Thank you, God, for tomorrow!

My husband, Larry, had major surgery on December 16. It was a surgery that we, together, have put off for a few years. He has actually had a date set a couple of times and cancelled the surgery out of fear. Fear of the surgery, fear of the pain, fear of the recovery, fear of messing up the future.

As we get to the other side of the worry and concern that we have had the past week, I have been looking back at what we ALL went through. Not just Larry, but everyone that loves him and me. Even our little dog, Lola, has been acting weird. As I listened to our sermon this morning, the preacher asked us to read Isaiah 43:18 which says to “forget the past events – pay no attention to things of old.” He said that we should forget negative things of our past, we should forget anxiety and worry, we should forget the horrible yesterdays. Just as I started to relax and settle into the sermon with the thought that I had been told by Jesus himself to forget the horrible past week, the pastor threw in something that I have never thought about. He asked us to read a few verses before verse 18. He told us that he had misunderstood the verse – it looked to him like Jesus was saying to forget the past positives too. What?!!

To go back and give a little background, Larry was to have surgery, spend ONE night in ICU, which was standard procedure for this very major surgery, and then move to a room and come home around the afternoon of the fourth day. He called me the day after surgery – he was doing great. Surgery was a great success and went exactly as the doctor had planned. I was on cloud 9 – praising God. I started to make plans to pick him up. My mom and I started planning what we would make him for dinner when he returned home. When the next morning rolled around and he called me in a panic to tell me that he couldn’t breathe and he thought he might die, he begged me to get in touch with the surgeon. I started calling the nurse’s station, I left a message at the doctor’s office. I grabbed my mom and we said a prayer in the middle of the store that we were shopping at. My faith pulled me through. I didn’t give up. I stayed positive. My mom said, “this will pass and he will be so much better in the future.” This went on for four more days. I stayed positive. I kept my faith all because I knew that Jesus promised me he would take care of us and he would bring Larry home. He promised that I would be able to forget the hurt and worry of the past.

We went through day after day of him hallucinating because of the medication that he was on. I talked to the PA from the doctor’s office, I talked to our daughter-in-law who is a nurse practitioner. I was told he was going to be fine. I believed all of it because I knew in my heart that Jesus was going to bring Larry home. Fast forward to Monday morning (he had surgery on the Wednesday before). He was worse then he had been the rest of the week. He called me around 6am scared and panicking. He asked me to ask my mother to pray with him. Immediately he felt better. A few minutes later he was telling me the power of prayer helped him. He said he had never felt anything like it. He was praising God. In our horrible past, Larry was praising God.

Now, back to what the preacher was talking about. Why should we forget our positive past? He said we should not become a prisoner to our positive past. I didn’t understand. How could I forget about Larry praying to God and immediately being answered and healed? What was I missing? The verses in Isaiah are telling us to forget the horrible past and the positive past? I didn’t understand. Why in the world would I want to forget about that day? The day that Larry was healed by God?

The answer is right there in the Bible though. Right there where I had just read that I could forget about the worry and anxiety of the past week. The verses tell us that we should not dwell upon the horrible past or the positive past because our God has so much more planned for us in the future. We need to remember not to look only to the past for our good memories because God’s blessings for the future are going to be better. Our faith in not limited by the past. We should expect blessings! We should get excited about the future! He said it is like God is saying to us, “y’all ain’t seen nothing yet”!

Larry has been home for two days now and we are seeing major improvements in him already. It is amazing that this man is up and walking around by himself. We have finally quit talking about the horrible past week. We are moving ahead, thanking God for the recovery, and asking for his blessings for the future. Together, hand-in-hand, we are saying, “Thank you, God, for tomorrow”!

Isaiah 43

Until next time,