The Blessing of Health

Often times I take being healthy for granted. I never realized how thankful I should be that I am healthy and happy!
What led me to this epiphany was what transpired this week:

My amazing husband has been battling what we both had thought was simply a cold/sinus infection...but it just got worse (he still has it 3 weeks later). We think we finally have it figured out and he now is stocked up with what is a small pharmacy! Hopefully this fixes the problems! My heart literally was breaking for him, he sounded miserable with his deep coughing, his constant sinus blockage/drainage, his difficulty breathing and his inability to actually get a good night's sleep. In the beginning I felt that I was complaining because he could NOT stop coughing which was making it impossible for me to sleep. But I realized how much pain he was in and I was thankful that I could try to take care of him and that I was indeed healthy.

 

Then my incredible mother had a little bit of a scare which of course pretty much panicked all three of her daughters. Apparently my mother had a severe painful headache for several days which eventually led to her heart rate increasing and her blood pressure to elevate. My older sister Molly (thanks for being there Molly) took her to the urgent center because her regular doctor was unavailable...they hooked her up to an EKG machine and there was an irregularity in the reading. They sent her to the ER for some tests. All of this happened while I was at work and all I could think about was how scared I was for her and how lucky she was to have insurance. I was thankful for the doctors, my sister, and for my health. Everything turned out fine in the end and she was released with the intentions that she would follow up with her doctors in the next couple of days. (And she better or she will have 3 daughters yelling at her)

Another event was that my driver's wife was rushed to the hospital for severe abdominal pain, the hospital thought that she needed to have her appendix or gall bladder removed. Then other things transpired and she eventually went to a different hospital where they diagnosed her with Chron's Disesase. Again, I was so worried about her, my driver, and their family. I realized how blessed I am to be healthy.

It is sad to me how often I do not thank God for what He has done, what blessings He has given me. It is because of Him that I am here. I need to remember my good health is a blessing.

So for you readers out there I hope that you are staying healthy, that you are taking care of what the Lord has blessed you with. And for all you out there who are sick or struggling to find out what is wrong with your body know that God has it all figured out and be thankful for what He will do to bring you healing!

1 Corinthians 6:19-20

New International Version (NIV)

¹⁹ Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; ²⁰ you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.

Thoughts on Change

What is change really? Why is it that change is always considered to be such a bad thing? Why is it so hard to do? You see society defines change as “to make the form, nature, content, future course, etc., of (something) different from what it is or from what it would be if left alone”(dictionary.com)
However, more times than not society treats change as something that is a last resort that it is something that we should avoid. We scream from the mountain tops that change is what we want and what we need but as soon as the change begins to happen we all dread and complain that it is no longer the same? Why is that? Why is it that we cannot face the consequences of what change is? Why is it near impossible to realize how change can be a positive thing? Never once did the definition say that change was easy and that change is instantaneous and quick.
You see, I am one of those people! I am the one that complains that something needs to change; that something needs to be different. However, when the changes occur I find every reason to doubt it and to find the negatives in it. Now it is going to sound ironic to those who choose to read this but really I am trying to change. For about the past year or so I have been going to therapy. I have been trying to change how I view the everyday occurrences in my life that seem to cause me a wide range of emotions. I have been learning how to change not only how I react to these episodes in person but how I let these events dictate my life. I used to let everything be blamed on me, I used to never defend myself. That is how it always was, it was just easier to take on the problems, issues, and stresses then to defend myself and express how these things made me feel. I CHANGED!
I still fight the change sometimes but don’t we all. I can honestly say that life still throws me curve balls, and that life is not always fair but I can also say that honestly I have never felt more confident in who I am and who I want to be. I used to not want to change anything about me, about my relationships, about my personality but now I realize that changing me to improve myself is not a negative thing. It is difficult to realize what it is about you that has to change or to realize traits in your relationships need to be altered. But these changes lead to strength, unity, and confidence that the world can be better. I realize that I can be a better person and that by me initiating change I really can make a difference in this world that claims things need to be made different. I can make the difference, I can make the change.
My challenge to you is to not fear the challenge of change but to embrace what it is and what its impact on you, your relationships and community could be! Thanks for reading. I hope that you enjoyed my rant about change. Tune in next week!

Philippians 3:21

New International Version (NIV)

²¹ who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.