Tag Archives: Serving

11.3.11 A Day in the Life of Dad

     It’s Friday afternoon around 3:00, and I have just arrived at Dad’s apartment to do my bi-weekly inventory so I can re-stock his shelves with groceries, medical supplies, and medications.  As I enter his apartment, I see the typical clutter.  In the kitchen is a makeshift pantry, made of four tiers of shelving.  Littering the floor are old newspapers and newsletters that need to be placed in the recycle bin, although I can’t do that without him supervising, lest he gets upset.  So the floor remains cluttered. 

     When I call out his name, he let’s me know he is in his bedroom.  I wander into his room and find a smiling nurse named Charity standing by the foot of his bed.  Dad is in his wheelchair with his back to me.  Charity has just finished redressing his stasis ulcers and his bed has a used chuck on it that needs to be thrown out as it is contaminated by some of the fluids that drain from his open ulcers.  Dad is glad to see me.

      “Charity, have you met my daughter?”  he asks.  Dad loves to introduce me to the staff.  He watches Charity pack her medical supplies so she can tend to the next resident.

      “Lee Ann,” Dad asks.  “See those alcohol pads?  I need you to buy some for me when you do your shopping.” 

      “I actually have plenty of these,” offers Charity.  “ I will be glad to leave you with a supply of them.” 

      “That won’t be necessary,” says Dad.  “I need some on an ongoing basis, so I will have Lee Ann go buy them.” 

      “Charity, that is a sweet offer,” I say.  “On behalf of Dad, we accept!”  (I’m thinking protect the little cash we have on hand.) 

     We hear a knock at the door.  Dad hollers, “Come in!”  A tall medical aide enters with clean laundry.  Now there are four people squeezed into Dad’s small bedroom.  Dad can’t see her face because his back is still to us.  She is not smiling.  In fact, she looks like she hates her job.  This look only gets exacerbated when my Dad begins to criticize her as she brings in clean T-shirts, sweat pants, and towels.  Dad is fussing at her because she not only picked up his basket of dirty laundry, but she took the liberty to pick up a dirty towel off of his bed. 

     “I don’t want you to take the towel off my bed,” says Dad.  “If I want it cleaned, then I will PUT it in the laundry basket.  I even typed a note and hung it by the laundry basket requesting that you only launder what I put in the basket.” 

     The aide is NOT smiling.  She is clearly put out.   

     “Dad, she was only trying to be helpful,”  I say, trying to rescue her.

      “I leave all kinds of notes around this apartment, but they don’t bother to read them.  Do they not read English?” Dad asks.   The aide rolls her eyes and shakes her head.  She seems sorry she ever showed up.  She heads out the door.                 

     Charity has her travel bag packed with her medical supplies, and she leaves also, “Have a good day, Harry,” she says with all smiles. 

     It’s now Dad and me.  I pull his wheelchair out of the bedroom and into the living room.  He is still agitated from the interaction with the aide, but I am ready to walk through the apartment and make a  list of groceries and supplies he’ll need to sustain him for the next two weeks.  My goal is to get this done quickly so I don’t have to hang around long in an apartment that smells like urine.  Dad is incontinent.  He has adult diapers, but they aren’t enough.  Dad stuffs his sweats with a thick towel  to absorb additional leakages.  But those aren’t always changed as often as they should be, and when they are, the towels go in his laundry basket, and it may be a day before a new wash is done.  The stench  never goes away. 

     I leave him by his computer in the living room.  “I will be back with your groceries in about an hour,” I say as I head out the door. 

     Dad has a strong need to control, especially his environment.  If things aren’t done the way he requests, it’s emotionally disruptive for him, and he takes it out on staff.  If he can’t find what he needs in his apartment, it frustrates him.  If I try to tidy up his apartment when he’s out of pocket by throwing away old newspapers and newsletters, he gets angry because these papers “might be useful later.”  He wants to oversee what leaves the apartment via the trash can, recycle bin, or otherwise.  Caring for my Dad can be challenging for me and the staff who care for him.  Yet I serve my Dad because it’s a high calling.  God commands us to honor our parents.  

      I Timothy 5:4 says that “children or grandchildren should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God.”  Though this passage refers to caring for widows, I believe the principle applies to any parent or grandparent who is in need of care.  Verse 8 of this same chapter says, “If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”  These are samples of biblical reasons I care for my Dad.  But there is an emotional reason that supersedes them.  I love my Dad.  I am committed to giving him the very best I have to offer.  When he passes, I will be able to put my head on a pillow each night knowing I did the very best I could to help him manage the fears and frustrations he’s had to deal with before the Lord takes him home.  He is sick and tired of his life and is praying for an early ticket into eternity.  

     There are many reasons I look forward to heaven, but one will be seeing a father who is completely healed physically and emotionally and spending eternity with him in a perfect, sinless state.  Better days are ahead! 

Blessings,

Lee Ann

9.1.11 The Long and Winding Road

It’s 2am in the morning, and I’m asleep.  The phone rings.  As the cellphone screen brightens the room, my eyes try to focus on who the caller is, and it’s Dad.  I let it roll to the voice mail because Dad is known for impulsively calling and requesting prayer without regard to the time.  I try to go back to sleep, but my curiosity wins, so I listen to the voice mail.  Dad called to report an act of vandalism.  He put his wallet and his cellphone inside some pants that he hid in his microwave oven.  When he went to go get his wallet and phone, he discovered that they were both completely SOAKED.  The pants were dry.  He believes some aide is coming into his apartment while he is asleep and vandalizing him.  He is calling because he wants me to consider spending the night with him to catch the perpetrator in the act.  The account is bizarre.  He thinks it’s demonic, and maybe it is.  It also might be a side effect of one of his medications for depression. 

The world is out to get him, and I am working hard to not discount his reports.  He wrote up an employee named Tootsie because he felt she was inflammatory when they met at an elevator.  She allegedly said with a hostile tone, “You’re finished!”  Dad had no idea what she meant by that, but it created anxiety and a lack of emotional safety. The Nursing Director heard from him.  He called me again Sunday afternoon to ask for prayer and for salvation for “whoever is still vandalizing him.”  He reported that someone came into his apartment while it was unattended and stole a blue bowl and a bottle of Witch Hazel.  For the record, things come up missing regularly because he displaces items in his apartment by moving them to another room, soon forgetting where he left them.  What was once lost and then found gets chalked up as “harassment by a nurse.” Nothing has been stolen!  I have a hard time believing that someone is shuffling items around the apartment just to aggravate him, but Dad has installed motion sensor cameras to catch the nurse in the act.  

This journey with Dad regularly includes tales such as the ones I’ve shared.  Discerning reality is becoming an ongoing routine.  Because of my Father’s state of mind, I continue to grapple with how and when to use my legal right to conduct Dad’s business.  I deeply desire to honor my Dad and give him dignity by giving him a voice in the decisions I would like to make, but what does this look like?  The struggles are many. 

First, Dad is hooked on supplements, which is one of the reasons he’s in debt.  It is not uncommon to meet him for lunch and find a small glass jar filled with 40 supplements.  I watch as all 40 pills slide out of the jar and into his mouth, chased down with enormous gulps of water.  Dad is also on multiple prescribed medications.  I think his primary care physician (PCP) should know what he is taking to make sure he is not counteracting any of his prescriptions.  As the medical POA, I could simply write the physician a letter and apprise her of this.  I’ll give you one guess as to how my Dad feels about that idea. When I mentioned it, he said, “Honey, they are required to cover their tails.  Of course they are not going to support supplements because not all of them have a proven track record.  I believe in optimizing my health, and I believe these supplements are the reason I am as healthy as I am.”  I said, “It still doesn’t change the fact that your PCP should know because you don’t know for a fact that you aren’t offsetting the benefit of prescribed medications.”  Can you see that this exchange is going nowhere fast?  

My family believes that he has a psychological addiction to supplements, and he believes that they have benefitted him over the years, though that can’t be quantified.  He wants to keep popping pills, and I want to see reduced credit card bills.  So how do I honor Dad and yet make sure he is not damaging his health by taking all of these supplements?  How do I make sure he feels his voice is heard?  I met him in the middle. 

I had the list of medications from his PCP, and Dad compiled his list of supplements.  My brother Gene is sending this combined list to a registered dietician, and I am sending this list to a pharmacist who will evaluate the interactions to see if there would be any negative side effects.  Gene and I are waiting on the results, but if there are any red flags, it is understood that we will make his physician aware of it.  If neither professional sees the supplements undermining the efficacy of his medications, then we will probably let this be something Dad will continue not to disclose to his PCP. 

There is also a mental health issue that has been the white elephant in his living room for years.  My Dad has compulsive hoarding disorder.  I don’t have time to explain the key features, but I would invite you to Google it.  I used to joke with Dad that when I would come to visit him, his house looked like another Office Max outlet.  Dad has a major tendency to overstock on anything he buys.  I have never known him to buy one of anything.  It’s a Sam’s store concept taken to an unhealthy extreme.  This has become a cash flow issue as he wants me to buy two to three times what he needs, and he doesn’t have the money to back it up.  Another drawback of this disorder is that nothing can be thrown away because “It’s important and may be useful later.”  Anxiety drives this disorder, and he has had it for years.  His physician has no clue that he suffers with it.  As his medical POA, I think the PCP should know about this.  There are medications that can assist him to reduce his anxiety.  However, to stay consistent with my goal to honor Dad and give him a voice, I introduced him to this disorder first and gave him a thumbnail sketch of it.  I asked him if he would be open to letting a psychologist come in and do a home assessment, but he is resistant.  He has never heard of this disorder, so I am going to provide him with information so he can learn about it. 

The credit card situation also creates tension.  The idea of closing credit cards creates angst.  When I visited with him two weeks ago about the need to move in this direction, he emphatically said, “DON’T!” He proceeded to tell me that these credit cards are his “rescue” if he gets in a bind.  No amount of logic or spiritual truths mattered.  I told him that the Lord was providing for his needs already.  Any expenses above his needs are truly wants.  That would not be heard.  I suggested that credit cards don’t rescue him, but the Lord does.  That would not be heard.  I told him if he had expenses that went beyond his income that he truly needed, our family without question would help him.  That would not be heard either.  Dad feels security holding onto these credit cards.  Again, I am convinced that honoring Dad means letting him have a voice and helping him feel some sense of control.  So I honored Dad by asking him to let me hold most of the credit cards so he wouldn’t spend on them, and in return I made a promise not to close them.  That seems to be working for now.  The good news is that Dad is trying hard not to spend on his credit cards, and he is starting to call me now when he wants to put something on his credit card.  

The help Dad needs goes beyond financial assistance.  Our financial stress reflects his psychological stress.  I have to remind myself that what I experience is only a taste of the turmoil he must feel on the inside.  I need the Lord to season me with grace to exude His compassion and mercy when I am feeling frustrated with my Dad.  I haven’t felt successful in doing this over the last week.  I let my frustrations show several different times, and I need to get a handle on this.  My Dad is a challenge, but I am still up for it because I know that in this journey God’s grace is sufficient, and His power is made perfect in my weakness (2 Cor 12:10).  It’s a long and winding road, and I have no idea where it will end.  Please continue to pray for me and my Dad.  I don’t want to lose sight of the goal to honor him and give him the dignity he deserves.  I believe God is big enough to help me with this.  But I do need His grace and His insights, so please pray! 

Blessings,

Lee Ann

7.24.11 High Maintenance or High Calling?

Quagmire: an awkward, complex, or hazardous situation (OED). 

Many of you know that I moved to Austin to help care for my father, who is in assisted living.  Up until recently it’s been relatively straightforward and simple: I’ve made grocery runs for him and stopped by to check up on him regularly.  That was all I was able to muster given the major life transition I had just made by moving back here and trying to establish a sense of normalcy in my own life.  Now that the dust has started to settle, I’ve moved into high gear with Dad. We’re in the process of transferring his financial responsibilities to me. Because of my extensive professional experience in finance, I believe I can provide him the most meaningful help in this area. I had no idea what I was getting into. I thought it would be as simple as getting my name on his checking account so I could sign checks and then paying a few bills on a monthly basis.  But the number of hours I’ve spent trying to sort out Dad’s finances are beyond anything I could have expected, and I can’t see the finish line. The word “quagmire” comes to mind. 

The problem is that the help I am providing is not exactly the kind of help Dad is seeking.  He is looking for someone to help him pay his bills without raising questions about how he spends his money. I am not only going through bills, but I am reviewing credit card statements and checking accounts as well as unhooking over twenty bank drafts (with his permission) for charitable donations.  Dad gives at the drop of the hat, and it takes just one piece of mail for him to say “yes” and fill in credit card data and send it on. Here is just a sample of what I’ve uncovered regarding Dad’s finances and some of the questions I find myself pondering: 

  • Major credit card debt is building each month.  What kind of purchases has he been making?  Are his financial needs greater than his income?  This needs to be analyzed.
  • He pays for two hospital indemnity plans.  Are we submitting claims to get reimbursed when he’s hospitalized?  He has spent many days in a hospital since I’ve been back in Austin.  I have scrambled to file claims with his two insurance companies hoping to get some reimbursement.  It’s a waste of money to pay premiums and then not utilize the benefits when the need arises.
  • Over twenty bank drafts and monthly credit card charges were going to charitable organizations using money he doesn’t have.  I had to unhook all of them to free up the cash.
  • He was making double payments for backing up computer files simply because he had forgotten that he already had this service in place.
  • I continue to discover multiple online orders for things that can be easily picked up at the grocery store.  We are doubling the cost of the product due to shipping charges and credit card interest.
  • He has a strong tendency to overstock. For cash flow purposes, he needs to learn how to buy in moderation.
  • As a retired military officer, he has benefits at the VA that he wasn’t even aware of.  I am trying to figure out as his Power of Attorney (POA) how to get access to this.  He has been paying for years what apparently has been available to him free of charge.
  • He wants to tithe, and I want to support him in that, but then he has to control his spending.  It can be accomplished, but he will have to understand what he needs to give up to do it.  He loves to give, but he’s not in the same financial position as he used to be. 
  • He has three medical insurers.  By the time a claim gets sifted from the primary carrier to the second and third carrier, there are balances still left to pay.  These bills are coming in from multiple providers.   How do you know which bills he really needs to pay versus those the providers are suppose to write-off based on usual and customary charges?  This is a whole different world, and I will be on an exponential learning curve as I try to get a handle on this.

Have you tried unhooking bank authorizations with an institution that likes your money?  Imagine sitting at my Dad’s apartment with cell phone in hand calling multiple organizations to inactivate bank drafts while not being the authorized person on the account.  We get a representative on the line…I introduce myself along with the purpose of the call…they ask to speak to my Dad…they verify his identity…Dad struggles to remember some of the data they are asking for and looks to me for assistance…I provide the answers to the security questions…and then Dad authorizes the organization to talk to me.  The process is cumbersome, and at times flat out irritating.  It infuriates me when I am asking someone to stop a bank draft for free credit reports or fraud protection, and they keep trying to sell a lowered benefit when we just want out!  Some of these organizations will not let you give notice in writing that you no longer want the service.  They say, “We’re sorry for the inconvenience.  (That’s hooey. These organizations are NOT sorry.  They need to quit reading their scripts and listen to the customer!) The only contact information you can find by statement or on the web is a phone number. 

It’s a bad sign when I tell Dad that I have put together a budget, and he replies, “Budget?” Dad hasn’t operated with a written budget for years, so he has no motivation to control spending and live within his means.  If he needs something, he just goes online and orders it. “Dad, you need to see the visual of how your fixed income is being spent,” I told him “and then you need to see the additional money you’re spending through credit cards.  You’re digging a deeper debt hole month by month for items you don’t need.”  This leads to another problem.  He and I have two different concepts of “need”.  I emphasized that God is providing the income he needs to have a roof over his head, clothes on his body, and food to eat.  Those are the needs the Lord promises to provide and tells us not to worry about. Dad’s definition of “need” is ordering 6 months worth of supplements with another 6-month supply already at his apartment.  

I am so thankful I have a POA because it gives me much latitude to assist Dad.  But just because I have the Power of Attorney doesn’t give me the right to take over unilaterally.  It gives me the legal right to take matters into my own hands, but I have an ethical and biblical duty to manage his affairs in a way that gives him dignity and honor.  You might think this is pretty clear-cut, but I find myself swimming in many shades of gray.  For example, it’s tempting to fix these financial issues myself by closing credit cards or by lowering limits on them so he can’t run them up. I could make decisions that are “best for him” without his input.  However, my Christian testimony is at stake, so I want to manage his finances in a way that honors him, which means including him on decisions that need to be made, even though I will spend more emotional energy dealing with his need to be in control.  I want to control his finances and empower him to make good decisions around spending to help him stay solvent and start paying down some credit card debt. However, the last thing I want to do is to control my father.  

I have shared what has been going on, but the greater question for me is how I will go about serving my Dad.  It’s one thing to have a black belt in budgeting and help Dad see his financial reality, but it is another to do it compassionately.  

I am writing with sadness in my heart.  My father has a master’s degree in Physics and another in Mathematics. This is a man who obtained one of the most prestigious scholarships in the Navy and had the privilege to work under Admiral Rickover (remembered as the “Father of the Nuclear-powered Navy”).  Dad worked in nuclear-powered submarines as a Navy officer and engineer.  He retired as a Lieutenant Commander. As a civilian, he worked as an engineer, but his love for teaching led him into the high school classroom teaching algebra, physics, trigonometry, analysis, calculus and Russian for over twenty-five years. He learned Russian as an adult to communicate with the Russians he was trying to reach for Christ. Dad is a very intelligent man, and it breaks my heart to see a mind that had such acuity slip so many gears that he can barely move out of neutral and get any traction in his day. A man who has been known for being meticulous in everything he did can hardly talk about what he did in a given day.  When he leaves a voicemail, he will forget midstream why he is calling.  It is not uncommon to walk into his apartment and find him just sitting in his wheelchair and having no idea how long he’s been there.  

As my father, this man deserves my respect and honor.  He is my top prayer warrior. He has told me over the years, “I consider it my highest privilege and responsibility as a parent to pray daily for my children.”  I can’t begin to tell you how much that ministers to my heart to know my Dad prays for me!  His prayers are a daily gift from God. 

I am in Austin for such a time as this.  If I focus on the hours I’ve spent on Dad’s behalf, it would be easy to label him as “high maintenance.”  However, if I focus on how I am going about investing these hours, then I will see this venture as a “high calling.”  I am on a journey with my Dad.  We are in our seats with our seat belts on, our tray tables locked, and our seats in their full and upright position.  While holding his hand, I expect this transition to have many bumps with occasional turbulent patches.  I will clothe myself with compassion (Col 3:12) as the Lord requires and love him through this time the best way I know how and leave the results up to the Lord.  I pray that the Lord will constantly remind me that Dad is more mentally vulnerable and to maintain sensitivity at all times.  His memory lapses will continue to happen, and he will get online and order things he forgot he already has or didn’t need.  I will feel frustrated when those times occur.  Over-spending will undermine the work I have invested to get his financial house in order.  In the end, I can only control what I do for him.  I love my Dad.  He deserves at a minimum the very best I can give him with the Lord’s compassion and mercy.  It’s a high calling.  Someday I will be looking for the same compassion and mercy from my own caregiver. 

Blessings,

Lee Ann

5.15.10 My Rose-Colored Glasses

Upon my death, I bequeath to the highest bidder at my estate auction my most phenomenal, amazing pair of rose-colored glasses.  These rose-colored glasses have been with me all of my life and they have successfully helped me to see situations more positively than they really were. 

Most of you probably know that I relocated to Austin seven months ago with aging parents being the primary motivator behind this decision.  The pressing need that caused me to seriously pray about being in Austin over the last three years was my father who is an amputee, and who was facing assisted living last year.  God’s hand was definitely in the timing of this move, and I am so thankful that the good Lord worked out all of the details in His typical, marvelous fashion.  But I will tell you that when I made this move,  I was wearing my special rose-colored glasses.

With the help of my rose-colored glasses, I was able to visualize being the daughter my father needs me to be by being available and accessible whenever he needs my help.  Often the help he needs is as basic as doing grocery shopping for him since he doesn’t drive as an amputee.   Since he has problems with chronic venous stasis ulcers on his “good leg”, he has faced multiple hospital admissions since I have been in Austin due to infections that develop.  These hospital stays are prolonged as it takes a week just to overcome the infection, and then he faces two weeks just to rehab to make sure he is mobile enough to  function safely in his own apartment before they discharge him.  The primary point of moving here at this chapter of my life was to be helpful in his time of need and to really have a servant’s heart to assist him whenever possible.

Unfortunately, this adjustment has been overwhelming to me.  My Dad’s needs are real and often, and as soon as I took off my rose-colored glasses, what I saw very clearly is that I am a fiercely independent person who has not experienced “being needed” by another person on such a regular basis. This move has sadly accentuated how self-focused I really am.  Many requests “inconvenience” me.  That’s pretty shallow, I know.   Some of these requests aren’t even “inconveniences”; he just wants me to come over and see him and spend time with him, and I will resist at times by finding excuses as to why it doesn’t always fit my schedule.  I find myself entertaining the hypothesis that if I had ever married and had kids, I would have learned sacrifice in relationships and learned what it means to “be needed” by a child, and a servant’s heart would have been cultivated much earlier than now.  Frankly, I overrated my spiritual maturity in the area of serving others.  I am apparently attached to daily routines without major “interruptions”.  It’s just my tendency of making tasks more important than people. 

My Dad is one of the most gracious persons you will meet.  If you had stopped by his hospital room today, as I did, you would have heard him gush about how thankful he is to have me as his daughter and how helpful I am to him, and how he can count on me to pray for him, and how proud he is of me.  He will tell this to nurses in my presence, or staff at his assisted living facility, or anyone who will listen.  (As he sings my undeserved praise to others, I am thinking, “Those rose-colored glasses look really good on you, Dad.  They are working really well at the moment!”)  He is being very kind, even after having processed my struggles with him and sharing with him my own disappointment in myself.   I believe he is being way too generous in his assessment of me. 

The hope I have as I work through this situation is that Christ is not done transforming me into the woman of God He desires me to be in Christ Jesus.  Phil  1:6 says, “Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”  I am praying that He will give me a servant’s heart to serve my Dad and to keep in perspective that in the scheme of eternity, there is no task I am doing that is truly more important than helping my Father out when he needs me.  I am learning boundaries as to what kind of help I can provide, and I am learning to scale back expectations of myself and give myself room to spiritually grow, and I am learning how to pace my daily routine so that requests don’t have to be such an “inconvenience”.  I certainly haven’t arrived, but I am getting there slowly, but surely.

I will still wear my rose-colored glasses.  There are days that I just don’t want to deal with reality, and wearing these glasses help soften the real picture when reality is harsh to look at.  On other days these glasses are quite helpful because I can see the best in a person when they are not always at their best, or see challenging situations that are daunting and embrace them because “it doesn’t look so bad”.  Just as my Dad sees the best in me, I know God always sees the best in me, even when I can’t see it or visualize the end result that He already knows I will someday achieve with His help.  The difference is God doesn’t need a pair of rose-colored glasses.  He sees the beauty in me and what I am becoming in Him without the help of glasses.  That alone gives me hope.

Be sure to bring your checkbooks and arrive early as my rose-colored glasses will be the hottest item to bid on and the first to go. 

Blessings,

Lee Ann

11.7.09 Life is Short

I struggle with procrastination more than I care to admit.  There is so much more I want to do for God.  Yet, every day I wake up, I realize I am now one day closer to meeting my Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ.  Stated differently, when I wake up each day, I realize that I have one less day to make a difference for Him, which equates to another lost opportunity that can’t be retrieved to do more for Him.  After all, the number of days that have been allotted for each of us has already been ordained before we ever came into being according to Psalm 139:16.  Life on this earth is short, and He has given us an opportunity to give our lives back to Him and partner with Him to make a difference in His kingdom.  I am always impacted by I Cor 6:19-20 that says, “Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?  You are not your own.  You were bought at a great price.  Therefore honor God with your body.”  I have always internalized this as “Well, if I was bought at a great price and Christ was willing to take my place on the cross, the least I could do out of gratitude is give my life right back to Him so He can use me with the gifts He’s given me.”

This struggle has been accentuated over the last 12 months as I have watched young people fight for their lives against cancer.  One friend has lost the battle (Lori Peister), while one whom I continue to pray for has been in a tough battle for nearly a year (Dennis Dick), and one who just got diagnosed with brain cancer and had brain surgery last Tuesday after going to the ER for an unmanageable “migraine” on Sunday (Eric Walton) is getting ready to do battle.  Life is so short and truly unpredictable.  That’s not news.  The bible says in James 4:13-14, “You who say, ‘today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city,  spend a year there, carry on business and make money.  Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life?  You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.’”  You and I really don’t know that we have tomorrow unless the Lord allows us to wake in the morning.  We all see these situations on a regular basis, and I think to myself, this could be me just as easily as it could be you in these situations.  Cancer and illnesses are not a respecter of people.  Some of you can already identify with this kind of battle as God has healed you and extended your earthly life by His grace.  I would bet my life savings that it changed your life and the priorities you have in a positive way.  Many cancer survivors will say “appreciate the life you have and live each day to the fullest”, or many will consistently say, “we are too wrapped up in things that don’t matter. “  Without fail, survivors seem to have a much stronger appreciation for the gift of life than those of us who have not (yet) faced life-threatening challenges, and they live life more fully in the presence of God than they ever had before.

So here is my frustration.  Exactly what does it take for me to quit wasting time and/or procrastinating and really pursue the passion God has given me to be a better bible study teacher and be a better student of the bible so that I can reach more people for Christ and facilitate the growth of those who are already believers?  How much more motivation do I really need to get going? How much more sickness do I need to see?  How many more days am I going to squander before I finally get moving?  I have only been dwelling on this passion for the last 3 years and have for the last 3 years found ways to keep it on the back burner.  It’s time to step it up a notch and take the gift of life and live it as fully as I know how with the passion and gifts He’s already given me and just build on it.  After all, I don’t know when I will be called home.  My days could be alot shorter than I think.  Presuming that I will live a long life is a faulty assumption.  I don’t know that I will get to live a long life.  The unknown number of days that I really have should be more motivation to get started. 

If you have made it this far, I would simply ask that you pray for me.  I need to tag what my real resistance is to move forward.  I really want to be more effective for Him and really sharpen my spiritual gift of teaching and impact more people.  Jer 29:11-12 should be further motivation as He promises me (and you) a hope and a future He has already laid out for me.  It’s time to experience what He has laid out for me in advance and get going because life is short. 

Blessings,

Lee Ann