Flashback Fridays

Well, technically this is my last Flashback Fridays since they were an institution of the summer, but because I will be in Disneyworld next Friday, I will likely have one more for you.  I went way back for this one.  It's short and was written in the first month or so of me writing.  This was originally written on December 16, 2010, and entitled Mustard Seeds.  My writing will be a little light next week since I'll be partying with my kiddos in Florida, but I will be back in full force with you after my birthday.  Happy Labor Day!

A very dear friend of mine is going through a very dark storm right now. Her sweet precious 4 year old has a very aggressive cancer. Despite all my weeks in the hospital with our babies, this is a new kind of trauma that I can't imagine. It is prolonged. It wreaks havoc even outside of the chemo treatments. And it wears you down to a state where you are scared to ask for miracles for fear that God might disappoint you - and then what? What would happen to all those years of faith if He didn't intervene like you asked?

I understand your faith being tested. I have been intimately acquainted with your hopes being dashed and dark news greeting you like a hail storm.  And while I have no words of wisdom for those going through a cancer storm with a child, I do know that the Lord understands that we are human (God made us after all) and does not expect us to blithely dance through trauma unaffected and sunnily optimistic. Our faith may feel small, but He tells us that small faith can do big things!  My mom gave me a mustard seed encased in a glass bead dangling from a gold chain which I wore through much of my childhood. It was supposed to be an ever present reminder that even though sometimes our faith feels SO small to us, God can use our small faith to do big things.  The God who multiplied 5 loaves and 2 fish, the God who raised Lazarus from the dead, the God who walked on water and calmed the storms WANTS to do big things.  He is a moving mountains kind of a God.  And when that mountain stands between you and survival, it is so hard to believe it will move and it is so scary to ask. But it CAN move.  So open your palm, imagine that teeny tiny mustard seed, and believe in a God of miracles.

Matthew 17: "Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

*Note from 2012: my darling friend's daughter is in full remission.  I know this isn't the answer for everyone with this struggle, but praise gracious God that it was His answer for her.