Appointments and Small Improvements

Living with chronic illness has been one of the greatest challenges and tests of faith I’ve known yet, constantly revealing where I look for hope. And it isn't always pretty.

I had a phone appointment with my doctor last week with very little to “show”. Sadly, my autoimmune numbers are not improving yet, despite over a year of substantial immune support, detoxing, and gut healing, as well as over three months of intense lyme and co-infection treatment. My body is currently fighting six infections that I'm aware of, but additionally, fighting against itself! I so desperately wanted my lab work to show something was "working". Yet all I know for sure is that I still have a long way to go....

The reality that it could take years for my pain to get better sunk in and brought me to a place of discouragement again. It is here that I’m faced with two choices:

1. I can worry and become anxious about how to continue life with such limitations and pain.
Or...

2. I can entrust my future to my Heavenly Father who perfectly knows and understands my situation.

This is a continual choice, to cast my cares on my Father and trust that He will do what's best for me when it doesn't seem like this is good at all! Do you find yourself in this same dilemma because of the ups-and-downs of your health, your job, or life in general? Well the Psalmist provides comfort in our distress:

“When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears
and delivers them out of all their troubles.
The Lord is near to the brokenhearted
and saves the crushed in spirit.
Many are the afflictions of the righteous,
but the Lord delivers him out of them all.”
Psalm 34:17-19

As much as I would love to promise you that life will get easier and all your pain will dissipate, that is not necessarily true in a broken, sin-cursed world (side note: this does help us long for heaven!). "Many are the afflictions of the righteous" (v. 19). That does not sound hopeful! But we have hope in a Redeemer: One who hears, who is near to the brokenhearted, who delivers and saves the afflicted and crushed. This is a God who intimately knows our pain and cares more than any person ever will. The One who promises, in time, to deliver. This is the God we can trust.

Today I'm reminding myself that while I need to trust, I also must keep crying out for help. Continually asking God for grace to persevere. For deliverance. For hope.

God is with me today, no matter how "terrible" my circumstances may be or how bleak the future may appear. And if you know Him, He is with you too. May the Lord draw near and comfort your heart today.

(On another note, I have a wonderful functional, lyme literate doctor in Indianapolis who works hard to get to root issues in health, if anyone is looking for a doctor! :) )