Thank you Father for seeing us through this past week. Thank you for your faithfulness. Thank you all for your prayers.

This was a pretty stressful week. Theresa’s left arm, opposite to the radiation side, has become much more painful. She is finding severe pain in it when she moves it and now can’t move it above her head. It is keeping her up at night. She in fact has had to restart some medications just to take the edge off. It seems each day it hurts worse. With this in mind she mentioned it to her Radiation Oncologist who felt a bone scan needed to be done as soon as possible as it could be a metastasis. As you could guess both of us experienced a roller coaster of emotions this week until on Friday we found out that the bone scan was normal. Both the radiation Oncologist and Oncologist believe it could be nerve injury due to either the radiation or previous chemo, though I am not convinced of this yet. We will try to get her into an Orthopedic doctor this week to see if it could be the shoulder itself. We could use prayer here. As you can guess, the left arm and shoulder pain causes her more discomfort than the radiation and skin blistering on the right side. This pain is starting to wear on her, especially since she doesn’t get much sleep. Hopefully this can be figured out in the next few weeks. She is getting her higher intensity Radiation now and will be done with radiation on Friday, we think. She got her immunotherapy infusion Friday too. She gets pretty worn out on these every 3rd Fridays. The nice thing, radiation is done by next weekend. Yea!

God deserves the praise for his kindness to us. We are both emotionally spent this weekend, yet we didn’t need to be, as He again held us in His hands. When we only see one step in front of us, it is easy to worry what could be around the corner and not focusing on the one leading. We are the weak link in this faith venture. In the Message, Psalms 25:15 reads “If I keep my eyes on God, I won’t trip over my own feet”. I tripped up a bit this week. I’m thankful God understands our frailties and gently draws us closer to Him. Life can be tough and messy and even more so when you love and care. From Streams in the Desert, Joseph Caryl writes, “an affliction hits a believer never by chance but by God’s divine direction. He does not haphazardly aim His arrow, for each one is on a special mission and touches only the heart for whom it is intended. It is not only the grace of God but also His glory that is revealed when a believer can stand and quietly endure an affliction”. In the same devotional below this is another statement “if you have been praying to know more of Christ, do not be surprised if He leads you through the desert or through a furnace of pain”.

I can vouch I have learned more about submission of will, obedience and His Lordship through this year of trials than at any other time in my life. I have also seen His gentleness, miracles, and vast lovingkindness and grace as well. I would have never signed up for this path, if I’d known ahead of time how hard it would be. Yet at the same time, if this is the only path by which I can walk with my Savior, Hold His hand, know His voice, and reach the final destination with Him, then I will follow Him all the more on this difficult path He has trusted us with.

Thank you for supporting us with your continued thoughts and prayers. We continue to covet those prayers, as God has blessed us through them.