Waiting

You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, 

because he trusts in you. 

Isaiah 26:3

I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living!

Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord! 

Psalm 27:13-14

About a month ago, my boys caught a virus from preschool. The tiny little bumps of Hand, Foot and Mouth emerged on the bottoms of Zeke's feet one day, and on Noah's several days later. We spent the week working on potty training and raking leaves because we were house-bound.

It's times like those that make me very thankful that the boys like being home.

On the heels of their sickness, I acquired a low-grade fever.  Not high enough to take Tylonol, not low enough to where I felt normal.  I stayed home from church because I wasn't sure if I was contagious with anything.  Dave slept in the living room because he didn't want to catch anything. But then 24 hours extended to three days, and I began to wonder if I should be doing something about my temperature. The nurse assured me that it was fine as long as it didn't get above a certain degree.  Three days turned into six. The doctor was not concerned, as long as the temperature didn't get higher. Six days turned into two weeks. I went in for a check up; I got blood work done (twice); I drank lots of water. Still no reason for my fever.  And yet it continued.

For most of the days during this time, I struggled to go on with my daily activities.  Mind you, I was also in my first trimester with our third child at the time. The fever wiped me clean of whatever energy I had leftover from growing a tiny person. Instead of kicking the ball back and forth with the boys in the back yard, I watched from my camping chair as they would try to kick it close enough to me in hopes that I could reach it and throw it back to them. Instead of chasing them around the house, I had to sit on the couch and do my best to stay engaged rather than mentally slinking away to a quiet, peaceful place.  Instead of easily following my routine of doing the dishes or making dinner, I had to work myself up to what felt like a mountainous task before me.

It was hard.

I knew in the midst of it, though, that God was at work.  I knew that he saw my pitiful state, and that he had enough power for the both of us.  When I felt like crying and collapsing in a heap at the end of a particularly long day, he calmed me with his words of peace and his Spirit gave me just the right amount of strength to remain standing.  He showed me in a very real way that night that he was the answer to every single one of the areas where I was lacking: He is Peace... He is Strength... He is Wisdom... He is Patience... He is Joy.

And my fever lasted for just three more days after that.  Twenty days was enough, I guess.

You can only imagine the giddiness I felt when my body had energy again.  I was beside myself with Joy.  I was capable once again to do the work that God has put before me to do as his child, as a wife, and as a mom.  And how sweet that work is when it has been taken from you for a time.

Now, how sweet are those twenty days of "waiting" in my memory.  It was a time that God was using to show me his power and his love for me--an opportunity for him to teach me and speak directly to my heart.

It will be said on that day, “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the Lord; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.” 

Isaiah 25:9