Fear Not!

I do not fear heaven. I do not fear death, because I trust the promise of heaven. I do not fear onliness because my God is always with me and his love surrounds me. I have lived with success and failure. I have lived with honor and disgrace. I have lived with appreciation and with rejection. I have eaten steak and cordon bleu and I have eaten rice and potatoes. It’s just food either way and when it’s gone, it’s gone. I have worn fancy clothing and precious stones and I have worn cheap earrings and clearance rack clothing. I’ve driven new cars and I’ve driven old clunkers that barely got me from one place to another. None of that made me more or less of a person or dulled the flame inside. This is not to say that I cannot be brought low. I had a car wreck that stole more than I could imagine from me and a God who gave back more than I would have ever thought. I’ve looked death and disability in the eye and reacted as humans react and yet was loved and delivered. I’ve had my greatest dream crushed more than once –and once by my own doing. I have been degraded and deceived. And through it I lived. 5 years ago, I was given news about my health that I would not accept –again. Since before that revelation until now, I have lived with rheumatoid arthritis. I recall a time when I used to think it was a joke. But aside from the pain and swelling that is disabling if allowed to progress, when I get an infection, it touches my whole body. Along with the attack that is waged on my body, the lack of desire to keep doing it one more time becomes the greater enemy. I believe in divine healing. As yet, divine healing has not come to this disease. When diagnosed, I chose not to take the medications they prescribed and opted for a total change in diet and a life of discipline. God has been good to me through that. Yesterday I was ill, brought on by careless neglect, just a slight kidney infection. It would have been a small thing at one time but not so when it is governed by my silent partner. I had to fight just to walk upright. I was achy and distracted by pain most of the day. I went from task to task just to get through the hours until my efforts could rectify the damage I had done to myself. The relief was slow coming. Tonight my face and arms were hot and bumpy with the red places that follow any strong internal distress. I doctored them with my herbal remedy before laying down. Each day and year I stand closer to heaven, my final destination. That does not discourage me. I do have fears. I will tell you of them. I fear living beyond my usefulness. I fear living past my final sunrise or last creative venture. I fear losing my freedom to decide when to rise and what to eat. I fear losing the ability to laugh and see the humor in things around me. I fear losing the right to give to others or to teach a lesson or to lead a craft. I fear not being allowed to live in my own space, eat my own cooking and listen to music that feeds my soul and spirit. I am not a poor soul because I am sick or because I may be misunderstood when I am sick. I am only poor when I do not trust God’s best for my present and my future. I will never be perfect by the human eye’s standard but I am perfect in the eyes of my Father because of the work of his Son completed in whole on the cross. He rose to give me ‘new.’ Should my greatest fears become reality, it is trust that will bring me through it to the other side. And should my greatest hope be realized, it is trust that will bring me through it with a right heart and mind. 1 Peter 1:6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Hebrews 12:10 God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.