I apologize for not blo
gging last week, I was very ill. Actually I am still ill, seeing as how I am typing this in my room lying on my bed, whereas usually on Thursday nights I am at Vida Joven (young life), basically youth group. I haven’t gone to ministry in a week I’ve been so sick. These past couple days my fever has been down allowing me to go to class, but once the Tylenol wore off I would come back to my room and crash the rest of the day.
I have had a fever, headache, sore throat, headache, stomach ache, achy all over, and a few other odd symptoms. I have been to the Doc a couple times and they have diagnosed me with a throat infection, but I have been on antibiotics for almost a full week and the only thing that has improved is my fever, which I think the Tylenol is keeping under control. Physically I feel miserable, and I am eager to be back on the field serving. I’m sure all of you know the huge benefit of being sick is having your mother to care for you. This is the sickest I remember being in my life with maybe the exception of chicken pocks and mono. Basically I really miss my mom.
There are some benefits though. I think for me it’s almost been like fasting. I am suffering and I have more time to spend with God. The only difference is that I am not doing this by choice, and I can’t break fast whenever I want( I’ve definitely tried “ok God thanks for the time with you it was good, now could you please heal me? I give up.” Which is actually pretty cool if I think of it like that. God initiated, and he controls the intensity and duration. He definitely turned up the intensity of the quiet times too. I have had such fruitful times with God this week.
First my team and I all prayed that God would heal me. A couple days later God answered me as I was up sick all night. I felt it during prayer and then I listened to a sermon on waiting, and then all as I read the bible it seemed liked waiting kept coming up. This actually gave me great encouragement. I knew that I was sick for a purpose, which is much better than feeling like I’m missing all this ministry. I trusted that God had something better in store for me.
A couple cool things I had already seen God do was give me even more compassion for sick people. Sometimes when I have good health I forget how much of a burden physical sickness can be. Another thing I was watching God do through this was brining Joe and I together even more. There were a couple days where he stayed back and took care of me. Joe has been growing with God at an unbelievable rate these days! It has definitely gotten me excited to watch him just taking leaps of faith for God. He often now will choose to spend time with Jesus over other fun things that we might normally do!! That is so awesome to find satisfaction from just being in the presence of GOD!
So as Joe Carter nursed me back to health, Jesus Christ was also making plans for my well being. A couple nights later I couldn’t sleep again, and I was in my room and so I sat up and started praying quietly in my bed, some where in there my prayers became louder and I felt God’s presence more. I can’t describe all that happened that night, but Joe and I ended up getting together for hours of some of the most powerful prayer and encounter with God I have ever had. It just felt like God was pouring out so much love into our hearts. We had so much joy and it felt like God was revealing so much. One thing I felt I got a picture of a sponge. Well I think my dad was the one who originally said that the Holy Spirit is like a pool and we are the sponge, in him but he is in us. With that in mind I felt like some parts of my life are full and saturated with the Holy Spirit, but other parts of me are dry. I felt like this past week God was telling me, to fill me he had to squeeze me like a sponge so that I will be ready to be filled. That night I felt sooo filled it was incredible. Being sick was worth it! Yeah God!
