Sleeping with Chemo

Sleeping with Chemo

James 1:2-4

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sister, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything”

When I got married nearly 15 years ago I never expected to one day be sharing the bed with a pump full of chemo. When I said “I do” I envisioned children, vacations, a thriving career and the white picket fence. At age 24 I thought I knew what was ahead. I thought I could plan each year out and settle into a marriage and life that would become what I dreamed.

In many ways it is what I dreamed. I have the family I always wanted. I may not have the vacations, thriving career or white picket fence but I have more than that. I have faith, I have truly lived the vow of “In sickness and in Health” and have learned to push through even the hardest trials.

I have recently been spending a lot of time thinking and meditating on what it means to consider trials pure joy. Pure joy is not something that comes naturally to me while facing a trial. It is something I put into practice every day. When I hear the swishing of the chemo pump in my bed it is hard to say “ Thank you God, I consider this pure joy that my husband is being injected with poison” But, as I know, I must once again take every thought captive and know that God is working all things together for good.

I do take comfort in knowing that the testing of my faith is producing perseverance. I have always loved the word perseverance. The definition is “continued effort to do or achieve something despite difficulties, failure, or opposition” So when we are in the midst of our trials, our storms we can continue on despite our opposition. Your opposition today may not be cancer, but if you are human I am pretty sure that today wherever you are, whatever you are doing you are facing something in which you can choose to persevere. I look at it like this, I have two choices, I can persevere or I can shrink down into the fetal position and become inept to do anything.

Perseverance needs to finish its work. It needs to help us become mature and complete, lacking nothing. To me that is a big enough reason to persevere. God promises that through our trials if we persevere He will give us the gift of lacking nothing. Our faith becomes stronger when we persevere. All the storms and trials are molding us into what we are created to be. Sometimes we have to push through the pain for God to show us our purpose. I cling to the fact that God wastes nothing and He makes beauty out of ashes.

Today, tomorrow and in the future, with God’s help I will persevere. When I am weak He is strong. When I go through the fire He refines in a way that only He can and I come out stronger than I could have ever thought. He helps me press on, press in and trust in His beautiful process.