody knew that particular day was the one most needed. But GOD knew. Friends and family have come, they have called, they have messaged, they have prayed with us faithfully and brought food.
Through these months since I have made a post here, I honestly have felt like I’ve had nothing to say. I’ve felt empty… void of anything useful to the Kingdom of GOD. I’ve honestly felt like there are many more days than not that the angels have been standing by in Heaven soldering the jewels back into my crown. Funny as that may seem, I’m just being real. And yet through it all, GOD has been so faithful.
I think through this process, one thing has become clear to me. GOD has removed the crutches from my life. Things that I have leaned on or I’ve sought out for help rather than leaning on Him alone, have been removed as the days have passed. GOD has moved most, when I have asked least. I’m still learning to just wait on Him, and when the need arises, He activates the help. There has come a renewed realization that I have not had since my own encounter with Him. It’s the realization that ONLY HE CAN… and ONLY HE SHOULD. Above, beside or beyond Him, there is no other.
“I Need To Trust Jesus.”
When I told my friend in the beginning of all of this that I needed to trust Jesus… what I meant was, “I need to trust Jesus, in this eight hours, today.” But, I think Jesus heard what was in my heart and decided to seize on an opportunity to take me much further down that “trust” road than I ever imagined I’d go. While we are still in the midst of this process, there have been some moments, I’m happy to say, I feel like I have been successful in just letting go… and leaning in. I would call them “little faith opportunities”.
I would also say that through this all, I’ve realized how easily we are apt to stumble and/or fall regardless of how high up that mountain of GOD we think we are. We all need Jesus, every moment of every day. Knowing the hour that we are living in and the things that are yet to come on this earth, also knowing how this one event so effected me, I’ve asked the LORD a number of times and wondered in my heart, “How can any of us make it when things grow darker?!” That’s a real question I hope we are all asking ourselves. Are we as ready as we think we are? I hope, at least to the best of our ability, we are trying to keep our hearts clean before the LORD. I hope that we are being honest with Him… as real and raw as that may look from one moment to the next. I hope that we continue to press forward in the faith, even when moments come we’re not even sure we still want to. I hope that no matter what we may face, we continually learn to depend on Him. Life is real, but He is worthy of our trust.
I’ll leave you with the lyrics to an old song that is running through my mind this morning as I end this blog:
“Through it all, I’ve learned to trust in Jesus. I’ve learned to trust in God. Through it all… through it all… I’ve learned to depend upon His Word.”
– Andraé Crouch