God is so good! Sometimes i am so overjoyed by Him that I feel guilty because I think it's wrong for me to have happiness after losing my love. Although I know that's not true, there still is a part of me that thinks i should be consumed with sorrow. Dont get me wrong, there are days when i am sad, i do miss him constantly and i do feel this awareness that something is missing from me- not just my life, but from me physically as well. I also find myself covering up alot. Like im always wearing a sweater or jacket and constantly feeling the need to hold it closed. I never did that before. It reminds me of the part of the "The Valley Song" by jars of clay when he says:
While we wait for rescue
With our eyes tightly shut
Face to the ground, using our hands
To cover the "fatal cut" --- I never really understood that until now. But i do feel like i am wounded and need to keep it covered maybe while Gods healing me- not too sure. I love that whole song! Im going to have to to put it in my playlist. The rest of it says:
Though the pain is an ocean
Tossing us around, around, around
You have calmed greater waters
Higher mountains have come down
I will sing of Your mercy that leads me THROUGH valleys of sorrow to rivers of joy. I am so amazed at Him! That He has not only the love for me- us- to want to help us but that He has the power to heal even our worst pains and sorrows! And i do believe He heals it. I believe the valley does end and the wound does heal. While im sure i will always love george and miss him, i dont believe we are to just adjust to a new way of living without him. I believe my Father is creating a new beautiful life for us- and quite possibly an even a better one than before! I just believe that's how He is.
Some scriptures i found regarding Him doing "new" things:
Isaiah 40: 31 He gives new strength
isaiah 42:9-10 He declares new things to us before they happen
Isaiah 48:6 He proclaims new hidden things which we have not known
Isaiah 62:2 He gives us a new name
EZ 18:31 He gives us a new heart
Ez 11:19 He gives us a new spirit
Lamentations ( my favorite) His mercy, lovingkindess, and compassions are new every morning
Luke 22:20 He gives us a new covenant in His blood
John 13 He gives us a new commandment
2 Cor 5:17 He gives us a new creation when we become born again in Him
Eph 4:24 he gives us a new self made in His likeness- in righteousness, holiness and truth
And He wraps up His love letter to us with this - Revelation 21:5 And He who sits on the throne said " Behold, I am making all things new." And He said, " Write, for these words are Faithful and True." If He can do all that, im certain He can create something new and beautiful for us! Praise His Beautiful Name!

Today was a strange day for me. i thought of george continually. One of my amazing sisters and her husband filled out the extreme makeover home show app for us and today they came over and shot the video to send in with it. So i had to sit and share our story with them via a video camera. And i went through all the details. Its strange to rethink about it now and to realize how far we've come and how faithful God is. I do miss him greatly! I try really hard not to think about the time in the hospital. I try not to think about the times i could hear him crying out to God and i would just get on my face outside wherever he was and just weep and pray for him. I hated thinking that he felt like God wasnt hearing or helping him. But he's not thinking about those things now so why should i? But sometimes i do and today i did while doing that video. Its so strange to me still to remember sitting at the table with all those teams of doctors and because of a bunch of different things there was nothing they could do for him- nothing! But they said it in such a clinical way that you just dont even understand that theyre telling you theres nothing they can do. And then when it finally settles that there IS NOTHING they can do to help and then they tell you you have just maybe 2 weeks to live! Its unbelievable! And may you never know. Its been almost 6 months and honestly i still cant believe that he's gone! We went to the park today. It was a park we had been to with George a few times. I kept having sorta flashbacks of the times we had been there before having picnics and playing. But i couldnt remember them clearly, and that bothered me. I was watching Simeon watching a little girl and her dad. The dad was standing at the bottom of the slide just playing with her and taking her picture and Simeon just stood there staring at them. Now, i doubt that he was thinking of it the way i was but still thats something he'll never have and i wondered what he was thinking. Tonight i was laying with him in bed and it dawned on me that he hasnt looked at georges pictures in a while and I dont even remember when he last said daddy.So i gave him a kiss on the head and told him that me and daddy loved him and he didnt respond like he use to. Has he forgotten already? How wrong is that Lord!!! And he will forget George nomatter how hard we try to keep his memory alive Simeon wont remember his dad. UH!!! Today was just one of those days that 200 sighs wasnt even enough and i just had this sad awareness of him not being part of me anymore. Life is so up in the air right now. And while I know in my heart my Father is taking care of us, I just miss him being by my side. I miss my team mate, my cheering section, the strong arms that would hold me when i was afraid or when life just sucked- because it just does sometimes! And i miss taking care of him. I miss being his wife. I miss having coffee with him in the morning and getting him big bowls of ice cream at night. I wish i would have been a better wife to him- although honestly i dont have any guilt or regrets- i just wish i would have have loved more. I miss him coming home every night and the boys hearing his truck and they would all hide and he would look for them. Isaac just said to me last night that he never got to tell dad where his hiding place was. It's strange to think that im here sometimes consumed with thoughts of him and he may not even think of us. We dont really know what it's like in heaven, what we remember and the word doesnt say much about it. I do remember on Isaiahs birthday, 4 days after george passed. I was in the bathroom and Isaiah came in and told me he heard his daddy's voice in the living room. I asked him what he said and he answered- he wished me a happy birthday. I do believe he heard him. So i dont know about all that. But what i do know is God is faithful. And as long as i live, till my very last breath i will make known His faithfulness and sing praise to His Name. Because no matter what we go through, He is able to give us peace in the midst of it, deliver us from it, restore and heal us and even work it for our good. Who is like Him? Tell me!
Romans 8:35-38 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?... But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,
nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Thats always been one of my favorite scriptures but i hadnt actually read it since George died and reading it tonight...wow! I love when a scripture takes on new life for me. It's true- nothing is more powerful than Him and there is nothing greater than Him that could ever come between His love and grip on us-Nothing! NOTHING!!! Amazing!

I was having a talk with a pastor the other evening. I had shared with him that through all this ive been learning to wait on the Lord for things. His response was- wow, you dont hear that in the church anymore. That sort of took me back. And i said well, maybe thats why the people in the church arent getting anything from Him because theyre not waiting for Him to do things. It is afterall, the one who waits on Him who gets the promise. And if we arent waiting on Him, what are we doing? Delivering ourselves? Because thats not even faith. And usually, if your like me, you strive, and spin your wheels trying to make things happen just to end up right back where you started in the first place with no deliverance. Why do we do that? I was sharing with this pastor about how God sold my husbands truck. It was a big Ford f700. It was pretty old with quite a few miles on it and it smoked alot! A few people came by to look at it but no takers. Finally a man came by and looked at it and asked me what i wanted. I told him my price and he said ok. So by the next friday he called me and said he was short $500. and asked if i would take it and i said no. And let me tell you, that was really hard. I remember going into the nursery at my homeschool group and telling the moms about it and how i wanted to call him back because i was afraid no one else would want it. But, I said im not going to. God is the seller of my things and im going to wait on Him because when i do He does better for me than i ever could have done for myself. Plus you see His hand and have the testimony of Him doing it. So I resisted calling him and waited. 5 days later another man came to look at it. This man looked like he could have been Georges brother. His family is catholic and they homeschool their children. He was telling me how he buys and restores old cars with his dad and his son. He said this truck would be a great project for them and asked me what i wanted to get out of it. I told him my price and he in return offered me $500. MORE than what i asked for. Who gets that??? I'll tell you, the one who waits on the Lord! And on top of that he told me that the truck was going to a good family - which does matter to me- and that whatever he restores he keeps forever. I just love that! And i had mentioned to him how other people wanted to chop it up and hated the color and he said he loved it and as a matter of fact the truck was his favorite color and that it was actually his friend who saw the ad for the truck and emailed it to him saying it was his truck because it was his color! See what God does when you wait. And i could have sold to that other man, but look what i got for waiting on God. I could see and have the testimony of His Beautiful Hand orchestrating that whole thing- which means more to me than the money. I believe it's when we seek Him and wait on Him that we get the exceedingly abundantly more than we could imagine that is talked about in Ephesians. And did you know that He waits too? Isaiah 30:18 Therefore the Lord longs to be gracious to you, And therefore He waits on high to have compassion on you. For the Lord is a God of justice; How blessed are all those who wait for Him. And this pretty much sums up my life at this moment. Psalm 40:1-5 I waited patiently for the LORD And He inclined to me and heard my cry. He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm. He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God; Many will see and fear And will trust in the LORD. How blessed is the man who has made the LORD his trust, And has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood. Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders which You have done, And Your thoughts toward us; There is none to compare with You If I would declare and speak of them, They would be too numerous to count. It almost amazes me that i can feel like that at this moment in my life. But He is bringing me up out of this pit and He is continually putting a new song of praise in my mouth. I almost feel guilty sometimes because im so over joyed at what God is doing. Like thats wrong and some how means im not missingand loving George still. But how can i keep from singing His praise when He is being so faithful and real to us. And I am convinced that our Father wants to walk the ins and outs of our everyday lives with us- just like He did in the garden with Adam and Eve. And even though Jesus doesnt walk physically with us like He did with them, i believe we have something better. Jesus said it was better that He go away back to the Father so that the Holy Spirit could come and live in us. So Him living in us must be even greater than Jesus walking physically with us. He cares about about our lives, us, our every decisions- the small ones as well as the big ones. He wants to be involved in it all. Include Him in and watch what He does :)

Last night i took a meal over to a lady who's husband is in the hospital. I mentioned them a few weeks ago. He had what they thought were lesions in his brain and were going in to check it out. Turns out He has a crazy virus that in a compromised immune system causes your white blood cells to destroy your brain. So what they thought was a lesion is really dead brain tissue. To make matters worse, there is no treatment for it. And the one clinical trial has side affects that could be detrimental. It is amazing what a difference a few months makes! Hear me- Dont take your life, your wife, husband, your health, and your time for granted. I am still, regardless of all this i see around me, a believer in Gods promises of a long life and my years filled with good things but God help us- help me- not take these things for granted. As i stood in her kitchen just listening to her heart i could just hear myself having said the exact same words. The realization that we wasted a lot of time being upset over meaningless things and how we didnt really appreciate their being a covering over us. We talked about how we wished we would have complained less and encouraged more- like they did for us. She mentioned how she repented to him at his bedside and i shared with her how i got on my knees and washed my husbands feet with tears apologizing for being out of order and putting the kids and other things before him. I know this may sound redundant to you but i find very interesting that we experienced the same thing. It must just be what happens when you face death, you start evaluating how youre really living your life. And then you pray for time to love them the way you really want to now. But i dont think you have to go down a road like this to love like that. That's why i keep repeating it over and over again. Dont have regrets. Dont waste time. Make the choice to love absolutely unconditionally without any thought of getting anything out of it for you- especially when the person youre loving isnt doing what you want or isnt treating you necessarily good. It takes a lot of foot work but it also takes a huge amount of energy to live with irritation and strife. And like Jesus said- if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even the world does that. But Jesus in luke ch 6:27 says...But i say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you... Isnt it interesting that he qualifies it to those who hear? I mean surely everyone around him had ears that worked right? They werent all deaf. So we can have ears but not hear. I think we're only hearers if take what we hear and do it. I remember praying for george once and the Lord just kinda saying to me- well do really care about him and whats best for him? or do you just want him to change because it will help/ benefit you in some way? And you know what, when i really prayerfully thought about it He was right ( what a surprise hah? ). The underlying of my prayers for my husband were in some way to help or benefit me, not because i was genuinely concerned for his heart and being right with God. It was more to make him right with me or what i thought was right for him. So ill say it again, dont waste time. Tonight when you get in bed with your husband or wife- be thankful for them. Your life may not be perfect, no one's is. But think about the wife of that man who is in the hospital who for now and maybe for the rest of her life has to get in her bed alone. Its one of the hardest things to get use to, looking over and that side of the bed is cold and empty. I at least ( and thankfully ) had all my boys to fill the bed. But now theyre all back in their beds and it is strange. The night hours are the hardest. When youre alone and the business of the day settles, your mind just starts spinning and you seem more vulnerable and fear, saddness and what if's come and thats where she's at facing decisions you never want to have to make for someone you love. I know because i was there too. The only- yet best- comfort i could give her was the testimony of Gods amazing faithfulness to me and the assurance that He is and will continue to be that for all them. He is our Refuge, our Strong tower, our Shield, our Rock, our ever present help, our Comforter- our Dad. Praise His Holy Name! Please pray for this family.

I am blessed

Its been a little over 5 months since my husband went home to heaven. The story of what was happening in our life spread pretty wide by some of my amazing sisters in Christ. The prayers, letters, gifts and phone calls that i received from absolute strangers during the beginning was amazing and the love and encouragement just overwhelmed me. I still have every note and re-read them often. To know that people prayed and still do with tears for us ...there are no words. Some people said that that would end and people would get back to their lives and i guess that has happened some, but even though i dont hear from alot of people anymore i still believe they are praying for us. I remember saying to the Lord in the beginning to help me not to rely on anyone to carry me through this but Him. It can only be Him- He is our Healer. I have to say though that i feel exceptionally blessed. I have recieved some gifts from some home schooling families and stay at home moms -someone even offered to share their home with us. I noticed that they make a point to say their gift is small, but it blesses me even more because i know as a stay at home mom you had to sacrifice to give us that and you probably cut something from your own grocery bill just to send us that $10. or $15. There is no small gift. Its beautiful to me, that people give to us like that. I have some amazing ( that word doesnt even do them justice! ) sisters who i know are on this journey with us for the long haul. I love them more than i could ever express and dont know what id do without them! I am part of an awesome homeschool group whose support is invaluable to me. These are women who may not know what to say, but they will hug me or just sit and listen to me if i need to talk. There is one lady who whether i share good news with her or im sad she just grabs me, squeezes me tight and loves on me. I have a sister who i sent a text to the other day because i recieved a letter from the bank and i was afraid and she sent me back jer 1:19- read it, its awesome! And then maybe 15 minutes later she and her husband called me and prayed for me over the phone. Who does these things? I had a bad dream the other night and i woke up beyond sad and for probably an hour i was laying there worrying about our life, how are we going to do this, can God really make the way, the boys etc. It was about 6:30am and i got a text from another sister saying exactly what was needed in the moment. She's been sending me text messages just about every morning for months. I usually wake up to them. She just prays and sends me His word. There are times she doesnt even know how much im hurting and the words she sends just wash over me and the pain and sorrow leave and it focuses me back to my Father- who IS able. She told me the other day she loves me like the little sister she always wanted but never had. Seriously, I feel so loved! And thats just some of them. I cant even tell you how rich and blessed i feel. I love you beyond words and will never forget how youve loved us!

I keep a stash of my husbands unwashed shirts behind my pillow on my bed. I also have some in the closet wrapped tightly in a trash bag to preserve the smell of him. Every so often i take them out and try to find a spot that still smells like him and when i do i tell Isaac to come smell them and he buries his sweet 9 yo face into the shirt and comes back out smiling. It's really sweet. We must do it often enough that now Simeon my 2yo has caught on. Tonight i had one of georges sweatshirts on and i told Sim it was daddy's shirt and he put his face into it and sniffed. It was a bitter sweet moment. I have a lot of those with Simeon- with all of them actually. I love that Simeon still seems to have some rememberance of his dad. He still loves to look at his pictures and always wants to sit and play his guitar. We were in walmart a few weeks ago and he saw a man infront of us with a shaved head who did slightly resemble George and Sim- with a question sound in his voice- said Dad? That was a heart breaker! Isaiah who is my very sensitive 7yo remembers when george made their fort in the back yard, singing and making cd's with George, going camping ( at a lodge--which is the only way to camp! ) Yet sometimes out of nowhere, he just curls up on my lap sorta sad and tells me he misses his dad. Today we went to out to where our homeschool group had gone camping and we werent even there 5 minutes and he came up to me and asked me if i missed daddy. Ofcourse my answer was yes! I later asked him what made him ask me that and he said there was a man there that looked a little like dad. Ben is just full of every question you can imagine from why did dad die? Can he come back if he wants to? does dad have friends in heaven? And also wondered if dad has hair in heaven. And probably atleast 5 times a day Ben will come cuddle up with me and tell me he misses his daddy and wished he didnt die. Isaac my 9 yo tries to be a tough guy. He is at that age where he thinks he the man with all the answers and tries to tell everyone what to do. He is not a hugger anymore and really was never affectionate with George but every once he lets me sneak in a cuddle or back scratch. He has the most memories and talks alot with the other boys about him. He talks about the trips to the dump- which for all of them was better than disneyland, he talks about how they all use to hide when he came home and he would go look for them, how crazy he use to drive. Fun stuff. The other night we were sitting on my bed and i just said to them wouldnt it be awesome if dad just walked in the door? Think of how excited Sim would be and they all said it would be great and i looked at Isaac and said -would you hug him? and without a second of hesitation he said " Oh ya I would! " I just cried and forsure wont be asking that question again! When George first went into the hospital i had him make a little video for each of the boys. I knew they would be too scared to go to the hospital so i had him make them a video and they made him one.I havent watched them for months but I asked them if they wanted to see them the other day and isaiah and ben did. Isaac didnt want to yet- which i can totally understand. Simeon i think is still too young to understand its a video and not really him so im waiting on him. I am so glad i have them. They are just maybe 15 seconds but he tells each one their awesome and that he loves them- which is enough. I wish i would have had him make me one. But i have letters and cards and other sweet memories of him. I miss him greatly and have been dreaming about him a lot. i dont like the dreams. Im either looking for him and and I know he is there but i cant ever seem to find him or he is with us but he's just not right- he's just not him. I wake up just feeling... empty. It's not easy, but God is faithful. He is being so tangibly real to me that sometimes i just want to burst. And im believing for big seemingly impossible things. He says He is my Father, Husband and Provider and Im believing He's going to make a way for me to remain at home, have a home, and continue to raise and home school my sons like we have been doing. I dont know how he will do it but i know that He can. And im also believing that my little guys wont be lacking anything by not having a dad. I believe that He'll hold their hearts, heal their hurts and walk them through this and show Himself a faithful Dad to them as well. Pray for us though. People tell me how strong i am but you dont see it all. It's really just me leaning on Him and Him carrying me. He is so amazing- how He cares for us. There is no one like Him.

I have been without a computer for a week and thats been really hard. It's amazing to me how much it actually helps to write here as well as journaling. So much has been going on...I am loving the daylight lasting longer. We planted our vegetable garden in the backyard and Ben and Isaiah planted some wildflowers in the front yard. I wasnt going to do it this year but the kids really wanted to and i have to say it feels good to have life and things growing here. In the evening we turn the praise music up really really loud, sit out front and check on their little baby flowers growing and eat otter pops. Life CAN be sweet even when youre in the valley of weeping. For those of you who didnt know my husband, he was very out going, talked to everyone, helped anyone who needed it. He's literally given the shirt off his back to people before. All of our neighbors knew George and they have been walking in the evening now and ofcourse they all have stopped to mention they havent seen him out front in a while and now his great big ford truck is gone as well so i have had to share with a whole new slew of people what happened. I am amazed to find out how many people have lost someone they love to some form of cancer! Im not sure what pit of hell cancer crawled out of, but its evil and people live in total fear of it.
Right now i know of 3 people that are facing death. One is a sweet 85 yo widower friend of my family Joe. He has COPD and his lungs are just stopping working. They took him off the ventilator today, it will be a miracle if he lives through the night. One other family the husband has terminal bad prostrate cancer and the other family is a man who was really kind to us after George passed. He is having brain surgery tomorrow morning to try to figure out what the lesions are in his brain/ body and figuring out treatment. His son's wedding is this saturday. It just blows my mind how much death or potential death is near me. And it trips me out how life and the world just keeps going on! We just celebrated Easter and it really wasnt hard for me because of George. What was hard for me was enjoying my day, stuffing my face when i knew what other people were facing. It felt like a waste of my time. I would have rather been visiting the sick or even just spent the day in prayer for all these people. When you know what those people are going to be feeling- the magnitude and anguish of grief- it just makes me want to wrap my arms around them and love them. You know, thats probably the only thing i like about hospitals is the fact there i feel free to do that. When george was at UCI we would just see someone pacing the hall and he would tell me to go check on them and i would just walk up and put my arms around total strangers and listen to them and pray for them. I even did it one time going up the elevator to the parking structure. Life is different in there. Your career, your money, your social status dont matter in there- we're all on equal ground. All the world garbage is left at the doors and you just care for each other- total strangers- and you want to help ease their burdens. I think that happens when we experience great catastrophes like the the world trade centers. Again you have this sudden realization of death and disaster and it immediately brings into our focus what matters most in our lives- loving people. Yes our families, but even absolute total strangers. I wonder why we lose that, because we do. We go back to the routine of our lives. I dont want that to happen to me. Yes, we do have to do our life stuff but I want to always be moved by compassion for people. Really, what else matters? Loving God, loving others. Try it this week. When youre walking through the market and you see some little old lady, reach out and touch her arm and ask how she is. Find a mom and compliment her or encourage her or do whatever the Lord brings infront of you. Dont wait until you experience something sorrowful to have that love for people- love them now.

soundboarding

This post may not make alot of sense or it may make some mad. Iv been struggling with a lot of thoughts- a lot of controversial thoughts. Im not looking to argue anything, convince anyone or be convinced, but really just trying to work through them out loud here. Im struggling with what people are thinking about my husbands death and about my Father. In reality, their probably really not thinking about it like I think but these are things that are on my mind. My husband believed whole heartedly that God was his healer- not doctors. His belief was grounded in the word and God had healed him of many things through his life. He had seen God do things similar to the things done in the scripture since he was a little boy. Anyone who knew us during the time of him being sick knew that he was putting his trust in his Father. and even though he went to the hospital, that was really because he just couldnt bare the pain anymore. His words to the hospice nurse were these- I have a Father in heaven who with a word created everything we see and until a man can tell me he can do that, I think im better off in His hands. My husband was not perfect ( none of us are ) and I was with my husband every second right up to the end and we had conversations about things that he believed led to the situation he was in. Now, i dont feel the need to mention those because i believe love covers those things and keeps them private. And i dont believe all sickness is the result of sin. The bible says trouble comes to us all. And i dont think we can ever really know about other people because its really between the person and God. But scripturally speaking, The word does say His people do die from a lack of knowledge, wisdom and Jesus also said that if the tree isnt bearing fruit it gets cut down. Sometimes i think people forget these things and most of the time I think God gets blamed for things that are not His doing. The bible says Jesus is the EXACT representation of the nature of the Father, John says Jesus has explained the Father to us and Jesus also said that He was doing the things the Father was doing and that if we have seen Him we have seen the Father. I dont see ANYWHERE in the scripture where jesus said it was not His will to heal. I dont see anywhere where He let someone die as the means of them getting healed. I dont see anywhere that He said someone was sick to learn something. Yes, we do grow as a result but He never made anyone sick or left them sick to learn something. I read that He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed of the devil. I see that He saw the people sick and was moved with compassion to heal them. It hurts my heart that people - His children- say that He does these things. Things like- He doesnt heal, its His will for you to be sick, it may be His will that you walk outside and get hit by a car- its all in Gods hands. Well is it? We dont have any part in what happens to us? I think too many times we look at other people and base what we believe on what happens to others. Iv heard probably 100 times about some great person, preacher etc... who had some sickness and although he was good and worthy God didnt heal him and took him home. Well, Jesus said no one is good except the Father. And I wonder if we never looked at anyone else or their circumstance and ONLY looked at the word of God what would our belief about our Father be? And believe me, i dont claim to know everything but i like to believe i know a little about the nature of my Father and i dont see it. I see a Father who loves us more than the life of His Son. And i see a Son who for the joy set before Him trusted His Father and endured torture beyond what we could ever imagine to bring us back into reight standing and fellowship with the Father. I wouldnt give the life of my child for anyone and Jesus gave His for the worst of the worst. And i just dont see how after doing that unbelievably beautiful demonstartion of love and sacrifice how people believe He does these other things. I wouldnt do that to my child, would you? Why then would we think our Father would. As far as why things happen, I dont know. I dont know why children get sick or people get ripped away. I will be honest and say sometimes i think like the people in the wilderness we never come to know His ways. And i dont think we are taught to believe Him and fight for things. Like the woman who came to Jesus and her daughter was demon possesed in matt 15:22. She was crying out so loud the disciples were trying to send her away- alot of people would have left at that point. Jesus says to let her stay but then He ignores her request. How many of us would have left then? The He calls her a dog! Read it- He did! Im pretty sure that would have taken care of the rest of us. But she doesnt leave and it doesnt appear she was going to until she got what she came for. And she did and not only did her daughter get delivered but Jesus marveled at her great faith. She had pitbull tenacity that wasnt going to let go. Do we have that? Or do we quit before we get our promise. Do we give up because He doesnt answer us right away? Or do we stand firm. I may not understand all things and i know we only see through the glass dimly right now but i dont want to go down with out a fight- like my husband. I believe there are far more promises in God's word about having a long life filled with good than that of dying young and im gonna fight like hell for what i believe the bible promises to me. Right now, im amazed. I feel like 10,000 are falling at my side and 1000 at my right hand and im really amazed at the number of men- young men- that are passing over. It's not right! No one would will EVER be able to convince me that it was God's will that my husband at 45 pass over leaving me without a husband and my sons without their dad. and likewise no one will EVER convince me that this was the way God chose to heal him. Give me chapter and verse. I dont understand it all and thats probably one of the hardest parts of this trip. But i refuse to believe and say that his death was from my Fathers hand- my heart just cant believe that.