John 11:1-44
I will use the familiar story of the resurrection of Lazarus as the backdrop to a message that the Lord has been speaking to me. I have been going through a very difficult season in my life. For the first time in my 28-year Christian walk I found myself saying “Lord, if you had been here”.
Like Mary and Martha in this passage of scripture, I had a situation that was looking bleak. I asked God for help, and I was counting on deliverance in a certain way. I felt that I would get a solution to my problems before things got bad. They got bad anyway. You see at the end of 2017, I was sick, and the doctors were still testing to figure out the cause. I lost my full-time job, and I just wanted to go to bed to rest. I started working a part-time job in March of 2018 without benefits. In April, my health insurance benefits ended. I began home peritoneal dialysis (PD). Happily, one chronic condition ended as the doctors had finally found the right treatment after a year of testing and treatments. But the journey with PD was just starting. I received a $50,000 bill for dialysis treatment, and I was without a full-time job or health insurance. I had been using my savings to keep things afloat, but this situation was going on longer than they could sustain me. I exhausted SNAP food assistance. I was not able to pay for all of the medicines that I needed, so I just went without some of them. I was eventually unable to pay rent. I took the offer of my friends to move in with them. I was still looking for full-time work, and then I got a breakthrough that I needed. I started full-time work in December 2018 which was nearly one full year later. After my first full-time paycheck arrived, my car was repossessed. I was able to pay the monies needed to release it, but it left me with next to nothing until the next pay date. As this was happening, I reflected on how I felt.
It became evident to me that kidney disease was going to be a life-long battle. I was despondent. What if I have the same problems that I had before with the next transplant? Would there be another transplant? There wasn’t going to be a healing for me. Just good days and bad days ahead. That felt like death to me. “Lord, if you had been here”, I would not have lost my job, my housing, my car nor have to deal with a rare kidney disease.
Then the word ministered to me. God is the resurrection and the life. In the scripture, Jesus asked Mary if she believed this. There isn’t a situation that is too difficult for God’s power to turn around. Like Mary and Martha, I had to ask myself if I believed that God is who He says that He is. I am now living the truth that my life is for God’s glory. I now understand that I have to live with my disappointment about some situations. I have to step outside of my situation and go to where God is. He understands my emotion and He is delivering on His promises. He is all that He says that He is and He is able to meet my every need. I believe that!
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