Devastated with Hope
Nobody wants to hear that word.
It was like I was listening to someone else’s story, looking into someone else’s life. Almost two weeks ago, the doctor told my granddad the fluid from his lungs had cancer cells and it had more than likely come from metastasizing from somewhere else.
Thursday, we were told it was stage 4 lung cancer and not much could be done.
When I was 10, my dad told me he had lung cancer sitting on my grandparents’ bed, where I now lay next to my granddad throughout the day, I was immediately confident that Jesus would take care of us. And He has. Even losing my dad 6 months later, He has always taken care of us. And He won’t stop now. Jesus won’t stop now, He will always take care of us.
My granddad married my grandmother when my mom was in high school. My Papa George, died from lung cancer when I was six months old, and told him he needed to be my granddad because he wouldn’t be around to be mine. My granddad who does not have to love me, does not have to call me his granddaughter, but my granddad who is my Papaw. Because he chose to be my granddad. He loves me fiercely and gently. My spiritual leader, my family leader, my encouragement, my Hail State winner and the sole reason I will bleed maroon and white until the day I die. He makes me want to read the Bible more, know the Bible more and live it Word for Word like he does every day. I cannot imagine a day without my PaPaw, without his smile or his laugh or his Biblical wisdom and Biblical insight.
There are so many things I always thought my PaPaw would be and do in the years to come, and now I just pray to see his smile just one more time tomorrow.
I love that you pick up your walker as you walk when you’re suppose to be leaning on it for support. It reminds me that the world will give us all we think we need to lean on, but God is our ultimate “walker” of strength. You hold my hand and tell me it’s going to be okay, Jesus will take care of us. I believe you, I have always believed you. When I should be nodding my head in comfort and telling you to be strong, you are telling me. You are comforting me.
You are my favorite man on Earth. I am a granddaddy’s girl. I couldn’t have made it this far in our family without you, PaPaw. And I don’t know what I’ll do when you’re gone.
A nightmare I keep thinking we’ll wake up from.
God has a plan for our life. From the very beginning. We’re all taught that His Plan is not to harm us but to prosper us, to give us a Hope and a Future. Right after we found out from the oncology report, I went to my mailbox and the Hope Heals book was sitting there. HOPE HEALS. At the exact time I needed it most.
Could you imagine going through life without hope? Especially, without THE HOPE that Christ is in our lives. Hebrews tells us that our hope is an anchor for the soul. Amen. If I did not have my anchor in hope, I would not be here. This is the third man in my family to have lung cancer. And you have your story. We all have a story. We all have a story of why, how, and what tempted us to lose our Hope but in the end strengthened it.
There are so many quotes I could use from the Hope Heals book, but you’re just going to have to wait until April 26 (PREORDER NOW). But one of my favorites from the beginning is this “Perhaps some detours aren’t detours at all. Perhaps they are actually the path. The picture. The plan. And, perhaps most unexpectedly, they can be perfect.”
In so many ways, I look at this storm we are going through now as a detour to my plans for PaPaw. But perhaps, this isn’t a detour. A detour is a road around where we’re supposed to be. God has a road we are to be on and when we are seeking Him, His Path will be our path. Perhaps this is the path. The picture. The plan. Unexpectedly, this is God’s perfect plan. Don’t miss God’s perfect plan for you wishing you were somewhere else.
Don’t misread this- that I am not devastated. I am more devastated than you can imagine. But perhaps, with Hope I am just a little hope-full-y devastated.
“I can give God the glory, and it can still hurt.”
Perhaps I’m devastated with Hope. I can be devastated with Hope because I am anchored to Christ. Even in my devastation I have Hope that Christ is here, His Path is perfect and He is always taking care of us. I pray today that you have that Hope.
Devastation, grief, depression, sadness, mourning don’t have to mean you’re not hoping in Christ, you’re low on your faith or mean you don’t trust God. It doesn’t mean that at all. But in those things- devastation, grief, mourning- you know the Hope of Christ and know joy comes in the morning. He is HERE! He is HOPE! He is VICTORY! He is JOY!
Hope today knowing His Perfect Plan is not a detour, it is the path.
“..no matter the storms around us (OR the seemingly calm and “perfect” waters) we are anchored to something–someone–beyond it all, anchored to Christ, who blazed the way before us through death and pain so that neither would ever sink us.”
-Hope Heals, Katherine and Jay Wolf
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