The past few weeks I have found myself grieving some of the things that cancer has stolen from me. Namely, how motherhood is a little different than how I envisioned it. If you would have asked me earlier in the year where I saw myself this Fall, my secret hope would have been to be pregnant again. Instead, I’m undergoing chemotherapy and wondering if any more children are to ever be a part of our future. I’ve often found myself on this loop especially when I log onto social media and see beautiful swelling bellies and pictures of fresh eyes squinting as they take in their new world. I rejoice for these women while also wondering and praying if it could possibly ever be my story again.
I’m finding with cancer, that life needs to be lived with assertion. It’s not that I can’t be soft, but I need to be acutely aware and more intentional with my priorities. One of those things being my attitude. I understand it’s okay to grieve, it’s okay to cry, but at some point, life does go on and I don’t want it to go on without me. There is so much beauty and goodness surrounding me but I’m not going to know it if I’m not purposely seeking it and being a coauthor of it.
C.S. Lewis once stated in a letter to a friend (who at the time thought she was dying in a hospital and was scared), “There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” The irony is that woman ended up living for many more years, while Lewis died just five months afterwards. He wasn’t talking about the woman’s change in circumstances. How could he have known? We never know what’s in store for tomorrow.
What Lewis is referring to is a life that is lived in a trajectory towards Heaven. God is making things right. He is redeeming His children back to Him. All will be made new. In the end, good triumphs over evil. This is the hope we can carry through our day to day moments, no matter how scary, or sorrow ridden, or gray it may seem. Today’s trials will be a mere shadow to the glory we are and will be sharing with the Lover of His Creation. We only have to be watching and shepherding it in <3
If this all sounds too good to be true, I’m imploring you to drop whatever else you feel may be important and make this the most important. For Jesus said in Matthew 7:7-12:
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”
“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.”
Lay aside what the world says about Jesus, what you’ve previously thought about Jesus and find Him for yourself. He is waiting and hoping to offer you peace, joy, hope, faith and love eternal!!
