Our friend, John McCollum (Executive Director of Asia’s Hope), is speaking at Vineyard Church of Columbus (6000 Cooper Rd. Westerville) at 7pm tonight about the unsettling gap between God’s promises to care for the orphaned and the poor and the actual state of destitute children around the world.

Would love to see you there!

A little overwhelmed by the love and generosity all around me today.

For starters, thank YOU for donating educational materials (and $) to schools in Cambodia. And thank you for your wisdom and advice and heart for others. Such givers.

Then this afternoon I went on a field trip with Nina’s kindergarten class (42 kiddos and 2 fabulous teachers) to a farm–pumpkin patch, big tube slide, straw maze, corn box, hayride, big fat turkeys & chickens. It was so much fun. Her teachers blow me away. Seriously. They have so much love for each of these kids, and it just bubbles over and spills on everybody. Such givers.

Then our friend Linda brought us a delicious, healthy, barely-any-sodium meal. This is our 4th meal since Gabe has been home from the hospital, and people are signed up MWF through the 16th. And I didn’t even have a baby!! Such givers.

Then our community group met at our house tonight and we talked about serving. Wow. Lots of people had lots of ideas for serving people in our community. Like a family from another country that is barely scraping by. We’re all going to chip in and find/buy the things they need. I listened to my friends (old and new) share what gifts God has given them and the joy they find when they use those gifts to help others. Such givers.

I am moved and inspired by those who give of themselves to help others. In their neighborhoods. In their schools. At their jobs. Around the world. Such givers.

Feeling so blessed tonight. And so grateful to the Giver of all. When we give, we feel his pleasure, because we’re becoming more and more like him.

Gabe had his first outing last night. We met with our community group from church at our friends Doug and Rebecca’s house. It wore him out, but it was good to do something normal. Out of the 11 folks in our group, 6 of us spent time in the hospital last week. Sean and Meg had a baby (darling Ella!), Doug and Rebecca’s son & daughter-in-law had a baby (beautiful Evelyn!), and Gabe had a heart attack. And Britt and Pam visited us every day (and Sean and Meg once), so WHEW!

We’re going through the Strong Challenge at church for six weeks, and this week is all about Training and Discipline (so far, we’ve had Play, Pray, Study, and now Train), specifically the disciplines of fasting and solitude and examining our hearts. We have a pack of Strong Cards that we’re working through with activities on them, and last night at Group, we paired up and decided to give something up for a day this week.

My friend Bre fasted from food today, and I’m fasting from Facebook, Twitter, and my blog tomorrow (Friday). Keeping texting/e-mail open for “emergencies.”

Well, this morning I decided to do one of the other cards (we’re supposed to try to do one per day, and I’ve failed miserably). “Skip a Meal” was the first one I saw, and I knew I was supposed to do it. And since I rarely eat anything until 10:30 or so anyway, I knew it would be easy (lame, right?).

The card reads: “Skip at least one meal today and use that time to write out a prayer for something specific in your journal. Use any hunger pangs as reminders to pray and listen to God.”

Felt strongly that I’d pray for wisdom and clarity about our trip to Cambodia.

The card suggested three Scripture passages to read, so I decided to do that first. Matthew 6:16-18 is all about not making a big production of your fasting, i.e. showing off how spiritual you are (you know, by blogging about your fast and stuff). Daniel 9:3 was about Daniel fasting and praying for the sins of his people. And the last one, Ezra 8:21, was OHMYWORD.

I read the verse and almost fell off my chair. Or maybe I did fall off my chair. I can’t even remember.

Ezra 8:21 (ESV)–”Then I proclaimed a fast there, at the river Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God to seek from him a safe journey for ourselves, our children, and all our goods.”

Um.

Then I proclaimed a fast there, at the kitchen table, that I might humble myself before my God to seek from him a safe journey for Gabe and me, Livi, Ava, and Nina, and our 10 suitcases (+ carry-ons) full of supplies for schools and orphanages in Cambodia.

After I picked my jaw up, I kept reading. Verse 22 made me smile. Ezra was ashamed to ask for bodyguards, because he had already bragged on his God to the king. Verse 23–”So we fasted and implored our God for this, and he listened to our entreaty.”

And that’s what I did today. I fasted and implored my God for this, and I know he listened to my entreaty.

Less than an hour later, we got an e-mail from John McCollum, the director of Asia’s Hope. He had passed our story along to his friend, Dr. John, an ER doc who’s on the board of Asia’s Hope and has traveled extensively in Southeast Asia. A little bit after that, Dr. John himself e-mailed us.

He told us he was so glad we would most likely still be going on our trip and that he had “no problem being under the care of the Great Physician as long as you are acting wisely and following the counsel of your physician.” He gave us advice for what to do in an emergency, gave us phone # and e-mail for a doctor friend in Cambodia, and gave us the name/# of a missionary who had a similar experience on furlough earlier this year and is back in Cambodia.

Praise you, God!

My “plan” for tomorrow’s social media fast is to spend time in prayer for others, like Daniel did (9:3). Not so much asking God to forgive their wicked rebellion (well, maybe in some cases), but to ask him to hear their cries and remember their needs and meet them where they are.

Would you join me today in praying for 3 people? 1 in your community, 1 in another state, and 1 in another country?

I’m going to pray for 1.) our pastor and his family (he’s leaving for Ethiopia in a few days and they have four small kiddos). 2.) my friend, Joanne, who lives in Colorado and had a stroke in January. 3.) the folks at Heartline in Haiti.

If you feel so inclined, I’d love to know who you prayed for (or at least what states/country they’re in). Of course I won’t be checking my blog until Saturday. See you next week, friends. And I can’t stop thanking you for all your encouragement this week after Gabe’s heart attack. THANK YOU.

I’m kind of at a loss. Not for words (always plenty of those), but for the right words. What do you say after you’ve already told the story of an event that changed your life and yet you don’t have any clear definition of what that “new” life should look like?

What if you want to be forever changed and pursuing Jesus with everything in you, but apparently, you’re just as human as you ever were? And more tired. With more responsibilities. And more what-ifs.

Once before I got up to speak at a MOPS group (about s-e-x), the leader told the group that the sister of one the MOPS gals had lost her husband in a car accident the night before. Then she turned to me and said, “I’m sorry to share something so heavy right before your talk.”

And I said, “Oh, goodness. If anything, it should put this in perspective for us. I’m getting ready to give you all a pep talk about wanting to make love to your husbands, and this dear wife will never again be able to hold her husband in her arms.”

And from that moment on, I’ve tried to remember that young widow whenever Gabe wants to do something I don’t. Or when he chews food (because even if he does it as quietly as possible, I still can’t stand it. I’m OCD like that.). I say to myself, “Would I rather him be sitting in his recliner eating Doritos or would I rather him be dead?” It’s a sobering question (if not a little funny).

And yet, here I sit, four days after I almost lost him, and I’m cringing at the sound of him eating raw almonds (not even CLOSE to Doritos on the obnoxious noises scale) in his recliner all the way downstairs.

I admit my hideousness not because I want to try to outdo my crappiness confessions with every blog post, but because I’m struggling, and I need you to know that.

This ordeal has made us stronger and more grateful for what we have and more in tuned with God and his mercy and sovereignty, and a whole host of other amazing things.

But it has also exhausted us. And whipped our world out from under us. And opened our eyes to some things that aren’t pretty. And made us question what our future will hold and why we’re here on this earth.

It feels like we’re in a battle, and not one that’s over just because Gabe’s life has been spared. God was responsible for all of that; now we have to keep up the fight. The fight to be healthy, the fight to keep depression at bay, the fight to recover physically, the fight to make the best decisions…

And when I feel this tired after four days, I wonder if we have the strength to keep this up for the rest of forever.

Thankfully, God promises we don’t have to do it on our own. We have him. And we have all of you. Thank you. And we are so, so, so, so blessed.

My prayer (well, one of them) for today is that God will show me how to make this whole heart attack thing all about HIM and not about us. And I’m praying for an extra helping of grace for the times I just don’t get it right.

God, help us to seek nothing but you and your glory.

Not sure what I was thinking when I typed that title. Life after a heart attack? What do I know about life after a heart attack?? Maybe I should type a bunch of ????????? and call it a night. I’m already in bed. Oh, my bed.

We’re home! Gabe is home!

Speaking of Gabe, the general consensus is that he looks amazing, and me? Well, not so much. Awesome. Who had the heart attack anyway?

Tonight has been emotional. And good. I’m holding up well. And also losing my mind a little bit. Lots of tears from the girls. I didn’t mean for them to know about the Cambodia thing, but Livi was on my computer all day reading all the Facebook comments–”I’m praying!” and “Happy Birthday!” And she read my blog post.

We had an amazing conversation in the van on the way to pick up Gabe’s prescriptions. She told me that God tells her things. I’ll share more later with her permission. Powerful, powerful stuff.

I brought Gabe home at around 7pm (Monday). Got him settled, my parents brought the girls back from trick-or-treating, Livi and I ran to get Gabe’s meds (then ran back out later because we forgot the aspirin that he has to take every day for the rest of his life). Had some emotional conversations. Ava rubbed Daddy’s head a bunch, and Livi and Nina took his feet. Gabe’s going to love this.

Finally got them in bed and they conked out immediately. Gabe’s asleep beside me, snoring like usual, and it’s not hard to pretend that everything’s just exactly like it was three days ago.

But then I remember the 6 pills he has to take every day for at least a year. And that one of them cost more than the car payment we were so glad to almost be rid of.

And I remember the circulation socks he has to wear. And that he can’t drive for 2 days. Or have “relations” for 5 (and for those of you who asked–and it was MANY–that is NOT what caused Gabe’s heart attack, you little stinkers). That he has to start his new exercise regimen with 4 minutes of walking per day. FOUR. That he has to cut salt and fat out of his diet. Salt is my love language.

But I’m confident that he’s going to get healthy and in shape and lower his bad cholesterol and raise his good cholesterol and have a stronger heart than ever before.

And God is already doing some jaw-dropping stuff through this. He is just nuts like that.

The doctors still don’t know what caused his heart attack, but they have a great plan in place for making sure (as best they can) that it doesn’t happen again. Speaking of, there was a rainbow in the sky right before Gabe had his heart attack, and tonight when I was gathering our stuff at the hospital and going out to pull our car around for Gabe, there was another one. A double one. It was like God was saying, “Ease your mind, girl. This won’t happen again.”

Please keep praying about Cambodia. I was reading through the Psalms this morning while Gabe was getting his echo done. I just read every verse that I had already underlined. Out loud. One of those verses was Psalm 119:32–”I will run in the way of your commandments when you enlarge my heart!” I didn’t add the exclamation point. It was already there. And guess what I had written in purple ink right beside the verse (and don’t remember writing).

Cambodia.

Believing big for God’s glory to be manifest in ways we can’t even conjure up in our puny little brains.

Speaking of puny little brains, mine is fried. Thanks so much, friends, for everything. We’ll have to reschedule the big birthday blog bash I had planned for today. Going to go sleep away the last 20 minutes of my 36th birthday.

36?!? What in the what?!?