Escaping Wrath

Well, well, well.

There was a little party in the last chemo room at the Stephanie Spielman Cancer Center today.  No wine, no champagne but it was a little celebration none the less.  My white blood cells pumped up to a mighty (at least for me lately) 3.8.  (norms are 4.5 - 11.0)  I am still low, but it's enough to get me back into treatment. 

My red blood cell count was a whomping 3.4 (norms are 3.8 - 5.1), but again, high enough to get me back in.  My hemoglobin is a tad low, along with my HCT, but it was all much higher than the last 6 weeks.....

And this is the magic formula that they look at every week - the 'Grans, Absolute' line on that lab printout that can crush my life or give me a possible cure.  It came in at an incredible - and I repeat incredible - 1.8 (norms are 1.8 -7.7).   

That one hit the "norms".  We might have been close to needing oxygen - it was a little unexpected. 

They like it to be 1.5 for chemo, they let us slide in at 1.0 if needed - which I have done a few times - so looking at a 1.8 after a sobering .7 last week, and a "close to hospitalization" .3 the week before that - is just like walking on the first star that shows up at night.  

Nurses stopped in to say "Yay!" and raise their hands up to lift the roof, and we were all pretty happy, steroid pre-treatment aside and all. 

Scott also reminded me at least 57 times that I got two -- repeat two -- "VERY VERYs" out of Dr. Mrowzik today.  As in, after she examined me I asked a little tentatively "are you pleased?"  and she said "I am very, very pleased".  

Big smile. 

The low point of the day -if there was any except for the stop-and-go traffic on 315 (three people at the center told me today that when it rains, folks in Columbus just melt down and traffic stops..... which surprised me), but, the new wary-eye-on-the-lab-printout is my monocyte line.  They failed to come down.

But Scarlett, tomorrow is another day.

I even got a "pass" to go out this weekend to celebrate Passover and Easter if I am up to it.  Holy, holy, holy, Lord God almighty.  I think I have possible appointments with a Seder plate and an Easter egg hunt with five little sweet girls.  

I am marveling at the power of a community of prayer, to use an old Christian cliche, but I am still marveling. 

So I had my little "vacay" and now it's back to work.  Or, I just landed in a C130 in enemy territory and it's time to get my boots back on the ground and become serious again about this fight.  And might I just say after our early drive to Columbus today, I have nothing, nothing, but extreme admiration for any soldier home on furlough getting back on that plane in the USA to step off some 30 hours later in a faraway land that hates them and simply wants them dead.

I don't know how they do it - I played a video game and listened to a purposely very loud CD about the crucifixion of Jesus the Christ - and I still wasn't sure my feet were going to move out of the car onto the pavement when we got there.

And with this being the week that we celebrate and remember Jesus' death and his resurrection - may I just say - I don't know how He did it.   The CD talked about how maybe Jesus wept and sweat blood in the garden because possibly in His humanness He had an "abrupt realization" that He was not only the lamb sacrifice - but that He was also taking on the wrath of God - with His death.  It was all interesting and actually helped me tremendously. 

A lot of people have suffered a lot more than me, and remembering that at times, horribly, sadly helps.  But I am so thankful for a Savior that has loved me no matter what; has forgiven me when I have been sinful to the point of not barely being redeemable; and I also follow One that has healing in His wings. 

He took God's Cup of Wrath on Himself for me.  If what I am experiencing can be a little, little bit compared to God's wrath - a picture of how sin can take hold and grow and do great damage in your life - and if suffering is sometimes a picture of God's wrath - what He did for me, for us, is beyond words. 

I am truly at a loss of words.  If you have any interest whatsoever, below is some of his audio that can be released - not the lesson I heard him teach last year on the "Cup of Wrath" - but it's a good reminder of what He went through for us.

I think about what has happened with me - the embarrassment, the turning of heads to look at me twice when people haven't seen me for a while or the three times I have snuck into a store - the realization that I am grossly out of place, I don't fit, I don't look like everyone else - that has not bothered me before, but when you are the main "look" in any given place, it's a bit uncomfortable, and I just want to get away.

He was stripped naked and beat to the point of death - and hung on a cross at eye level with the same people He had come to teach that mocked Him and spit spit on Him. 

The pain and not only the pain, but like today, the knowing that you are going to one place to be given pain by choice, by need - how did He do that?

I think longingly of the loved ones that I am not able to see for a very long time - to miss Baby Evelyn Fridays.  To have little Millie-bean look at me and say "I miss you so much Grammum" and then she added most sincerely "I can stay with you all weekend!!??" with a huge hopeful smile and a question in her voice - and I have to say no.  And Addy and Chloe and Zoe all say it and they have no idea how much I miss them; and I think how His heart hurt so over His earthly relationships.

If Passover is a reminder about sin and freedom and being happy remembering what great things God did for His people; then remembering Jesus' horrid flogging and the crucifixion and His ultimate defeat of death is Passover squared by like 100 gazillion.

And because of that, I escape the Wrath of God.

The God that told them to remember the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread and to use it to take a look at sin in your life and get rid of it, is the same God that did awesome things to bring us freedom again. 

It's all one story.  

I don't have words for that.  Jesus walked His whole life with His eye on the cross - did He watch crucifixions when younger and know what He was in for?  And I can barely make my feet move and get out of the car for a painful help and cure of sorts? 

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The "Flogging" audio should not be listened to with small children around - it's pretty graphic - but I kind of relate to 'graphic' and embarrassment and hurt these days.  But it is nothing in comparison.  Nothing.  I am saved from God's wrath - I may suffer and may hurt - but the God of Moses and the God that Jesus taught us about, has saved me from that wrath.

I cannot explain it like a learned Christian-Rabbi, so here is the link if you have interest.  

http://www.followtherabbi.com/guide/detail/the-death-and-resurrection-of-christ