I think we all have times when we wrestle with God. We like to say we're wrestling with ourselves, or we're wrestling with our emotions, but really, I think we're wrestling with God - with what we know to be right and true, with our unwillingness to do a certain thing or not do a certain thing...or maybe we just refuse to submit to His will because it doesn't look like our own.
Jacob was on his way out to meet his brother Esau, and he was afraid his brother would try to kill him. He sent his groups and flocks ahead of him, and stayed alone for the night.
"That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two maid-servants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him til daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob's hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, "Let me go for it is daybreak." But Jacob replied, "I will not let you go unless you bless me." ... "So Jacob called the place Peniel saying, "It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared." The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip." Genesis 32: 22-26, 30-31.
These past few months I have often wrestled with God, and with my own submission to Him - especially in the unknown. I have prayed for healing and for comfort. I've prayed for peace and for deliverance. I've prayed for grace and begged for mercy. But I also knew that above all my response as a follower of Christ was to pray, "nevertheless, not my will but thine be done." I do not attempt to think I know God's ways because His thoughts are higher than my thoughts and his ways are higher than my ways. I do not attempt to think I can know His perfect will -- all I can do is make my requests known to Him, and then submit myself to His plan, even though I may not understand or agree.
It is a difficult thing to pray, "nevertheless, not my will but thine be done." What if His will was to take me from this world? Psalm 116:15 says, "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints." What if His will was to allow my cancer to remain so that he could teach my heart to trust in Him? We cannot fully know His will in every situation - because we do not see the bigger picture, the final outcome and the lessons it will teach us.
When my doctors told me what all my surgery would entail, and how long my recovery would be, I knew I would be in it for the long haul. My surgery was two weeks ago today. I have a nine inch incision in my belly, I had 27 staples. I had three catheters, an epidural, an NG tube, blood pressure cuff, oxygen sensor, and a JP drain. I had an IV tube and a morphine pump. It literally took me 8-10 minutes to get out of bed to walk, and about 8-10 minutes to get back into bed when it was done.
Now that I'm home, I have lost many of my tubes and wires, I still have the incision, but the staples have been removed. I still have two catheters that will remain for at least three more weeks.
All of these things are alright with me. I realize my body has forever been changed. But only for the better. I may have lost my bladder, but in a very strange way, this is a great blessing to me.
August 2012 I got a bladder infection that I could not shake. Three weeks and five antibiotics later, I finally got relief. January 2013 it happened again. What we found was that out of seven antibiotics I can take to fight these UTIs, I had grown resistant to five of them. That's a pretty big deal. Now that my bladder has been removed, I don't have to fight that anymore. I was telling my husband this weekend that these past two weeks have been the only two in the past couple of years when I didn't have some pain or symptom of a UTI. That's relief, people!
As many times as I prayed for God to heal me I believe that He answered my prayers. Oh, I may have an altered body, and I may have lost an organ or two, but overall I believe this IS my healing. Not only is my cancer gone, but also, I won't be haunted by constant bladder infections.
Like Jacob, I believe I wrestled with the will of God... and although I may have walked away with a scar as my limp, I believe I have been blessed. If I have to live with an altered body, I am blessed to do so because it means that God heard my prayer and answered in His timing, in His way, for my good.
Are you praying for something specific in your life? Ask yourself the hard questions: Am I willing to submit to His will even if it doesn't look like mine? Am I willing to walk away with a limp if it means I have been blessed? Can I trust Him enough to lay down my own desires and pray, 'not my will but thine be done?"
Only By His Grace,
Billie
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