Life has been pretty hectic lately and I’ve decided to not even try and update the blog for the last month.  Most of what is on my heart is on the deeper level and I just have not found or made time to process and write the way I need to.  I’ve been out of town for 12 out of the last 30 days in 3 different states (visited my parents and helped my soon to be sister-n-law with some final wedding preparations in Colorado, traveled on a business trip with Daniel to Salt Lake City, went camping in Arkansas with some of our great friends, The Westers), helped Daniel’s brother’s family get ready for their move from Nashville back to Texas and said goodbye, planned two wedding showers, celebrated graduations, birthdays, and engagements, bought a fridge, started dancing lessons with Daniel, hung out with my 242 girls and friends, and have been preparing for the upcoming family wedding this next weekend and the trip to Texas.  Whew!  It has been a whirlwind of fun and change and I am looking forward to a hopeful respite after we return from the wedding.

But……

My precious friend Emily whom I have blogged about numerous times before is currently in the 6-8 hour surgery that should provide her a new chance at LIFE.  She is undergoing the lung transplant surgery that she has been waiting on officially for the last year but for many, many years as she has battled Cystic Fibrosis.  I am anxiously awaiting the news of the success of the surgery and have decided to stay in Nashville at least most of today so I can update her blog quickly for her other family and friends.  You can check that out here.  I ask that you pray for her, for her family, for her doctors, for the donor’s family, and for me as I make decisions and seek to love her and support her during this major life change.

Here’s the last picture of us I could find but this was from last summer.  I know we’ve taken more since then!

Ok, the final part of this crazy long series. Like I said in Part 2, I am very thankful for Nate’s openness in their story and for what God has done in my own heart and story because of it. Here’s my personal story and response to it all.

Emily and I have been friends for over 12 years. We were paired in our student ministry as Big Sister and Little Sister when she was in 7th grade and I was a sophomore in high school. My role was to help her adjust to being in the student ministry and be a friend and someone to talk to when she was there. I loved it and I of course chose her as my little sister because we shared the same name. I knew we would be great friends when our high school girls kidnapped the 7th grade girls really early in the morning and took them to eat at McDonald’s. Her not so lovely demeanor, frustration, and stubbornness about the whole thing won me over. I was the exact same way!

Throughout high school, our relationship developed into not only a deeper discipleship relationship but truly we had a wonderful friendship too. We would have Sonic dates all the time and talk about what God was doing in our hearts and lives, pray together, and as time went on, she began to share what she was struggling with in her fight with CF. I remember one very significant conversation on the phone when the fears of the future, the what ifs, and the whys were very heavy on her heart. As God was working in me to love and disciple her, I knew I was way out of my league. Thankfully, as God was working in me, I truly began to see that in my weakness, and in Emily’s weakness, HE is strong. Her physical struggles were a roller coaster just like the emotional, mental, and spiritual battles she was facing. I was thankful to be there all along the way and walk through life with her. The discipleship relationship really changed places too. Her faith, her journey, her struggles were teaching me more about who Christ is and His love and power than most anything else. And I am forever grateful.

We both married a few years later and were bridesmaids in each others weddings. I don’t have time to tell you the cool God stories in all of this but Jason, Emily’s husband, is such an amazing gift from God for her! Our friendship deepened drastically and although we ended up moving to different cities, we still maintained a very significant friendship. For many seasons, we have talked on the phone daily and if not weekly…something that is hard to maintain in any friendship much less long distance.

Although I rarely use the term “best friend” [because my husband truly is and I don’t like the exclusivity of the term...maybe I hang around high school girls or something ] but Emily is the epitome of what that means. She is the person besides Daniel who knows me best and who I know best and we take advantage of that. With the closeness of friendship, also comes the greater risk. I have realized over the past several years, just how much Emily means to me and how much my life is enriched by her presence in it. I can’t imagine living life without her.

Over the past few years, we have both had many conversations along these lines. When she became pregnant (a perfect gift from God NOT a mistake for not being careful enough), the reality of the risks was daunting. As she dealt with the many, many, many decisions, scenarios, and what ifs, not to mention the physical struggles, my role to pray, encourage, listen, and uphold became joyfully difficult. As God brought her daughter into the world and blessed Emily with the days to raise her, the new struggles of the urgent need for new lungs developed. The urgent need is still there and the wait is on.

How do you walk beside someone who is going through such a thing? How do you acknowledge realities and live in hope without being naive? How do you use words when words seem to fall so short? How do you handle your own fears while trying to help someone else with theirs? How do you hold the gifts that God has given you with an open hand when everything in you screams to keep your fist closed around it? I did not know the answers to any of these questions but somehow, someway God continues to use our friendship in both of our lives for encouragement and support. I love you Em. Beyond all words, I love you, I am eternally grateful for you and your friendship, and my life is forever changed because of you.

The LBD Dual Significance: So wrapping this back around to Nate’s blog, God has used his words and their story to help heal my heart in some ways. Emily is a very private person and her circumstances, although similar to Tricia’s, are different. In riding the roller coaster ride with her through specifically the past three years, there have been many things I have felt, wanted to say or acknowledge, or just been processing that were difficult to communicate because the words just weren’t there or the timing just wasn’t right. It also seems to be that I am far away when something happens rather than my normal two hour drive to her. I missed the birth because we were in Hawaii and seem to always be traveling when she gets a call for the lung transplant. For anyone that has lived similar circumstances, it is so difficult to not be there. It’s not like you can do anything but just to be there is so important. And the fears that I have battled about my own what ifs are much harder to battle when I’m not there. And by not being there in those moments, the emotional journey is somewhat unresolved.

So thanks to Nate being open and vulnerable and sharing his story. But it’s not Nate, it’s Christ in Nate that is doing something incredible. By reading His words, many times, it’s like I am reading my own thoughts from a few years back and able to heal some in the process. I’m also excited to see someone who is walking through circumstances like he is, speak the way he is speaking, even if it is just him processing his thoughts. It is a much needed perspective and reminds me of many conversations that Em and I have.

So these are my thoughts that I am processing related to all of this. I’ve felt pretty jumbled through this whole thing (sorry!) but it is also important to me to get this out there since it has been almost a week since the others have been up. Nobody is perfect this side of heaven and the blogging world will not be perfect either. I’m not expecting that, I’m just working through it in my own life, in my own weaknesses and struggles. And at the end of the day when all is said and done, I go back to 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 and pray that my life would look more like this: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

The catapult that started me writing about this subject most recently was a blog that I started reading (www.cfhusband.blogspot.com). A good friend sent me the link because she knew I would be interested in it from my own story with my friend Emily who has CF. And, she was right! Before I go any further, let me say that I have asked permission from Emily to share this and the CF Husband from the other website has also given permission through his blog to post about it.

Here is the summary of the CF Husband’s blog:
My name is Nathan. My wife, Tricia has Cystic Fibrosis (CF) and had been preparing for a double lung transplant until we discovered we were pregnant. Tricia is the most incredible person I’ve ever met. She keeps me humble and in love. Gwyneth is our beautiful, new, baby girl, born 15+ weeks early. Tricia is on her way back onto the transplant list, and Gwyneth is on her way out of the NICU and into our hearts. This is our story from my perspective…

Here is the summary of Emily’s story:
Emily, who was diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis at 3 months and Jason, her husband, started to look into a lung transplant but that evaluation was put on hold because of the beautiful surprise of pregnancy. It was a mix of emotions since Emily had been told all of her life that she probably would not be able to get pregnant and that it would be a dangerous endeavor for her. God had other plans. About 3 months after the birth of their daughter, Emily’s lung collapsed for the first time, she was hospitalized several times, and continued to have a rapid decline. In June of 2007, the news came that they not only made the double lung transplant list, but were #2 in line for her blood type. She has since had 4 dry runs and is still waiting for new lungs. Since her journey began, it has been a roller coaster of blessings, periods of frustration, and a whole lot of waiting on what God
has next. The faith that she and Jason have, is certainly
enriching ours.

As you can see, and if you read further, there are many similarities. Part 2 is about blogging and Part 3 is about my personal thoughts related to these stories. I first wanted to give you the intro.

So, Part 2…about the blogging side of it. As I read Nate’s posts to get up to date on what was going on, I immediately made the connection to all that he was going through and my Emily’s story. I emailed him just to let him know I was praying for them and to mention Emily in case her journey could be a resource for them. Emily had mentioned several times during her pregnancy of her desire to talk to someone who had lived through what she was going through in her stage of the disease. It was be awesome to see God use their stories for mutual encouragement.

However, as I started to read some comments on the blog and then read the posts that Nathan began to write about some of the comments, I began to see what the end of Part 1 was all about. I’ve seen this on many different sites in the Christian community and it usually is related to a situation that is very difficult, that the future is uncertain, and where the sovereignty of God is called into question because of the pain involved (terminal illness, tragic death of a loved one, death of an infant or child, adoption, etc). As a side note, it is also amazing how many people who do not know Christ are involved in reading these blogs too and how they immediately become evangelistic just because of the essence of the story. It’s also amazing how many people have the “perfect advice” for any given situation that they are going through.

There is also the reality TV side of the blog. I think people have even ‘demanded’ updates from Nathan like we would ‘demand’ a new episode of The Office during the writers strike. People are tuning in and checking their readers often. I am keeping up to date too after being behind for several days. But, the truth is, and this is blunt, once the ‘drama’ dies down, most of us will quit reading. It could partly be because of lack of posts but could it also be that the reading isn’t “as good” as it once was when things move on.

The LBD Dual Significance: Maybe I’m off here but as human beings, we seem to be attracted to the drama of a situation rather than the truth of it. We want to gasp at Satan’s evil schemes rather than wrestling with the sovereignty of God in painful situations. We want to sympathize with someone who is going through our worst fear and be thankful that it’s them and not us and maybe even wonder what they did to cause it to happen rather than trusting God’s sovereignty and that there are many things that are finite brains do not know or understand. My hope is that everyone who reads, is thinking, is praying, is wrestling. I hope that if you comment you think about what you say, you mean it when you say you will pray, and that your focus would be on how awesome God is.

I have admired Nate’s responses as he battles these comments, perceptions, judgments, and opinions. He is also giving due praise to the King of Kings in the midst of it all and not allowing Satan to get credit for the amazing things that God is doing. And although some may say that it is because his girls are both still living, I believe that the God he serves is with Him and is living out exactly what Ephesians 3 is talking about (see end of Part 1). And no matter what God’s plan is in the midst of it all, He is faithful, present, loving, and righteous and from reading Nathan’s thoughts, I am confident that he knows this and is resting in that truth and the life of Christ in him.

I also know that Nate is being very open and vulnerable with their story, a choice that they are making. I personally am very thankful (see Part 3) but it definitely is not the easiest road to take to retain your privacy. However, it appears that Nathan has a bigger vision than retaining their privacy and just surviving in the moments they are living right now. And I hope and pray that whatever that vision is, that He, his family, his community, the world, and Christ would be blessed because of it. It seems like it is already happening.

The Sovereignty of God: For further reading and listening on the sovereignty of God check out the following site and scroll down to the bottom section about Bruce Ware. There are articles as well as two sermons that he presented at Fellowship. He has also written a book titled God’s Greater Glory. I’m not even sure I agree with everything he says in all of this (I might, I just can’t remember) but I do remember it being profound in my wrestling and understanding of God’s sovereignty.