Many of you know Gary’s new battle with cancer but let me just tell you what God is doing in and through it. Even before these afflictions came, The Lord was gracious enough to prepare my heart in Him, to glory in Him always. So then life happened and God has been delightedly taking our hands and walking right alongside. Strengthening our Faith in Him. Success is about faithfulness, not results. Weakness is not a curse; it’s a blessing.

A glorious God given testimony of a daily silent battle with eczema that my boy had to endure in all of 2016 – it drew us deeper in God’s Word and closer to Christ as we did everything humanly possible, all that we physically knew to ease his pain, nothing seemed to help. Being his mom, the only thing I knew was to cling to Jesus! There were periods of despair in which lead us to dwell on Psalm 22, studied 2 Corinthians 12:5-10, and Romans 5:3-5 – we prayed, we loved, we cried, we begged, we screamed, we were prostrate, we held one another, and every night we lathered him up and wrapped him up. And he, my son, well he endured, he persevered, he fought, he rested, still an innate joy beaming from his eyes. It wasn’t until he embraced this horrible affliction and surrendered it to Christ which lead Grant to even fast in Jesus Name. 2016 was a huge year for him, a Spiritual growth, a clinging to Christ that would never have happened had this not befallen him. Still to this day, after months of the elimination diet, many “tricks of the trade”, oils, healthy eating, gluten free, gobs of eczema lotions, the infamous coconut oil, water, water, water – nada, no healing, nothing. Since the end of January 2017, his skin has miraculously cleared up. My mom reminded me the other day, that around the the new year 2017 Gary had prayed “Lord please take this from my son, I wish I could take it, because I would. In Jesus Name, Amen” Now, I took this recent clear picture of Grant Friday March 24, 2017 because I was so grateful to see his eyes sparkling. I still don’t know everything, but I know Grant has been changed in and through it and so have we. The peace and joy Grant had in the midst astounded us – a sure testimony of God’s presence and comfort in his life! Now, in the process of Grant’s healing, Gary already had the cancer growing we just weren’t aware, but has since been diagnosed on Feb 13, 2017 – and I can’t help but imagine when Gary spoke that prayer to The Lord, His response and wisdom of God saying yes I know that’s your hearts desire and it’s coming but I will walk you through this Gary, My Son. Oh to wonder and know Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and His Sovereign Hand over all. Until we meet Jesus we will never know the full truth to all of that and most likely by that glorious time we will not care one iota. But Ohhhhh to Glory in the sufferings of Jesus, to experience such a thing! There is no greater Love – He best uses us in our weakness (in fact when we think we are strong, well, we are delusional), when we truly know our dependence on Him – In Christ’s weakest hour He performed His most glorious work. I always look at the cross when I think of life and how fair the world thinks it should be. I’m sorry but There was Nothing fair about Christ’s brutal crucifixion, and when we fix our eyes on Him, there is nothing we can’t endure because Jesus alone is worth it. And God awesomely delights in breaking the generational chains of sins bondage.

I Love acronyms so I made one up for cancer –
Christ
Always
Nails
Crucifixion
Every
Resurrection

Last Sunday March 19th, God’s church laid hands on Gary and The Spirit in me has not stopped rejoicing since being witness to The Power of The Holy Spirit in and through His people. And because of the love poured out through prayer by many onto my husband, it has strengthened us in our faith, drawn us closer to one another, and given Gary the ability to Be Still and Know that He is God. Huge Gift! After not being able to eat and keep anything down for 5 weeks (the cancer tumor had completely blocked the esophagus hole leading to the stomach) – through the prayers and chemo – God has used it all for His Glory – massively shrinking and shriveling it up to allow Gary to enjoy food (in small bites and doses). He is grateful and giving God the Glory. Additionally, Our small business is not only being sustained by God Himself, but it is thriving (without Gary there day in and day out), praying, and the GMS team that He prepared in advance for this journey is loyal, committed, God centered and doing AMAZING.

Please do not stop praying. It is by His grace we have been given a tremendous privilege to join Christ in His Ways. And don’t stop reaching out, I truly believe that the people we think are “good” or “look good” on the outside are the ones that need it most – that is the lie the world would have us believe, that we are strong and independent – when the Truth is, we were created to be dependent on God and we, the church, desperately need to help people see that that is exactly why we desperately needed a Savior.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjNZf878ISQ