Bedazzled

The past two days I have been having these moments of 'awash in gratitude'.  No one came to my door with a million dollar cheque.  I am nauseas from chemo more than I like to be on these best drugs days.  So, nothing flashy and awesome event-wise around here.

BUT.   We have been receiving positive news regarding my lungs ("x-ray shows NOTHING, the lungs are clear" followed by a CT Scan a few days later that shows "the nodules are very diminished".  Super good news to take in, absorb, swirl around on your tongue, digest, balance with submitting to more chemo when you just kinda want to be done now with all the needle pokes!  [smile] 

AND. I've been counting all the "and your spine is clear" and "your c-spine (neck?) is clear" and "your pelvis is clear" and "it's not breast cancer" and "your bladder is clear" and "your brain is clear" and "the shadow on your hip is gone" and "your veins in your legs look fantastic and sound (?) excellent" and the bruising on my tummy (from all the shots) is clearing which means clots (which apparently can take the same amount of time according to one ER doc) are dissipating, too...  

It keeps bubbling up in me.  But then my thinking takes over and I get lost.  Is it too soon to be feeling positive?  And I'm not new to the chemo cycle, we are heading into the harder days this weekend.  Is it stinting God's goodness for me to clamp a lid down on the joy... yes!  So, my thinking and processing through the thoughts and emotions and figuring out balance... need to be nipped in the bud!

The magnitude of the gratitude (it is palpable...I can feel it... like... deep down but... like I'm having trouble articulating it (what, trouble getting words out... not usual for me, hey? [smile] has sort of thrown me for a loop in the moments where it quietly sneaks forth and then almost bubbles over into a bedazzlement.   And I have found myself sort of catching up with the thankfulness and checking it, reeling it in, not knowing if I should or could fully allow it to develop.  There are dear ones around me suffering loss, suffering cancer treatment, suffering the waiting on a medical understanding of a condition, there is me mid-cancer treatment but usually so open to the positives (or at least just saying it over and over in the dark moment until the reality of the truth of God's light busts through that dark spot once again).  But... how dumb is that?  For me to try and stop the gratitude?  The grateful heart?  God's awesomeness bursting forth as His spirit fills me?  Dumb.  But, also human.  We want control.  That's what caused the fall from grace originally.  Adam and Eve in the Garden... Eve wanted to know what God knew... she ate the fruit.  

And so, this morning, waking with gratitude in my heart, heaviness and prayers for three specific friends, and still gratitude pulsing forth from deep inside of me... and thoughts swirling around over how to 'handle' this gratitude that keeps trying to effervesce from my innermost being... I realized... God is wanting to bedazzle my day, my spirit, my moment.  Just let Him.  That's my job... to just let Him.  To accept it.  Why ever would I stop that good and lovely and perfect thing: joyful heart? Yes, please!  

I have a poster in the bathroom that says "Wake up and be grateful"... and for me, I am going to not think back, not look ahead, but really focus on being in this grateful moment.  Not let my hopes and dreams and 'when cancer is gone' and 'I wonder what God's plan is for me / us from this, thru this, next?' and instead of letting my planning and hoping and dreaming brain get my feet running (well, still slowed down from the blood clots... God's got a plan to help me stay present even!)... I am going to really purpose to let the bedazzlement happen.  God is good and bright and shiny and loving and lovely and magnificent and omnipotent and awesome and just really mind-blowingly-huge... that is more than enough to think on ... and really savour!

We ask Him for big things.  We expect miracles as the Bible tells us we should.  We trust Him for awesome.  So why would I try and contain the hugeness of His "can do it"- ness?  That makes no sense.  Let Him do the BIG stuff, Kristin... hmmm, not "let Him", He is omnipotent God.  Open your heart and mind to it, Kristin.  A quote I have long loved is this: "God is only as big as your imagination."  Now, I know that He is far bigger than my pretty humungous imagination... but what this quote means is think HUGE cuz God is HUMONGOUS TIMES INFINITY PLUS A ZILLION MORE!!!  

May you see and feel God's bedazzlement in your day.  It's there.  Breathe it in.  Let the sparkles of it light something warm and glowing and yummy and sweet and peaceful and restful into your day.  

With love and gratitude for YOU in my days,
Kristin