Sunday, November 28, 2010

STILL UNBROKEN





THIS BLOG POST IS IN HONOR OF ALL MY CANCER FIGHTING PEERS, WE'RE .......
'STILL UNBROKEN!!!!!'


Broken bones, broken hearts 
Stripped down and torn apart 
A little bit of rust, I'm still runnin'  
Countin' miles, countin' tears 
Twisted roads, shiftin' gears
Year after year - it's all or nothin' 
 
But I'm not home, I'm not lost 
Still holdin' on to what I got 
Ain't much left
No there's so much that's been stolen
I guess I've lost everything I've had 
But I'm not dead, at least not yet 
Still alone, still alive,
Still UNBROKEN!!!!! 
I'm still alone, still alive, I'M STILL UNBROKEN 
 
Never captured, never tamed Wild horses on the plains 
You can call me lost - I call it FREEDOM  
I feel the spirit in my soul 
It's something Lord I can't control 
I'M NEVER GIVIN UP WHILE I'M STILL BREATHIN! 
 
I'm not home, I'm not lost 
Still holdin' on to what I got 
Ain't much left 
Lord there's so much that's been stolen 
I guess I've lost everything I've had 
But I'm not dead, at least not yet 
Still alone, still alive, 
Still UNBROKEN! 
I'm still alone, still alive, STILL UNBROKEN!
I'm still unbroken 
Still Unbroken 
 
Like the wind, like the rain 
It's all runnin through my veins 
Like a river pouring down into the ocean  
I'm out here on the streets 
But I'm standing on my feet 

Still alive, still alone, still unbroken  
I'm not home, I'm not lost 
Still holdin' on to what I got 
Ain't much left 
Lord there's so much that's been STOLEN
Guess I've lost everything I've had 
But I'm not dead, at least not yet 
Still alive, still alone, Still Unbroken 
I'm still alone, still alive, I'M STILL UNBROKEN 
I'M STILL ALONE! STILL ALIVE! STILL UNBROKEN!
I'M STILL UNBROKEN!  
I ain't never going down! 

I'M STILL UNBROKEN! 
-Lynyrd Skynyrd





Friday, November 19, 2010

GOD IS ABLE; IS HE WILLING?

‎"God would rather us think of Him as not able to heal us as oppose to Him not willing." Think of yourself as a parent; wouldn't you?-me


I was recently asked by a fellow cancer fighter why a loving God would allow us to endure cancer. This particular person was angry with God and proclaimed they would never have faith in a God who would be so cruel. 
My response: Jesus came to do the 'Will' of His Father and Jesus' ministry was a healing ministry. The Bible clearly tells us that the enemy comes to kill, steal and destroy in John 10:10 and goes on to tell us that Jesus came to bring us life to the fullest. I often hear prayers that ask God if it be His will to heal a particular person than do so.. but I have yet to find anywhere in the Bible that Jesus stopped to ask His Father first if it be His Will before healing someone (the only ones who did not receive their healing were those in Jesus' own hometown and the Bible says it was because of their unbelief. See they had seen Him as merely a carpenter all His life so their perception of Him was not as their healer or savior). The Bible tells us that Jesus went about doing the Will of His Father so you have to look at the ministry of Jesus and what He did go about doing; He went about healing the sick and saving the lost (well the Bible says that same power lives in us). The disciples understood healing but could not understand salvation...today, we understand salvation but not healing. God brought me to studying healing through the two cancers over the past twelve years but it was not until the diagnosis of the second stage 4 that my thinking and my speaking really began to change. I agree, of course, that going home to heaven is the ultimate healing..we are made new and never again will sickness have it's place in our lives but the Bible says we can have these things in the.."Land of the Living."Psalm 23:11 "The power of life and death are in the tongue."Proverbs 18:21 So we have to be careful with what we speak in our situations and how we pray over people..and we have to take the authority given to us through the Holy Spirit and command the mountains to move. Yes, there is an appointed time for all of us to die and leave this place in which we were not created for to begin with but there is a back to the cross..the stripes of Jesus: "By His Stripes, We Were Healed."1 Peter 2:24 There are 39 categories of disease and there were 39 stripes placed upon the back of Jesus? That is powerful! Healing was part of the atonement: His body was broken for our healing and His blood poured out for our salvation.

This is how I know Jesus, as Jehovah Rapha, The God Who Heals. Like salvation, not everyone receives healing but it's not that God's Will has anything to do with it. When Jesus cried out "It is finished," He meant everything. It's up to us to receive..salvation, healing, spiritual gifts. These things will never be forced upon us, they're available for our taken. On the cross, Jesus cried out to God and asked Him why had He forsaken Him.. I believe this to be an indication that God had turned His head as He could not bare to watch the suffering of His son. And even though God is not shocked when things happen to us as the Bible says He knows the end from the beginning...God's heart does break for us when we fall sick or into sin (and I'm not talking about those everyday mess ups that we all have as none of us are ever going to be perfect). I do believe it is His Will for us to be made whole but I think, like Paul talked about, we grow weary in this "race" in the this flesh in this world. My grandmother understood healing as did my aunt, who passed recently from cancer, but both were satisfied with years and both had a greater desire to be with Jesus than to remain here and I truly believe that this is why we do lose some of our loved ones prematurely but I do not believe it was God's Will for them to suffer and die from a disease..(we are conditioned to the things of this world being flesh and bone). I believe when it comes down to it, we make a choice in our spirits (as we are Spirit, Body and Soul). I truly believe that if any of us, living, ever caught a glimpse of heaven and Jesus (and I do believe loved ones we have lost did see Him, I really do....as I could tell you many stories of people on their death bed who cried out His name as if He were in the room) none of us would choose to remain here. I have struggled many times with making the choice of life when my body has been racked with pain beyond explanation from bc bone metz ...and I can't wait to see Jesus face to face; the one who died in my place. I keep choosing life for now, because of my son but one day, I am going to go home! However, cancer will never get the credit and God will never be the blame for my leaving this earth!
I will not die until I am satisfied and I say this with boldness because of Psalm 91:16 "With long life will I satisfy him and show him my salvation."
I just want us to seek out what God really does say about healing and look closer at the ministry of Jesus. Salvation is only the beginning.... He has so much available for us but our heads are so wrapped around this world and what we can see that we so often miss the gifts He has for us. I want what Jesus suffered and died to give me so that it would not have been in vain. I want to pay my vows to Christ and pick up my cross daily and though, I fail often, I know He will give me what I seek in my heart to receive. (Psalm 37:4) I want everyone to know Jesus to be real and to know Him as the one who accomplished everything we would ever need to overcome this world. (John 16:33) If we are praying God's Will be done then we haven't read the Word of God because the Word of God tells us what His Will is, in all things. We need to know this and we need to pray His Word not what we grew up hearing in church. 



"Thy Will be done on earth as it is in heaven" Matthew 6:10...There is no sickness in heaven.





Wednesday, November 17, 2010

This has always been my favorite quote so I was elated to see this image posted up on a fellow breast cancer fighter's facebook wall. 



I wanted to share the story behind this simple but powerful declaration by Winston Churchill.


Story goes: Churchill said this on October 29, 1941, when he visited Harrow School. It was after the Blitz and things were looking up a bit for Britain.

"What we have gone through in this period of ten months, this is the lesson: Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never -- in nothing, 
great or small, large or petty -- never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. 

Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy."


-Winston Churchill






-Angie Suttles

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

The Cool Scars

Could we take the approach this courageous feline did in the face of such a threat?  


This video (link below) reminds me of a story I often share with survivor groups.

One sunny Florida day in the summer, a little boy was viciously attacked by an alligator. 
His father saw what was happening from their home window and ran courageously out to his son without hesitation while boldly assuring his boy that he would be alright. The boy's father grabbed his son's arms with a firm determined grip and began to pull him from the alligator's mouth.
The next day when the press requested to interview the small boy about his terrifying experience, he was asked about the ordeal and about the wounds caused by this ferocious animal. Instead of the boy revealing the markings on his legs from the attack of the alligator, he eagerly presented his arms to the reporters. In their confusion, they asked him why he was showing them the bruises on his arms. The little boy peered up to this very attentive group of journalist and explained in a bold proud tone that these were the real scars, the cool scares, because these were the scars where his daddy had held him so tight that it saved his life. 


This boy was not concerned with the damage that was now so clearly present from the attack of the alligator or with what he had lost. He was focused on the cool scars that was the evidence of his father's strong hands that had surely saved his life.


This story reminds me of the giants I have faced in my own life. I have scars from over a dozen surgeries and over fifty rounds of radiation and chemotherapy but when I look at myself in the mirror, I only see the scaring from the grip of my heavenly father's hands that has 'surely, saved my life!' 




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sAF8gMN9c0




This cat never stopped to think about the possible outcome from his approach to such a giant. Without wavering, he claimed what was his. He stood up to his enemy even after his enemy had multiplied. He had not seen what the outcome would be and it could have went very differently. It was his bold move of faith that caused him to be victorious. 


"Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen." Hebrews 11:1

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

IT'S "MOVEMBER"




It's "Movember"...Men grow a moustache to raise awareness for men's health issues.
SO, LET IT GROW, 
Gentlemen!