Out of This World Faith
OUT OF THIS WORLD FAITH
 THE ENTIRE STORY
Part 1:  How It All Happened
 Part 2:  The Entire Story-Part 3
 Part 3:  The Conclusions, What Happened?



Friday June 6, 2006
GOOD AND BAD
Bug went back for a checkup on Monday.  The vet said things look ok.  He did more x-rays and took some blood to test it.  The blood counts are better!!!  Praise God!!  Things were heading in the right direction!!!  Bug was togo back in two weeks.  It was all up to God then.  The kidneys had to get better in order for the bone to grow.  Actually, the kidneys had to get better for Bug to live.  The disease he had was fatal.

In the meantime, the medication schedule had eased up.  The only medicine he was still on was one potassium pill each day.  I crushed it and mixed it with water.  He was still having trouble chewing and if there was a chance it was a sore throat due to something during his surgery I didn't want to push a big pill down it.  I was also pumping him full of fluids every day to keep him hydrated and full of electrolytes.  The pins in his leg needed to be cleaned, too.

Since he finished his pain medicine he had been alert.  He had been moving around more and was trying to lick his wounds.  So, most of the time he was wearing his "Hoody" (e-collar).  Occasionally he ate on his own, but most of the time I wento in there and offered him food from my hand to get him to eat.  So, he was eating more, but only with encouragement.

I was mixing some turkey or fish in with his prescription canned food.  I guess the canned food wasn't very tasty.  I was cutting back on the amount of meat I added because it was protein that the kidneys couldn't process.  He seemed to like the dry prescription food, however... praise God!

The night before we noticed his foot on his bad leg was swollen.  He started to eat his cat litter, too.  The litter was 100% clay (non-clumping) so there was something in the clay that his body was craving.  The vet didn't know what it could be.  I began putting hot compresses on his foot and massaged it.  The vet thought it might be because he was getting more exercise since his pain medication ran out.  I tightened up the fence around his enclosure to make it smaller.

We got some different litter for him made out of compressed, rolled paper when the pet store opened that morning.  Yay!  He was using it and not eating it.  I had put a towel in there the previous night when I took the clay litter out and he soaked the towel, an area rug, and right on down to my living room carpet.  So, guess what I had to do.  It was something I'd been wanting to do, but not particularly that day.  I used the carpet shampooer my husband got me for Christmas and cleaned the carpet.

I'd been continuing to speak life into Bug without dwelling on his disease being fatal.  The vet could call it anything he liked.  I just knew that Bug was full of the life that had been spoken into him.  I'd been asking God to PLEASE let me see more of that life with my eyes.  If God was trying to give me more patience by only letting the life be seen in tiny increments I didn't understand.  With all the things that had been happening to me over the years I had enough patience to fill the Mediterranean Sea!!

I kept asking God why He was allowing his cat to be miserable.

It sure was hard being a human being and knowing that God was right by my side and, for whatever reasons He had, wasn't explaining things to me.  I had to assume that He was doing a work in me as well as in others through Bug.  It sure would have helped if I understood more of WHAT He was trying to do.  It would also have been easier if I knew WHEN we would see a more complete healing in Bug.  In the meantime, I was having a hard time making plans for other things that needed to take place around the house.

My garden wasn't getting planted.  The barn wasn't getting painted.  The weeds keep getting ahead of me.  All my plants needed tending and fertilizing.  The cobwebs needed knocking down.  The garage needed to be swept.  Blah blah blah.

So, that's where things were on Friday the 6th of June.  I planned on updating this again in about a week unless something significant happened.

There was one thing that was needful to continue birthing the miracle and that was prayer.  I know that God didn't just throw out the authority to speak life and not have it connected with the rest of the Body of Christ somehow.  I'm sure He expected everyone who knew about it to work as a team to cause His will to be done.  Anyone who felt the urge to pray for the miracle of life might have been one of the midwives for this "baby"!


Thursday June 8, 2006
STANDING ON THE WORD
My routine seemed to have change from running a cat hospital to a cat recovery room.  Bug was eating better.  I was finally able to get him to eat some of his prescription canned food by mixing it with the prescription kibble.  He was eating more of the kibble, too.  So, I expected to see less skinny bones and more fat soon.

His kidneys didn't seem to be shrinking, but that could have been just be my imagination.  They still felt very large when I felt his sides.

The swelling in his paw had gone down, praise God!  We found out that all his claws on his other back paw were ripped out, probably when he was trying to get out of the dog's mouth.  Poor Bug.  That's the second time he has ripped out claws.   I wonder if any of the vets that examined him this time even noticed his missing claws.  They didn't say anything.

Bug found a way to lick the lower part of his bad leg with his Hoody on.  I couldn't adjust it to the smaller setting because then it was too tight.  He didn't do it a lot, so I just had to keep checking on him.

As I continued to clean his wounds, give him potassium, infuse him with fluids, and feed him his prescription food I focused on the fact that God said to speak life into Bug and Bug was full of that spoken life.  When I went into his enclosure every couple of hours and took his Hoody off so he could eat, drink, clean the rest of his fur, and just enjoy not having to wear it I kept reminding myself that it was God's idea to speak life into Bug.  As I watched Bug contract his body in discomfort due to his kidneys, as I looked at his swollen kidneys, and when I felt the enlarged and hard kidneys when I pet his body I told myself that Bug was going to live.

God spoke it to me:  LIFE.  I now speak it into Bug:  LIFE.  The thought came back to me that morning about what I said to the veterinary surgeon, "I have a million reasons to have Bug put down and only one reason to NOT put him down and that one reason is God."

So, why was it taking so long?  God was able to do a complete and instantaneous healing in Bug.  Did He know that people's faith was wavering?  My son was talking about Bug being on medication and such until the day he died.  My son was thinking about death and not focusing on life.  I imagine there were others who knew about this who were wondering where God was in it.  Like I had mentioned there were plenty of stories of "miraculous" recoveries from fatal diseases that didn't have God in the equation.  Didn't He know that?

He knew.  He also knew the best way to do it.  He also knew what it was that He wanted me to learn and you to learn out of this.  It was imperative that I focus on life and not death.  I needed to push any thoughts out of my mind that crept in that were not in line with the word LIFE!  Believe me, there were tons of those thoughts trying to poke their way into my head all the time!


MAJOR ENCOURAGEMENT
The last two days two women I knew (one was the one who found out about Bug and wasn't on the Clarion Call mailing list so I call her my miracle friend) sent me a jillion (well, they were so great it felts like a jillion) encouraging emails.  They read devotionals and teachings that made them say, "This is for you!"  There were words of victory, of hope, of faith, of blessing, finishing the journey, etc etc!!

My miracle friend shared something God showed her.  I'm sure you will love it.  When she would ask God "when" He would reply, "I AM".  So, when I asked Him when Bug's kidneys would not be bad any more then I could rest assured that, because God told me to speak life into Bug, then His response was, "I AM working on those kidneys!"

Then I got an email on one of my mailing lists with encouragement regarding having faith even when I saw nothing.  God knew I was struggling with this.  He knew I needed to be lifted up.

I'm was having to leave for a few days and was having thoughts of not wanting to go because of Bug.  My husband and I were on a bowling league and our finals were the next Saturday in Laughlin, NV.  We decided a long time before that to have my husband take a few days off from work so we could have a short vacation.  The fact was, I really needed to get out of the house.  The whole situation and a few other situations that were going on in my family were starting to overwhelm me.  I had someone tell me they called me on the phone and spoke with me and I didn't even remember the call!  That wasn't good!

So, the encouraging emails gave me the strength to stand more solidly on the Rock and be able to know that I could safely leave and Bug would be fine.  My son knew what to do and would take care of Bug for me.  I decided I would come home refreshed and ready to continue the good fight!


Thursday June 15, 2006
WHAT COULD I SAY?
1.  Bug was still alive
2.  He still had horribly lumpy kidneys
3.  His leg didn't show any signs of healing yet
4.  The vet said I would have to inject fluids into him every single day forever
5.  My husband was starting to examine the money issue

What would I like to be able to say?  We had the evidence that God had completed the task of creating life where there was death!  The only evidence of that so far was that Bug was still alive with a fatal kidney disease.  That wasn't so remarkable... yet!

The day before he had a checkup and there was no good news and no bad news.  Well, there was a little bad news.  They were supposed to take out his stitches.  They took out one and left two on his knee where the vet inserted the rod.  Grrrr. 

Bug had been limping since he got home, too.  I wonder if they messed with his leg or if he was just tired.  The vet had commented that he was walking fine.  We were gone for 5 1/2 hours.  Traffic was awful, we spent a long time waiting, and we had to stop at two pet supply stores on the way home.


WHAT COULD I DO?
I was trying to convince God to give me an idea of how long this was going to last.  I pointed out to Him that I had four other major issues going on in my life that needed my attention.  That wasn't even taking into consideration that my plants outside were in serious need of attention, my drip system in the back yard needed repair, and other things around here were needing me.

My husband had become examining each thing I was buying for Bug and how much the total cost would be.  The previous day's vet visit set us back $200 more.  I had to buy Bug another Hoody because the one the vet gave us wasn't adjustable enough and Bug was learning how to lick his leg.  I had to buy more of the expensive paper litter and more of the expensive prescription food.  I was running short on money to buy our food for the rest of the month!

My husband was calculating how much the ongoing cost would be as the fluids I put into Bug were around $2 a day.

I was asking God if this was what we would be doing for the rest of Bug's life.  Reeboks, my other cat, was still miraculously alive after seven years with a tiny heart but he was still taking a daily dose of medicine because the vet never told me that he was healed.  So, would Bug just live a long life and continue to need care?  NO!  That couldn't be right!  He wasn't a happy cat.  It hurt him to be poked by me to put fluids in him.  It irritated him to carry around a huge pouch of fluid under his skin.  He acted like he was in pain from the kidneys.  The kidneys were large hard lumps on his sides.  He drank a lot of water.  He was licking his cat litter because his body was telling him he needed something else.

NO!
That just CCOULDN'T be what God considersedto be life!  I was torturing my cat as I waited for the life to manifest itself.   I was taking time away from other important things.   Under other circumstances, had God not told me to speak life into Bug, I would have followed the advice of the first vet at the first clinic we took him to and had Bug put down.  Our grieving period would have been over and we would not have spent almost $6,000 on Bug!!!

 kept reminding God that I just didn't know what else to do.  He knew that, if there was something different I should do, that I would do it.  I just needed to know what it was.  He knew that I had been faithful to believe Him and not believe the things my ears heard and my eyes saw.  He knew that I expected to see Bug alive each time I looked at him.  He knew that I had been stumbling blindly in the dark knowing only one thing.  That one thing was that He told me to speak life into Bug.  So, in blind faith I believed that Bug was full of life; I just couldn't see it yet.

I wish I could have given everyone who was following this story some better news or better guidelines for how to birth a miracle that God handed them to deliver.  At that point I was only a blind person leading the blind.  As I stumbled along in the dark I kept asking God to turn on the light so things would be clear.

WHEN, LORD, WHEN???

 

Friday June 16, 2006
THIS WAS LIFE?
I discussed everything with God again.  Bug was still limping morning and sometimes almost falling over because of it.  He was still licking his cat litter.  He was still lumpy.  He was still not full of life.  I asked God, "This isn't what You call life, is it?"

As I watched Bug barely making it as he headed toward his catbox I wondered if I should take him back to the vet.  Yet, the only thing the vet could say was that he had told me bones don't heal properly when an animal's kidneys are not working.  His blood was not healthy enough to cause the bone to grow and heal the breaks.

So, it wouldn't do any good to take him back to the vet.  The vet would examine Bug, tell me doom and gloom, and charge me more money.

Then, that made me think about something a friend told me.  She felt that perhaps I shouldn't have taken Bug to any vets at all.  If I had the authority to speak life then I should have spoken life and, had I done everything correctly, Bug would have been healed without going anywhere.

I had already thought about that.  I had come to the conclusion that I did not make a mistake by taking Bug to the emergency clinic.  Yet, as I always do, I began to wonder if I did something wrong and that I messed up the entire thing.  Then it occurred to me that I had been pondering the fact that we hear of God-inspired miracles but have difficulty finding the proof outside of someone's word for it.  As I always find out about things, if I am pondering something then so are a lot of other people.

Without vet intervention there would be no documentation of a miracle taking place.  It would just be my word saying it was so.  Do you believe every word I say?  I sure hope not because you can't see inside my head.  You know about me if you have read much here at the Clarion Call, but you don't know for sure that I wouldn't fake a miracle!  So, I again came to the conclusion that taking Bug to vets was the right thing to do.

I began to review what authority is.  Authority, by itself, is nothing without the power to fulfill that authority.  God issues authority.  He issued the authority to me to speak life and specifically said to speak life into Bug.  God was the one who had the power and the means to ensure that the authority was enabled and was enforced!  My authority without power was nothing.

Then I, again, reviewed the facts that I knew to be rock solid.  God cannot lie.  God issued the specific authority to me to speak life into Bug.  As a result Bug had the life in him.  I couldn't see it yet and neither could Bug!  Bug was the one who knew his leg hurt.  He's the one who knew that his system was missing something that caused him to have the urge to lick his litter.  He knew that he felt thirsty all the time because his kidneys were not functioning properly.  He could feel the giant solid lumps of his kidneys when he laid down.  So, until Bug felt the life then it had not revealed itself in the natural yet.

I examined what exactly life was.  Life was basically the opposite of death.  Death was the ending of or destruction of something.  So life was not a shattered leg bone.  Life was not limping around on a shattered leg bone.  Life was not convulsing due to kidney malfunction.  Life was not cysts growing in kidneys and preventing the kidneys from functioning.  Life was not unbalanced electrolytes and unhealthy blood.

Then I examined John 10:10 where Jesus came to bring life and that we "might have it more abundantly."  Abundantly is the key word.  So, life is not just life any more since Jesus has been here.  Life is abundant life.

I examined abundant life and found:
Abundant life is not the continuation of pain and suffering
Abundant life is not illness of any kind
Abundant life is 100% healthy life!!


IT WAS TIME!!
What was being proved by Bug getting worse?  Nothing.  I was being tortured and Bug was being tortured.  Torture is far far removed from anything resembling abundant life!

As I got more and more wound up that morning I broke into speaking in tongues.  As my mind raced over all the events of the previous month, all the other major things going on in my life, and my burning questions I spoke faster and faster and faster.  I tried to stop myself because it started sounding ridiculous.  I couldn't stop.  So, I just kept going trusting that the Holy Spirit would take what I was saying and make it powerful as in Romans 8:26,  "Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered."

I'd been rebuking satan, the cysts, the breaks in the bone, and any other thing that had the appearance of being bad.  I was sending all bad things out of Bug and out of our home.

I anointed our home's windows and doors and spiritually cleansed the interior by speaking of only things pleasing to God be taking place in there.  It worked before.  I anointed myself right out of the house.  If you want to read about that particular incident I described it in section 2 of my Prayer Closet.

In conclusion, I believe there were no magic words no special rituals that were to be strictly followed.  God is God, the Great I Am, the Maker of Heaven and Earth.  He was Able.  I was only to be obedient.

I felt it was time, it had to be!


Wednesday June 21, 2006
LET IT END!!
What round was it in the wrestling match?  I was coming out fighting, but it was getting harder to stay positive.

My eyes saw deterioration.  Bug's ribs appeared to be pushing out.  I'm assuming it was from the cysts in his kidneys continuing to grow.  His kidneys were putting a lot of pressure on his lungs (and all his other internal organs) and it was getting harder for him to breathe.  Whenever he did any moving around he began breathing hard.  It looked like he was getting a little blue around his mouth.  His leg was swollen up worse than before.  His foot looked like a puffy bunny tail.  His urine was reddish.

Bug was still limping.  Some times it was so bad he didn't take the time to lie down, he just fell over to get the pressure off his leg.  He wasn't cleaning himself much so that mean he didn't feel well.  Most of the time he didn't even try to lick his boo-boo's.   I hadn't had to put his Hoody back on him since the previous week.

That wasn't life, it was torture.  It was torture for Bug and it was torture for me to watch him.  It literally made me sick to my stomach to watch Bug struggling.  I kept crying out to God but couldn't hear a thing.  For some reason God was wanting me to figure it out all by myself.

It wasn't that weird or that hard with Reeboks.  Within days I saw a tiny bit of improvement.  In a week a bigger improvement.  Within a month he was almost back up to speed.  I just didn't understand!

Tuesday I was telling God I didn't even feel peace or strength from Him.  I kept telling God that I knew what life was.  I knew that Bug was full of the spoken word of life that I'd been speaking.  I kept asking what kind of switch there was that would turn it on and cause it to become real life and when was He going to turn on that switch?

I wasn't going to take Bug back to the vet until his appointment time in three more weeks.  There had to be improvement by then or the vet might call the humane society and have me arrested for cruelty to my animal!  Seriously!  If the vet saw a cat being tortured by his owner he might.  Like he told me, he wouldn't do what I did to his own cat. 

FIERY DARTS OF DOUBT
Watching this all unfold I was pondering how I saw my cat with the symptoms of his maladies getting worse and worse just like all the vets said he would.  I didn't hear or feel reassurance from God.  I was being held responsible for Bug's condition because I was the one who was told to speak life into Bug and I was the one who took a stand to prevent anyone from putting him down.  I was being scrutinized by every member of my family, the vets, and maybe even by you, too to see if maybe I made a huge mistake.

I felt doubts start to poke at my mind.  You've been duped... it started.  God set you up.  God stole that money from you that you spent on Bug.  Your cat can't live....

NO!  NO!  NO!

I must not have any doubts.  Get thee behind me, satan!!  Take your lies somewhere else!  You are the liar and God is not!

Maybe this was some kind of modern-day Job thing.  Maybe my faith was being checked for volume and quality.  I didn't know.  All I knew was that I must continue to believe that God would finish the work!  I was beating off those darts of doubt almost all the time.  I couldn't let any stick and stay!

I STARTED SEARCHING
I can't help but think that there were other people out there who had a faith story that would encourage me where they birthed their own miracle.  I had hoped that the people who wrote the emails that had encouraged me knew of someone or something that would give me strength, but they chose to not reply.

So I started searching on the Internet.  I looked for documented miracles.  I'd heard about miracles happening and I knew of a few smaller ones that I'd seen for myself or heard about from people I trusted.  However, I wanted to find some documentation.  I used the words documented and then evidence in my search.

I actually found more information on phony miracles and things against God having anything to do with miracles.  Yikes!  The more I searched the more weird stuff I found.

Where were they?  Where were the miracles?  Why, if God was causing miracles to happen, was the proof?  Where was the documentation?  Why were they so hard to find?  It just didn't make sense!

I found sites that talked about "higher powers" and healers that healed people for money.  I found new age and bizarre stuff.  I found holistic healing and stories of healing of people who remained anonymous or only used first names.

I saw some of the same stories over and over at different web sites.  I didn't see any that had any proof or any people to talk with, other than the healers that wanted to heal for money.

It sure would have been nice to find someone who had gone through this sort of thing already and came out the other end.

POOR BUG
I took him out of his enclosure and tried to get him to walk a little although his leg and foot were pretty swollen.  As a cat he needed some kind of stimulation both mental and physical.  The only thing he got excited about was wanting to go into the bottom of the guest closet where I kept the cat boxes.  Something, some chemical imbalance, was causing him to want to lick the clay cat litter.  I had to stop him and put him back in his enclosure.

He crawled under the blanket that I put over his bed cushion and he stayed under there for a while.  Poor baby.  It was breaking my heart!  Not only was it breaking my heart it was wearing me out.  Every time something different happened I got fiery darts of doubt.  What if Bug had crawled under there to die? 

NO!  NO!  NO!

Again, I must not have any doubts.  "Get thee behind me, satan!!  Take your lies somewhere else!  You are the liar and God is not!"


Wednesday June 28, 2006
BLIND FAITH
As many days as I had looked at Bug and expected to see an improvement in his condition and had seen him getting worse you would think I would have lost hope, wouldn't you?  I had not changed where I stood.  God told me to speak life into Bug.  I did that.  I expected to see life.

I flew in the face of vets who saw death and I proclaimed that God chose life.  All the money I spent and the decisions I made were all hinged on the fact that God chose life for Bug and that was a fact.  I did not back down.

Some days were a little harder than others to stay positive.  Each day Bug seemed worse.  Tuesday his front left foot began to swell up as had his back left foot and leg.  He had an even harder time trying to walk.  He pretty much flung himself in the direction he needed to go.  When he got where he wanted to go he flopped down, exhausted.  He was constipated.  He got so exhausted climbing in and out of his catbox (I cut the sides down to only 2" tall) trying to go potty that he flopped onto his side on the rug and continued to try.  Cats are rather proud animals.  He was now not able to do much of anything without help.  It was breaking my heart.

His body was getting much more swollen looking.  He showed very little energy.  That morning he didn't even want to eat.  I could see in his eyes that he remembered that eating was one of the highlights of his day, but when I put it in front of him he dove in like he was going to eat but would just turn away.

Tuesday I went around and around with God.  I kept telling Him that I didn't believe that what I was seeing was life.  I was telling Him that there wasn't anybody that would be impressed with Bug's having such a poor quality of life.  I told Him that the life He could provide was perfect and was far from what I was seeing.  God is God, after all, and God-quality life was something far far better than what Bug was exhibiting.

I asked Him to send a cat-sized angel with some cat-sized life.  I keep asking how long it was going to take.  Yet, I knew that it was coming.

I, again, pointed out that I had other things that were being put on hold waiting for Bug's life to manifest itself.  We were wanting to go on a two week vacation that summer.  I couldn't do that with Bug in his condition.  I couldn't hand him over to a neighbor and ask them to take care of him.  I just couldn't.  Nobody would want the responsibility.  He couldn't go with us. either.

So, every day that went by I saw a sicker and sicker cat.  My stomach felt ill.  My heart felt heavy.  I cried every day because I couldn't stand to see anyone suffer.

I kept asking God if I should take Bug back to the vet.  I heard no answer so I figured He was leaving the decision up to me.

My decision was that Bug's entire body had life spoken into it.  What the vet did by putting in the pins and rod did not heal Bug's leg, it only stabilized it.  The potassium and fluids that I was giving Bug were not curing his kidneys, only helping the rest of his body to function a little longer without them.  The healing, the life, was having to be manifested.  With bad kidneys the healing was probably not going to take place, per the vet.

So, I didn't feel compelled to go to the vet and plunk down more money for corrective surgery or whatever they thought might fix the problem with his leg.  I doubt if there was much they could or would do with his swelling body.  It was life that must come out of that spoken word and enter into the realm where we could rejoice over it!  There was only one cure for what was ailing Bug and that was GOD!

Faith sure can be painful.  I asked God to use me.  I was open to whatever He wanted to do.  I never imagined I would be torn up into tiny bits over and over every day.  Plain and simple it felt like torture.  I'm sure it felts like torture to Bug, too.

I WAS SO VERY VERY TIRED
There were times when my mind and heart just got so overwhelmed that I wanted to run out the door and just keep running.  I wanted to run somewhere that was quiet, calm, and uncomplicated.  I wanted to lie down by green pastures.  I wanted to feel peace again.

I was having a hard time making the rest of my life move forward.  I didn't know what plans I could make because I didn't know how long it would drag on.  I just wanted it to end.  I wanted it to be over so I could move on to other things.

Every single thing I did was hard.  I was continually fighting off thoughts of doubt.  I was continually telling my brain that my eyes could not provide the factual information it needed to come to a conclusion.  I kept telling my heart that Bug's suffering was going to result in God's will being accomplished.  I kept telling my brain and my heart that I was doing the right thing.

I was also fighting off the thoughts of how much more simple it would have been had God not told me to speak life into Bug.  I would have been able to let him go and let his suffering end.  My grief would have been over.  We would have had $6,000 less debt.  It was just too big for me to understand.  I'm hoping that it was all going the way God had it planned and that it would serve to have maximum impact on His Kingdom.

I also hoped that it was over soon.  I really needed to give my brain and heart a rest.  They had been under a great deal of strain.  I had been standing on a Rock all that time.  It was a tiny Rock and I couldn't see it under my foot.  I just knew it was there.

I wanted to be able to finish this story.  It just seemed way too long and way too depressing.  It would sure have done my soul good to be able to finally be able to write the happy ending.  It sure would.

 

Thursday June 29, 2006
THIS HAD TO STOP
It seemed very likely that Bug had a bowel blockage.  He still hadn't gone potty since Sunday.  He wanted to eat but couldn't.  My son got him to take some sips of water Wednesday but each sip was followed by a gag.  His breath smelled awful.  His eyes were dilated and he kept them almost closed.

When I got in his enclosure with him he crawled up to me and tried to hide under me.  I looked up the symptoms on the internet and there was no home remedy.  I had to take him to the vet for more surgery.  Bug had a second FATAL disease and was fading fast.

"OK, Lord, this is where you would shine, right?  This is where a healing would provide maximum impact."

It had to be time for a miracle.  I had a friend who had a bowel obstruction and she was in GREAT MISERY.  It sounded like one of the worst things a person, or cat, could ever experience.

I can't begin to describe all the emotions I was feeling.  It was making me SICK!  I was telling God that the only thing I wanted to see was Bug to be out of his misery.  I felt like I was torturing my cat in every way imaginable.

Every fiber in my being was screaming out to have Bug put down.  Yet, if I did that, I would be calling God a liar.  I then had 2 million reasons to put Bug down and only one reason not to put him down.  That one reason was God.

I knew that, even if I made a mistake along the way, God would still use it.  A friend of mine pointed out how Abraham didn't trust God to keep him safe on two occasions yet God still used him.  He is still referred to as a man of great faith.  So, even if my faith was a little shaky now and then, I still held strong and believed God.

I had no choice but to trust that God meant for Bug to have life.  My eyes saw nothing but death by then.  It had to be soon that my eyes would get to see the life that God had chosen for Bug.  You have no idea how much I was looking forward to rejoicing over being able to share the victory with you!!

BELIEVING GOD
I had chosen to continue to believe God and not to allow what I saw with my eyes, what I smelled with my nose, what I touched with my hands, nor what I heard with my ears to sway me.

I again, remind God that I'd been faithful to proclaim that Bug would live because He had said so.  I reminded Him that He gave me the authority to speak life and He chose for me to speak life into Bug.  He couldn't go back on that.  So I went about my morning chores saying over and over, "I choose You, Lord, I choose You!"  "I choose life, Lord, I choose life!"

I'vdnot really been devouring the emails on the mailing lists because of how the others I had gotten me all ready for an instant miracle and then had my hopes dashed over and over.  So, I was thinking that I wouldn't pay much attention to the emails that were being sent out to over 100,000 people.

This one was just too exciting to ignore.

SPEAKING THE WORD
I read through Hebrews 11 in the  morning.  Verse 6 was particularly riveting, "But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him."

I took parts of verse 33 and proclaimed, "Through faith I obtain the promise given to me by God!"   Then, in the afternoon I read:

"Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ:  grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, according as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:  whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.

For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.

Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall: for so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."
2Peter 1:1-11

I WAS one of those who had "obtained like precious faith" with them!  His divine power had given me all things that pertain unto life and godliness!!!!  I had been given an exceeding great and precious promise.  I COULD NOT FALL!!


Friday June 30, 2006
HOW MUCH HARDER COULD IT GET?
Bug was very very sick.  I kept crying out to God that I couldn't stand to watch.  Everything in me wanted to rush Bug to the vet and have them put him down.  I couldn't help but feel I was torturing my own cat.  God knew how I felt.  He's the one that gave me compassion in the first place.  It hurt me to even watch a goldfish suffering!!!  I constantly felt nauseated.

I put a picture of how Bug looked farther down here.  He looked pitiful.

I went to bed early the night before.  I was exhausted.  I forced myself to go into Bug's enclosure and tell him how much I loved him.  I continued to speak life into him.  I kept telling him that God loved him and that it would be over soon.  He kept trying to kiss my hand and couldn't.  My heart was torn open!

I hadn't cried that much in years and years.  I kept crying out to God to have mercy and to end the suffering.  I didn't want to get out of bed that morning.  I kept telling God I didn't want to see Bug looking sick any more.  It was just too hard.

I kept thinking I'd done something wrong or needed to do more and I reminded myself that I was given one thing to do, speak life into Bug, and I had done it.  I had done it a million times over.

I reviewed and reviewed everything in my mind and with God.  I kept speaking life.  I kept telling the death, the poop, the cysts, the broken bones, and everything else bad in Bug that there was no room for them because the life had pushed them out.  I was telling the death that it was a mountain and I cast it into the sea.  I kept proclaiming that God gave me the authority to speak life into Bug and that He doesn't give authority without providing the power to see it through.

My sons were looking at Bug in horror.  I kept telling them Bug won't die.

I hadn't said anything to my husband about the bowel obstruction because he would probably tell me to have Bug put down.  We were struggling with our finances at the time thanks to all the expenses for the month of June and, if my husband thought all the money we spent on Bug was wasted, it would have rattled his cage too hard.  He had to focus on teaching summer school and on other things going on in his life.

My prayer partner, who helped keep my mind focused on God, got sick and couldn't make it Thursday.  I knew that God was right there with me, but it felt like when I took a step toward Him to talk to Him or to press into Him that he tooks one step back.  I'm thinking He was strengthening me or something by allowing me to feel that way.  It was just so very hard. 

This was just so strange to be going through something of that magnitude and life just kept going on around me.  That made it so much harder to deal with.  I felt like I was out of my mind.  I was trying to balance on the spiritual side as well as deal with the worldly side.  It is very hard to explain.  I guess I got what I asked for.  I asked God to use me and told Him I wanted to be a "peculiar people".  (1Pet 2:9)

Then there were the constant doubts and fears that were trying to attach to my brain.  "Get thee behind me, satan!  I'm believing GOD!"  Over and over and over since this all began I'd told people what was happening.  As it had progressed the look of horror in their eyes was unnerving.  They thought I was out of my mind.  I had to be nonchalant about it and just remind them that God cannot lie and He was still a God of miracles.

There were just so many thoughts running through my mind and so many conversations I'd had with God I can't tell them all to you.

STRENGTH AND ENCOURAGEMENT
I read the book of Job that morning.  It wasn't the same as what I was going through, but I got something out of it.  At the end, when God was speaking to Job I got some peace.  It sank farther into my head that God was the one who made Bug in the first place.  Everything I was going through was very small in comparison to all the things that have gone on since the world was formed.  The things that God has done are way more important and huge than healing a cat.

This was nothing for Him.  His timing is what it was all about.  I saw a dying cat (don't get me wrong, I know that the spoken word of life was in him, it was my eyes that saw the death) and urgency gripped my heart and squeezed.  "Now, God, NOW!" I cried, "But, in Your perfect will and timing." 

I got an email that was another exciting and encouraging Word.   I was on that author's mailing list and she sent me another copy to make sure I got it.  God let her know I needed it!

There was a miracle in the making.  Oh, you have no idea how much I longed for the moment when I could see it with my eyes.  I told God that it wasn't life until I could see it and Bug could feel it.

I needed something to smile about, I really really did!

I did end up telling my husband because he pressed me for an answer.  When he heard how bad Bug was and how I wasn't taking him to the vet he got mad at me.  He began to say something along the lines of, "if God wants Bug to die, he'll die."  I had to get up and walk out of the room.  It tore me to the quick to have my husband speak negative words.


Saturday July 1, 2006
A GOOD DAY FOR A MIRACLE
Friday I felt expectation in the air.  Even though Bug looked much worse I felt something.  I looked at the date, July 1st and focused on the fact it was the seventh month.  Seven symbolizes completion.  The first day of the seventh month.  Seemed like a perfect day for a miracle.

As every other morning, I spent time with God after I got up.  Finally, He spoke with me.

"Time:  for plenty, for harvest, for miracles, for abundance, for reign."

"For you are not of this world.  Anyone who says you are is wrong.  Keep flying in the face of danger, fear, wrong..."

"My ways are infinitely higher than yours.  Step lightly.  Be ready.  Listen intently.  The world is yours.  Keep smiling."

"Keep absorbing the Word.  Let it soak in.  It is life.  Life does flow through you.  Speak softly."

He told me to keep writing.  "Don't waver.  Proclaim My truth.  Use the sword, use the armor.  Touch people."

"Do you see how quiet My voice has become?  Listen carefully."

I poured over what He said to see if there was any direction on what I was to do differently regarding Bug.  The only thing I could see was to speak softly.

I got some HUGELY encouraging emails, too.  I printed them out and poured over the words.   They spoke of victory, faith conquering satan's attacks, miracles, and more.  They gave me strength and hope.

God opened my eyes to something that was probably what He had been trying to teach me.  He told me to speak life into Bug and into the Body of Christ.  If the Body of Christ had gotten into the same condition as Bug was in then it was in serious need of having life spoken into it!!! 

So, once Bug was healed then I could focus on teaching people about the Body.  That's what Jesus did, He healed to bring people's attention to what they needed to hear.

My husband was working in the yard so I went out and helped him.  He ended up helping me to begin cleaning out the area on our back patio where the fish pond was.  All but one of the plants died due to the fumigation we had done.  So, he helped me figure out how to re-do it all.

So, it felt like a great day.  My husband and I were working together to accomplish something.  I was doing what I needed to be doing and God was taking care of Bug.  Even though I would see a very very sick cat each time I went in the house, I just spoke softly, "life, life, life."

I went to bed and Bug hadn't improved.


Sunday July 2, 2006
OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD
That was 90% of my conversation with Him on that awful Sunday.  Thank God my sons stayed at a friend's house the previous night.  If they saw Bug like that they would scream.

I made myself get up again that morning.  I kept telling God I wasn't sure if I could take much more of seeing a sick cat.  When I saw Bug I felt nauseous.  His eyes were globbed over with gooey stuff.  Dark secretions were crusted under his nose.  His paws and the front of his chest were matted with stinky drool.  He had strings of drool coming out of his mouth.

I went into the kitchen to feed Reeboks, my other cat, and heard Bug meowling.  He hadn't made any noise for a few days.  THIS IS IT, I thought.... he is feeling better and wants breakfast!!!

I ran to him and he was just meowling in pain.  His belly was heaving.  It was HORRID!  I crawled in with him and began to tell him how much I loved him.  I spoke life into him.  I cried OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD!  I added my tears and my runny nose to the other stuff on Bug's fur.

I asked God what else I was supposed to do.  I asked Him when when when will Bug be done suffering.  I cried, "Can You hear me???"  Bug dragged himself under my body and I rubbed and kissed his head.

As I hunched over Bug praying and comforting and speaking life my legs and feet started falling asleep.  I laid on my side to stretch out and couldn't stay awake.  Bug had finally laid on his side and seemed relaxed.  I don't think I slept more than a minute when I heard, "Your Daddy hears you."  At the same time Bug began to gag.  Is this it?  Is this the beginning of the healing?  It wasn't.  He finally relaxed and went to sleep.

I told God that I'd done everything He told me to do and now it was up to Him.  (How many times had I told Him that?  If I told Him once I told Him a million times!)  I told Him that I would continue to speak life into the Body of Christ like I'd been diligent to speak it into Bug.  I told Him I wouldn't forget once Bug was well.  I told Him I'd do anything He wanted me to do to teach the Body what He wanted them to know.

I kept asking Him whether I should put more fluid into Bug.  Just the way Bug was looking and acting I knew that his body was very close to giving up.  So, since 11:00AM is lunchtime for the cats I told God that, if He didn't have Bug up and ready for lunch at 11:00 I'd put more fluids in him.  Bug wasn't up and I couldn't get the fluids in him.  His skin was tender and he wouldn't stay still for me to poke him because it hurt him so badly.  His skin was tight, too, and I couldn't pull up a good enough flap of it to get a needle under it.  The needle kept poking on through.

OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD!

My whole body felt twisted up on the inside.  I was in agony as I watched my poor little Bug suffering.  I was going back and forth to his enclosure.  At one point he started to howl and I ran to him.  He jumped up and ran to get under my body.  Then he howled some more and flopped over on his side breathing heavily.
OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD!!!  Where is the life???

I couldn't stand to see him suffering any more.  I just want to have him put out of his misery!!!  I was crying out, "WHY DO I HAVE TO WATCH THIS??"

Bug's breathing calmed down and he seemed to fall asleep.  I put a little blanket over his sad little body.

OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD!

TIME DRAGGED ON
That's the way the day went.  I ended up just staying near Bug all day.  Thoughts rolled through my head.  I wondered why God was waiting so long to instill life into Bug and why it was necessary for Bug to be tortured to such an extreme degree.  I pushed other thoughts away that had to do with Bug dying.  He couldn't die.  God doesn't tell you to speak life into something and no life goes into it!  He doesn't tell you to smile when you are in the process of torturing your pet to death! 

The thought of my being wrong, wrong about my ability to hear God or wrong about something else that had me on a road to disaster, and should I be wrong my Clarion Call ministry was a sham and would have to be shut down.  There were more thoughts.  I refused to allow them to stay in my head.  I refused  to examine them.  I had to focus on having enough faith to be a useable tool for God.

  I went to bed early.  I was mentally and spiritually exhausted.  It was all I could do to tell myself that God cannot lie and the life He authorized me to speak into Bug was still there. 

Imagine yourself in a hurricane.  Your eyes and ears tell you it is a hurricane.  Everyone else is telling you it is a hurricane and to act appropriately.  Yet, you have to tell yourself it is not a hurricane and that God has other plans as you are being almost knocked over by the winds.

FROM THE FRYING PAN INTO THE FIRE
I wasn't in bed an hour and my husband came to tell me that Bug was very bad.  My son had taken Bug out of his enclosure and put him on a rug on the floor in this bedroom I use for an office and where I have my computer.  I got up and Bug was howling in pain.  I got everyone out of the room, closed the door, covered Bug up with a small blanket, and tried to comfort him.  He finally settled down.

I stayed with him all night.  He was in severe pain.  His body was dehydrated because he hadn't been able to eat or drink for two days.  I hadn't been able to get fluids into him.  His body was filled with feces.  It had backed up and his breath and his body smelled like what was in him.  His eyes were dilated and there was brown stuff oozing out of them and out of his mouth and nostrils.  The fur on his face was matted with saliva.  Yet, I had to believe that Bug was full of life!

I alternated between speaking life into Bug, telling Bug how much I loved him, and crying out to God for mercy.  It was a very long night.  It got extremely hot in the room.  We had a horribly hot summer.  I had turned off the fan for Bug's sake.  It was very uncomfortable for me in many ways.

I  asked God to not take it so far as to have Bug die and then bring him back from death.  I told God I wasn't sure if I had that much faith.  It was hard enough doing what I had done so far.  But, as I had been doing all along I told Him, "Your will, not mine!"

 

Monday July 3, 2006
THE END APPROACHES
The minutes ticked by.  Around 3:00AM Bug started to howl again and he got up and tried to drag himself under my computer desk.  I held him back and tried to comfort him as he struggled.  He finally threw his head back, screaming, and suddenly became quiet.  His face was contorted.  His mouth was locked open in a silent scream.  Oh, God, NO!  HE WAS DEAD!

NOW WHAT?
There was only one thing I could do.  I sat quietly and spoke life into Bug.  I was in expectation that Bug would come back to life.  Then it occurred to me that I was the only witness.  So, sure that God was going to bring Bug back to life, I got my digital camera and took a picture of Bug's twisted little face to prove he had died.  Then I sat back down and continued to speak life into his little body.

I kept asking God what He was waiting for.  I pointed out that I had remained full of faith clear to the end.  I pointed out that  Abraham had wavered a lot more than I had from what I read in the Bible.  I had held true to God all the way through.  I had done my portion and it was time for God to fulfill His.  I had held true since February and had toughed it out through the very worst part without caving in.

WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?
It was daylight and I was still sitting by Bug waiting for him to get up. 

"OK, Lord, bring on the life!  There is nothing else to prove, is there?  What are You waiting for?"

I wanted to see the results of my "out of this world" faith.  I wanted the joy back and I wanted to be able to rejoice and sing about God's faithfulness and power!

My husband was going to be getting up to go teach summer school.  I told God I had to go fix his breakfast for him and told Him what time I had to go do it.  My youngest son would get up shortly after my husband left.   I didn't want him to see Bug.  So, when that time arrived I wrapped Bug up in a soft blanket and put him in a cardboard box in the garage.  When he came back to life he would be able to get out of the box.  I still wouldn't allow myself to lose faith.  Lazarus was dead for how many days??

FOOLISHNESS OR FAITH?
Time ticked on.  My son was in a hurry and didn't ask about Bug.  Why should he?  His mom kept telling him that Bug would be fine!

I had told my husband what had happened when he was leaving for work.  He ended up getting a substitute teacher for his class came back home to be with me.

He and I dug a hole in the back yard and I put Bug in it.  I was an emotional wreck.  However, I still believed that God could bring Bug back up from that hole.  Off and on throughout the day I kept looking toward that spot to see if I could see Bug.

I kind of turned my mind off and refused to allow myself to cry because I didn't want to mess up anything that God wanted to do.  My husband helped me to work on fixing up the flower bed that had to be redone due to the fumigation we had done and the rest of the day crawled by.


July 4th and Beyond
WHAT HAPPENED?
I don't know what happened.  It is now three months later as I am writing this.  I just got done finishing up July 2nd and 3rd's details.  It is almost as hurtful today as it was back then.  I still haven't grieved properly.  I am afraid that I will crumble into dust if I grieve.  It isn't just grieving over losing my pet, it is grieving that I tortured him to death in the name of God.  I am not going to forget all that my poor Bug suffered.  I had the power to end his suffering before it even began and I chose to go with what I thought God wanted.

I've tried to do some examination.  At first I just turned off my brain and my emotions because I couldn't think straight.  I just told God He'd have to help me to understand what had happened.  I told Him to be sure to speak mighty loud because I wasn't at all sure that I could hear Him any more.  I wasn't even sure who He was any more.

It seemed obvious that I had made a mistake somewhere.  However, even if I had, why wouldn't God have corrected me?  I had been fasting, praying, worshipping, and spending almost every minute of every day focused on Him.  Is God not able to stop someone from making a huge mistake?  I had been telling Him to let me know what to do and how to do it.

Until I knew what had gone wrong, if anything had gone wrong, I couldn't minister to anyone else.  I went on sabbatical from the Clarion Call.  My first instinct was to yank the entire site.  I wasn't sure how large of an error I had even made.  So, I figured just leaving everything as it was (I did yank this story, however.  I had published it and the people who were on my mailing list had read it.) would suffice for the time being.

ALL HELL BROKE LOOSE
There I was, not sure of anything.  All the things I knew about God were put on a shelf.  I didn't know if God lied to me or not.  At that point I didn't even know if there was a God or if I was just a lunatic who just heard voices in her head.

I didn't turn off to God.  I wanted Him to be able to restore our relationship.  I wanted to be able to go back to where I was before and learn from this experience.  I didn't know what I was supposed to learn.

Since then I have been trying to read my Bible but the words feel cold.  He doesn't show me what to read.  I've asked God to speak to me and have spent time listening.  I have tried praising Him.  I listen to Christian radio.  I don't know what else to do.  I don't hear Him, don't feel Him, and don't feel any comfort or joy that is supposed to be mine.

All sorts of things started going wrong.  I found myself in some very awful situations.  I'm not going to bore you with the details, but it seems like every single day there was something breaking, a situation arose that took a lot of my time and effort, a crisis of some kind, people taking advantage of me, or a problem of some kind.  Something arose that made us think we'd have to move out of our house.  HUGE things were happening to me and where was God?

All sorts of things were going wrong and I wanted to be able to place them in God's hands.  I wanted to be able to feel His presence and His arms around me.  I wanted to be able to be joyful in the midst of things.  I felt nothing, absolutely NOTHING!  I went into a deep depression.  I took down the cat tree and boxed up the cat toys.  I decided that, once Reeboks was gone I couldn't risk getting another cat.

MY LIFE WAS UPSIDE DOWN
For years God had been my reason to get up in the morning.  The Clarion Call was my ministry.  Speaking to people about God and about Him being everything they need had been second nature to me.  My whole day was all about God and what He wanted me to be doing.

I just didn't feel His presence any more.  Off and on I doubted His existence.  I began to cry out to Him that I needed Him and for Him to show Himself to me again.

I couldn't go back and examine the things that made me believe in God in the first place because I was hindered by what had happened.  I wasn't sure, even if there was a God, whether He was the God who couldn't lie.  I wasn't sure if He was the God who told me He loved cats and who told me to speak life into Bug.  My husband and I ended up paying off over $6,000 in vet bills.  We ended up having financial difficulties because of it.  It felt like God abandoned me.

TRYING TO UNDERSTAND
I tried to understand but I couldn't.  I just didn't know what happened.  I did know one thing.  At that point I had a feel for what it was like to be a non-believer.  If I couldn't feel God how could I believe in Him?  If I didn't have proof that God was never going to lie to me and never going to forsake me, how could I believe in Him?  Just words weren't proof.  It takes God to reveal Himself to lock it in.

With every fiber of my being I wanted to be restored to a close relationship with God, but it just wasn't happening.  I just didn't know what else to do.  I could have pretended that everything Was all right and begin again where I left off, but I would have been a hypocrite and a liar.  I didn't want to live in a happy pretend world.  I wanted to feel my hand in God's hand and know that His words were in my mouth.

IN THE MEANTIME
Most of the people that I told about Bug hadn't said a word about him.  The ones who were my local friends hadn't even asked if he was still alive.  Were they right?  Was I out of my mind to think that God would do an actual miracle?

The supposed prophets I wrote to never wrote to me.  They weren't even interested enough to ask what happened.  I was still getting emails from the Elijah List that spoke of miracles and faith and God doing great things.  The ones I wrote to were still writing about those things.  Were those things true?  Were they in another dimension than I was?  Were they better at being spiritual than I was or were they crazy like I had been?

So, the world went on around me as if nothing happened and there I was, sitting upside down and twisted up.  My hair began coming out in clumps and I had a hard time finding anything to smile about.  Each day was a little scary because I keep wondering, "What next?"

Some of the people I met through the Clarion Call were trying to encourage me.  I appreciated their friendship, but I was still not finding my way back to the God I knew.

All I could do at that point was wait to see what would happen.  I kept hoping that it was all a huge learning lesson for me and I would be able to move back into my ministry.

 

October 18, 2006
STILL LOST IN THE DESERT
I don't have this story out for the general public to view at the Clarion Call.  It only gets read by a few people as I don't give the link out to just everyone.  I've been on sabbatical from the Clarion Call, but haven't pulled it off line.  Until I know something for sure I'm leaving things as they were.  In the state I'm in I can't teach anyone anything.  When people start to talk to me about God I get uncomfortable because I am still wondering "where He went".  I'm hoping to be able to come back and encourage people but I have to wait.  I would be a hypocrite and possibly even a liar if I carried on like nothing was wrong.

I listen to praise music when I am driving or when I'm working in the kitchen.  I talk to Him all the time.  I ask Him questions and wait for answers.  I listen listen listen for Him to speak to me.

I had a dream the other night that I felt that overwhelming blanket of His love wash over me.  In my dream I was ecstatic that I felt Him back in my life.  It was glorious, then I woke up.  When I woke up I still thought it was real and really happened.  I laid in bed and was in expectation that I would feel His presence.  The longer I waited the more I had to face the fact that it had only been a dream.

I haven't heard His voice, felt His presence, or felt any joy, peace, or comfort since before this all happened.  When I open my Bible to read it feels the same as when I was in sixth grade and forced myself to read Moby Dick to get lots of extra credit.  I couldn't get into what I was reading.  I was forcing myself to read the words but they were like they were in a foreign language.  They all fell flat.

THINGS JUST KEEP GOING DOWN THE TOILET
It was a while before I could bring myself to take the extra medical supplies and special kidney food that was left over from Bug to my vet.  They gave me $100 credit.  I took Reeboks, my other cat, in for his yearly checkup.  I needed a refill on his heart medicine and they require yearly checkups due to his heart condition.  The vet gave him a thorough checkup and wanted to run some extra tests on him.  The bill came out over the $100 credit they gave me.

Reeboks' kidneys are failing!!  That's right!  The first cat that God told me to speak life into still had a heart condition and then developed kidney failure!!  They were going to sell me back the supplies I just sold them!

I opted to not harass Reeboks with food he wouldn't like and with needles and fluids.  I'm the only person that he loves and he would end up hating me after I tortured him every day.  So, I'm on death watch with my other cat.  I'm making the rest of his life as nice as I can.  Where is God in all this?

I'm having some horrible things happening in my family that I am not free to share.  There is nothing I can do and I really could use the "peace that passes all understanding" but I am not receiving it.

I could twist your ear farther off with all the things that are going wrong in my life.  I know this has been a long and torturous story as it is so I will spare you the details.  However, every day that goes by I wonder where God is in all this.

A FLURRY OF EMAILS
I've been getting some interesting emails lately.  Some are encouraging me to fight when the people who are writing may or may not know what is happening in my life.  Most are encouraging and are giving me glimmers of hope.   I've had more than one offer to help at the Clarion Call, even!

I'm getting some prophetic words on some mailing lists that I hope are speaking directly to me.  They talk about trials and tests being over and about drawing closer than ever before to the Lord.  Yet, I take every one of them with a large grain of salt after being so deceived by the emails I got that led me to believe I was on the right track regarding a miracle.

I WONDER
I try to understand what is happening.

I wonder if God will be having me minister to people who are absolutely sure there is no God.  I know what it is like to talk to God and not get an answer.  I know what it is to seek God and not feel like I can find Him.  I know what it is to yearn for His comfort and to receive none.  I know what it is like to listen to people tell me how simple it is to restore my relationship with Him when it isn't that simple.  I know what it is like to believe that there is no God.

I wonder if He will use to me to rebuke and correct those prophets who are submitting Words from God to over 130,000 people who may each take those Words as being specifically for them.  Does God want those Words sent out willy-nilly like that?  Perhaps I will be used to rebuke those prophets who are wrapped up in being the "cream of the crop" the "tried and tested prophets of God" or the "prophetic clique".  I don't know, I can only guess.

I wonder if I got off track and where I got off track.

I wonder if I was becoming desensitized to God's voice and allowed myself to follow the enemy.  Perhaps I got too cocky or too sure of my abilities and went off course.

I wonder and I wonder and I wonder.

I still even wonder if I never did hear God at all and only made everything up because I was so desperately wanting it to be that way.  I was afraid to face the world without a God.  I wanted so desperately to believe that Jesus loved me so much He died for me.  I wanted so desperately to believe that I was loved.

I YEARN
I yearn to feel and hear God again.

I yearn to reach out and touch people through the Clarion Call.

I yearn to have God as the priority in every day again.

I yearn for His guidance in all the decisions that face me each day.

I yearn to know that I am on the right track in everything I do and say.

IN THE MEANTIME
I am doing the best I can.  I am not closing God out.  I am still hoping that I will feel His touch any minute.  I am hoping to get a glimpse into what happened.  I want to know what I should learn from this.  I want to know what I can do with what I learned.

I want to climb out of this darkness that follows me.  I want to be able to help other people to climb out of the darkness that follows them.

So, each day that comes I am expectantly waiting to find out that the trial is over.  As each minute ticks by I try to stay strong to survive the next minute.  I try to force myself to care about everything else happening in my life.

I keep hoping that I will be able to finally finish this story and allow anyone else that has suffered through something similar to draw comfort from the conclusion.  Heck, I am hoping that I can finish this story so I can draw comfort from the conclusion!!


November 12, 2007
IT HAS BEEN A LONG TIME
A few things have changed, but not much.  I am more hopeful that there will be a breakthrough, yet I still feel far from God.

I have been talking to God more and am still listening for a response.

I really don't have much more to add.  I am speaking to God a lot more and am listening for a response.  I am reading my Bible, but it is still not coming to life. 

I look forward to learning the lesson that God must be teaching me.  I hope it is very soon.  I feel very lonely.  My family doesn't understand my spiritual state.  Actually, I don't understand it, either.  It is impossible to talk about it with people.  It has to be prefaced with such a long explanation of what happened that it can't be discussed in less than a couple of hours.  Besides, when I do discuss it I usually end up bringing people down.  They don't like to hear spiritual stories that don't have a good ending and I can't offer a good ending yet.

So, there I am, still in limbo.

The Emails and pictures
Now we have a conclusion.  On to:
THE CONCLUSIONS
WHAT HAPPENED?



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