Thank you Father for Your many blessings, we can count them one by one and still not have enough time in the day to get through all your blessings. Thank you all for your continued thoughts and prayers.

Theresa is doing as well as can be expected – maybe even better. She gets petty fatigued, but still gets a bit done. This week her radiation treatment times were all different, but from this time on,they will all be late morning 5 days a week. She missed a treatment Friday because she took our homeschooled son to the Salem Oregon to a class outing, YWAM ropes course. Instead of driving down and back up on Friday, they went Thursday afternoon, and came back Saturday late morning. This allowed Theresa to rest all day Friday after dropping him off at the course. It was a good time for Theresa and our son. So with significant rest periods, Theresa, so far, is finding she can still take care of the needs of our family. As the radiation treatments continue her fatigue is bound to worsen and her skin will get more irritated. Her radiation oncologist is having her get a hyperviscous Aloe vera application that is compounded by a pharmacy in Olympia, for application after Radiation. They have found that is more soothing and less irritating than other creams with less aloe vera and with other ingredients like alcohol. Daily she has to move her arm above her head and keep the skin loose as it is beginning to pull and tighten down. She has tightness in her lower arm as well that has made her grip strength weak, so we have to open jars for her. One thing she has been able to do with vigor is shop on line on her iPad. She has gotten pretty adept at shopping and to my chagrin, buying too – and finding all those “deals”- a catch word for the sucking sound a wallet makes when all the money is drained out of it. 🙂

I’ve been impressed with Theresa. She has been working on being optimistic, seeing the positive side, smiling despite the struggle. She has also been working on giving all her worries up, trusting God completely. Her countenance is changing. What was meant to destroy, instead has grown beauty in her heart. These difficult times have caused growth and beauty to abound, helping us understand what it means to be more than conquerers, how God can transform any situation for good, for those who love Him.

Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning, great is Your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, ‘Therefore I hope in Him!”
Lamentations 3:22-24

Great Is Thy Faithfulness
Thomas Chisholm – 1925

Great Is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father!
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Though changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not
As Thou hast been Thou forever wilt be.

Refrain:
Great Is Thy faithfulness,
Great Is Thy faithfulness,
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided
Great is Thy Faithfulness, Lord unto me!

Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon, and stars in their courses above,
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy, and love.

Refrain

Pardon for Sin and a peace that endureth,
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide,
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

Refrain

Thank you for your continued prayers. They are truly being answered. Prayers don’t only change things, they change us. May you have a blessed week.