Monday, June 22, 2009

Deeper

This weekend Earl & I went to a Young Adult's Retreat called "Deeper" with a bunch of awesome people from Calvary Temple. We were at the Calvary Temple Camp at Red Rock Lake in the Whiteshell. This is us enjoying the sun and doing some canoeing. I hadn't been on a canoe in 3 years and loved it-even though Earl did a lot of the work. :)
The last 2 weeks have been intense. The tumor in my left leg has grown tremendously. When we left Redding, it was really small and we were super excited about how it had gotten so much smaller while we were there. Within about a week of coming home it felt about 4 times bigger. That is completely insane-it hardly seems possible. The tumor is so large now, that it is causing a lot of pain-especially nerve pain at night.

Earl & I are desperate and so hungry. We are pursuing healing at all costs. Therefore we've started to focus on inner healing. We're starting to understand the importance of that. Everyone has wounds and lies that for whatever reason, they have grown up believing. It's so amazing when you go through the lies that satan has tried to deceive you in, and find the truth, how freeing it is. All of us have opened up doors where we have allowed satan to come in and deceive. When we shut those doors and command satan and his lies to leave, not only does inner healing happen, but now physical healing also has a chance to happen. That is something that we are going through and learning. As much as it's hard-it's totally worth it.

This last weekend was totally amazing. The friends that we've made through Beyond and who were at the retreat, are so encouraging. Saturday night, one of my friends went up to a bunch of people and invited them to come and pray for me. I truly don't know how many people came up and surrounded me, probably about 15-20. They were crying out to God and asking the Holy Spirit to heal. I felt so loved-I know the only way I'm healed is through God doing a healing miracle. Here my friends were agreeing and believing with me for that miracle. The thing is, about half of the people I had never met before and some of them, I still don't know their names! After praying and praising God for a long time, the Holy Spirit revealed to one of my friends the strategy that He wanted to use for me to be healed. She was reminded of the passage in the Bible where Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane and he asks his disciples to pray for Him. When He comes back to His disciples, who are asleep, He asks them if they could not even stay awake for just one hour? Matthew 26:40 My friend felt that the Holy Spirit was saying a similar thing-Could we not pray for just one hour? Even more specifically, she felt people needed to pray in tongues for one hour every day, until total healing happened!


So immediately my friends look at their watches and start praying. I lay on the floor cause it was about midnight. A bunch of them lay on the floor, put their hands out and started praying. How beautiful-what love! An hour later we went to bed and the next morning from 8-9 the same thing happened. These friends have committed to this until healing happens. For those that are able, we are going to try and meet once a week to stay accountable. Our friend asked that we post this strategy on our blog so that everyone who wants to can join us. Gladly email us with questions.

God is so good. Yes, the pain is bad, the tumors seem to be growing and I am constantly fighting fear and yet I know God wants to heal me and I've got a group of friends who are pressing in for me. The battle is being won-satan is being defeated!!

So this is where we are at. Thank you for understanding that this blog is like our journal. We are learning and growing and are using the blog to pour out our thoughts, feelings and experiences. We are not asking that everyone agree with what we are saying-we are just pouring out our thoughts. We do not in any way, want this to be a place where theological debates are held, but rather, a place where, if people want to, they can read about the lives of two people who are fighting through and defeating cancer. We want the blog to be a place of encouragement for everyone-where only encouraging, life-giving words are spoken by us and others. We love you all!

And just an encouraging side note, the back pain that I've been battling has been about non-existent since Saturday night since people were praying-God is so good and prayer works!!
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Saturday, June 06, 2009

Just a quick note to let you know that we're home and have been since Monday night!

We had an incredible time in Redding and are continuing to absorb all that we learned. How awesome to know that God is ALWAYS in a good mood, that He loves us more than we can fathom and that He wants to heal me even more than I want to be healed.

Over and over in the last months I've been told to rest and not strive-that I don't have to work for my healing. That's been hard for me because I've always been performance driven. Somehow I felt that if I read my Bible more, prayed more, just in general was more Christlike, then I would be healed. That somehow God was waiting to heal me until I reached a certain level of perfectionism. I had such a wonderful reminder of that again while we were in Bethel. I remember a couple of times people telling me while they were praying for me, "You don't have to pray, you just get to absorb." And so, while others prayed, I absorbed a lot of prayer, and Jesus did a wonderful work not just in my body but also deep inside. Instead of begging God to heal me, I have the privilege of asking for more of His presence and with His presence healing will come. For me that is so freeing!

I'm so thankful for what I'm learning and experiencing. Having a relationship with Jesus and learning to listen more to the Holy Spirit is so exciting!

Earl turned a quarter century last Sunday and so we celebrated with our families yesterday. Getting old is really rough on him as he's not feeling very good today. :)

Thanks once again for all your prayers while we were on our trip. We're so super grateful for the time we could spend out there and for what we could all learn.
Have a wonderful evening
Ramona