It is well with my soul.

   Surgery day.  I talked with Kim this morning and he sounded extraordinarily strong and confident.  Thank You, Jesus.  I had a text around 8am that Sean had just landed in Charlotte.  Last night his connecting flight was late due to weather and he missed his flight to Raleigh so they rebooked him three hours later to Charlotte.  But he's landed and he's here.  Thank You, Jesus.
   I was just reading on WebMD about holes in lungs and trying to more fully understand and visualize what exactly we're dealing with.  Of course they list every (not-so-bad and really horrible) possibility and so it's easy for my mind to take off down rabbit trails of scary possibilities for Kim…  Nada reminded me this morning that we can be thankful that, if there is something that the docs need to find they will, and if nothing else that his lung collapsed now instead of some other time when he wasn't right around all this medical help.  Thank You, Jesus.
   I've been listening a lot to the song It is Well that Kristene DeMarco and Bethel Music sing - a new version of It is Well With My Soul.  It's a beautiful song and takes me to such a place of submission and humility and worship…  I found myself sitting here at the kitchen table in the quiet of this place and the music playing….my hands go out with palms up.

   "Through it all, through it all, my eyes are on You.  Through it all, through it all, it is well.
     Through it all, through it all, my eyes are on You, and it is well, it is well…
     So let it go my soul and trust in Him, the waves and wind still know His name…
     So let it go my soul and trust in Him, the waves and wind still know His name…
     It is well…. with my soul.   It is well…. with my soul.  
     It is well…. with my soul.   It is well…. with my soul."

   As I sit here listening with my palms open to the Lord I think of how this posture is such a good way to live - giving up and receiving both.  Not even always knowing what I'm to give up, but simply sitting here, arms outstretched asking God to take what I should not be holding on to.  At the same time asking God to give me all that I need to face what I will face this day or any day…but I know that God usually deals simply with today.  (I think there's something to learn in that..)
   It's hard to be in that posture with those prayers going on in your heart and mind and not be weeping like a lost child whose just been found.  Because it's not that you're scared necessarily, it's that you're held, you're safe, and you know it…no matter what.  It's relief! 
   When the trust is there we can believe that God will take those things we don't need to hold on to, and He will provide all we need to cope, to function, and even to thrive and excel in whatever we're dealing with.  What an amazing God we have.  How I wish that more people could know the God I know.  There is such peace.  That wholeness, that the Hebrew word "shalom," peace really means.  Wholeness  that we can't reach by our own efforts.
   Thank You, Jesus.  It is well with my soul this day, no matter what comes.  Thanks be to God.

~Sally

It is Well