Faith stronger than fear

When my daughter almost died due to leukaemia and was undergoing dialysis due to organ failure, 

I was overcome with fear and sadness. So much so that my legs gave way under me and I slid down the wall 

of the small tea room where I was making a drink to assauge my weakness. And to pray. 

As soon as I made my way to a seat in the ICU waiting room, I felt a peace wash over me like a cloak    around my shoulders. 

I knew that she was going to pull through- which she did and I still can remember the feeling of            faithful assurance and peace that defied the situation.

Give your cares  to Jesus and feel His peace in your life. No matter what the situation. Let your faith    become stronger than your fear.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through          Christ Jesus.  Philippians 4:7

I love being mistress of my home

Over the years I have spent a lot of time in hospitals with Scheuermann's disease, a spinal disease which caused bad back problems. Whilst spending 2 weeks at a time in traction, flat on my back and unable to move at all, the days would drag out so slowly and my thoughts would naturally turn to home.

In the morning, I would look at my watch and note that it was time for my children to be getting ready for school and I would wonder if their father or grandmother had everything under control and if the children were buying their lunch at the school canteen or taking a cut lunch. Were they missing me? I missed them. Terribly. And as I felt my eyes fill, I knew that I would give anything to be with them, looking after my own household.

Now this was a strange thing to think because I have to be honest and say that I often had suffered from a dislike of homemaking in my younger years and I can remember saying on occasion that I would rather be working outside the home than being trapped there, doing endless loads of washing and changing little bottoms, wiping little noses and washing floors!

But as the long weeks dragged on, punctuated only by bedpans and meals, I realised that life has a way of making us think of those things that truly matter. And as I watched the nurse close the drapes, heralding another long night of snoring patients and torchlight visits by nurses checking on my legs and feet, my heart would almost break longing to be home in my own bed surrounded by my family.

I would fall asleep dreaming and planning of changes that I would make as soon as I got home- ways that I could be a better wife, mother and homemaker. And as soon as the nurse came in at 7am throwing the drapes apart and bringing in the morning medications, my mind would turn to planning new homemaking schedules and better routines and I would find myself pining to be mistress of my home once again.

Sometimes I think God brings things into our lives so that we may learn from them. In my case, my enforced bed rest made me re-evaluate my life and realise that I had the best of life already. Until my back problems, I didn’t really enjoy my role as homemaker- I loved being a wife and mother- but housework- forget it! It took a few bouts of traction to get me to be still long enough to really consider that which is truly important.

And as I finally healed of the disease that ate away all the discs in my lower back, I not only regained my physical strength, but my spiritual strength and I realised that you never know what you have, until it’s gone. For God not only healed my back, but my attitudes. I resumed my homemaking duties with gusto and enthusiasm. I was thankful for the valuable lesson learned-that I love being mistress of my home!

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

So teach [us] to number our days, that we may apply [our] hearts unto wisdom.  Psalm 90:12

Let your faith become stronger than your fear.

 

When my daughter almost died due to leukaemia and was undergoing dialysis due to organ failure, I was overcome with fear and sadness. So much so that my legs gave way under me and I slid down the wall of the small tea room whre I was making a drink to assauge my weakness. And to pray. 

As soon as I made my way to a seat in the ICU waiting room, I felt a peace wash over me like a coak around my shoulders. 

I knew that she was going to pull through- which she did and I still can remember the feeling of faithful assurance and peace that defied the situation.

Give your cares  to Jesus and feel His peace in your life. No matter what the situation. Let your faith become stronger than your fear.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.  Philippians 4:7

There's no other way!

No matter how badly you mess up or how hurt you are. No matter how confused or how sick you are- when you give your broken life to God.

He will help. heal. guide. love. forgive. restore. honour. love. and give you a reason to be glad that you are alive and His Child.

Why would you not give your brokenness to God to heal? after all, He created you in the depths of your mother's womb..

Don't run from the One Who loves you warts and all. Don't delay but run to Him now. Let Him fix your life. 

Come as you are- there's no other way! 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

" For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope." Jeremiah 29:11 

I couldn't live with myself

 

I have been grappling with writing what's on my heart lately. As a deep thinker, I ponder daily on what I feel God wants me to write about in this blog. I try to encourage and edify, but I know that sometimes what I speak of upsets some people.

As I looked at myself in the mirror today, I saw a woman whose life is spent mostly on studying the Word of God, praying and blogging in between bouts of chronic illness. It's all I can do now.

Writing's been a passion of mine for the last 30 years after three separate pastors at different services prophesied over me, saying that God has appointed me to be a spokesperson- actually the word was "mouthpiece" for Him throughout the world.

I really took this to heart and started writing Christian personalised verse and self published a book of poetry called "In Spirit And In Truth". It sold at various Christian bookstores, but somehow this didn't seem the way that I was meant to go...

With the advent of the internet, I started blogging and that and writing for various Christian magazines have become my form of service to God. As the blogs and articles circulated, I realised that that was where the "throughout the world" part of the prophecies were coming from...

Apart from obeying God by writing, I realised that I burn with the desire to see the lost being saved and that I do indeed love people. Christian or not. Coloured or not. 

As I combed my hair, I realised that I must write more of Christ and His offer of salvation than focus on our many illnesses and the Corona Virus. Times are short.

I know some who read may take offence, but please recall that I do so out of love and nothing personal to gain. I want you to be saved from the imminent wrath of God for people who prefer to live in their sin than to repent and serve God.

This world is getting darker and very soon Jesus will be taking the Church- His Bride, to be with Him. This is known as the Rapture and only believers will go. 

My prayer is that you will go with us and not be left on this earth which is going to be hell on earth. I need to say it, before it's too late. 

I don't want you to be offended, but saved. God doesn't want anyone to go to Hell, and neither do I. Times are short as I said and we have millenia of prophecies that have come true  to uphold this.

One must be saved or born-again to get to Heaven. Jesus is the only way and that choice must be made personally and voluntarily. Either we accept Jesus and go to Heaven, or we go to Hell.

I have written this post for those who as yet aren't born again, because if I didn't warn you, I couldn't live with myself.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God? Micah 6:8

Hanging on by a thread revisited

We chronically ill women always have times when we feel that we are barely holding it all together. We are literally becoming unravelled and we feel like we are hanging on by a thread.

Flares, unrelenting pain, immeasurable fatigue, depression and lack of restorative sleep can all add to the feeling that we can't go on. Even breathing seems like an effort.

It is in those times that we must reach out to God and ask Him to give us the strength to get through each day- or especially the night which seems the longest when we long to sleep but can't.

We need to try to listen to the Word or put on some Christian worship music, and give ourselves over to relaxing as much as is possible for someone in the grip of pain or depression. But we have to focus on something positive, or else we will be getting a one way to the Pit of Despair. We don't want to go there.

By focusing on something positive, we can actually release endorphins, those chemicals that reduce pain and increase a feeling of well-being. 

Reaching out to God during these times is critical to our staying in control emotionally. But we must do it, in faith.

If the woman with the issue of blood hadn't reached out to Jesus by touching the hem of His garment, she would not have been healed.

I am not necessarily saying that you will get healed, even though it is possible of course. But you will be lifted up to a higher level of coping with it all.

Worship and praising God whilst suffering is the most exquisitely beautiful act of trust and reverence. It will lift us up and set the enemy of our souls to flight.

So, next time you are feeling you are hanging by a thread, make sure it's the hem of Christ's garment.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And suddenly, a woman who had a flow of blood for twelve years came from behind and touched the hem of His garment. Matthew 9.20

We are the Church!

 

It is no light thing to say that even unbelievers are saying the world is coming to an end: it certainly is a time of darkness and fear. 

It hasn't taken God by surprise and He hasn't kept it secret that in the end times before He comes for us, His Church, His Bride, that troublesome times will come.

We have church meetings cancelled as well as secular events in an attempt to curtail the spread of this virus. It is as if Satan wants to stop the Word of God being preached and of people being within ear shot if it is.

What he forgets is that WE Christians are the Church. It's not a building or hall. It's every true believer. His Holy Spirit dwells in us and there is no way God's Word will be silenced.

Let us pray for boldness and anointing to preach and speak the Word. How can we from home? you ask. By posting uplifting pictures with scripture.  By blogging about God if you blog. By posting of Christ in your Face Book groups.

Let us be Christ's Hands and Mouth and turn this evil pandemic into the biggest opportunity in recent times of reaching the lost for Jesus!

Make no mistake: we are in the end times and the next event on the Christian calendar is the Rapture! We want to take as many as possible with us, but it depends on us as Christ's Church and Bride to continue to live fearless lives and preach the Word. We are not the Holy Spirit, but we can have people hear the Word that plants the seed for the Holy Spirit to work in their hearts.

Rise up, both normal and chroncially ill believers and proclaim in any way you can that Jesus is coming soon. We may be ill, but we are faithful! A faithful Bride and Church of Jesus! 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

He that loveth his wife loveth himself. For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church: For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. Ephesians 5:23-30

Taken for granted

And so another week of being at home is upon us. The future is uncertain and looks a bit grim. However, there are some things surfacing out of this that are good.

There is a growing awareness of the value of living life intentionally.  Because the Corona Virus is no respecter of age or gender and can be so easily acquired, there is a deeper awareness that tomorrow is not guaranteed. Life is not taken for granted any more.

Our families that live with us may get on our nerves during the isolation, but with it comes a bond or connection to each other as we brave this outbreak.

Social media and mobile phones have been great in bringing us closer in communication, but this isolation has created in most of us a longing for physical contact with those who do not live with us. There is nothing like a hug, and kiss or a hold of the hand.

There has been a greater appreciation of the first responders who truly risk their lives to keep us or our loved ones alive if they contract the virus. They are to be honoured above all others. No longer taken for granted: they are the epitomy of servanthood and sacrifice.

The chance to revive family ties or marriages is here with no work to keep us apart, and intimacy both in marriage and with the parenting relationship have the opportunity to thrive. The family is no longer taken for granted.  Nor is love. 

So much is changing, but as at Easter, traditional worship was replaced by streamed online services, and social distancing when at the chemist or supermarket are enforced: helping life retain some normalcy and stability.

Rona has forced the whole world to stop and reassess and has found us guilty. Guilty of believing life would just continue as it was and largely taken for granted. 

There is so much negativity brought on by this virus, but one thing is positive from all of this: we will never again take our freedom, our worship, our family or our friends for granted.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

"So teach [us] to number our days, that we may apply [our] hearts unto wisdom" Psalm 90:12

No longer taken for granted

And so another week of being at home is upon us. The future is uncertain and looks a bit grim. However, there are some things surfacing out of this that are good.

There is a growing awareness of the value of living life intentionally.  Because the Corona Virus is no respecter of age or gender and can be so easily acquired, there is a deeper awareness that tomorrow is not guaranteed. Life is not taken for granted any more.

Our families that live with us may get on our nerves during the isolation, but with it comes a bond or connection to each other as we brave this outbreak.

Social media and mobile phones have been great in bringing us closer in communication, but this isolation has created in most of us a longing for physical contact with those who do not live with us. There is nothing like a hug, and kiss or a hold of the hand.

There has been a greater appreciation of the first responders who truly risk their lives to keep us or our loved ones alive if they contract the virus. They are to be honoured above all others. No longer taken for granted: they are the epitomy of servanthood and sacrifice.

The chance to revive family ties or marriages is here with no work to keep us apart, and intimacy both in marriage and with the parenting relationship have the opportunity to thrive. The family is no longer taken for granted.  Nor is love. 

So much is changing, but as at Easter, traditional worship was replaced by streamed online services, and social distancing when at the chemist or supermarket are enforced: helping life retain some normalcy and stability.

Rona has forced the whole world to stop and reassess and has found us guilty. Guilty of believing life would just continue as it was and largely taken for granted. 

There is so much negativity brought on by this virus, but one thing is positive from all of this: we will never again take our freedom, our worship, our family or our friends for granted.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

"So teach [us] to number our days, that we may apply [our] hearts unto wisdom" Psalm 90:12

When you're hanging on by a thread

We chronically ill women always have times when we feel that we are barely holding it all together. We are literally becoming unravelled and we feel like we are hanging on by a thread.

Flares, unrelenting pain, immeasurable fatigue, depression and lack of restorative sleep can all add to the feeling that we can't go on. Even breathing seems like an effort.

It is in those times that we must reach out to God and ask Him to give us the strength to get through each day- or especially the night which seems the longest when we long to sleep but can't.

We need to try to listen to the Word or put on some Christian worship music, and give ourselves over to relaxing as much as is possible for someone in the grip of pain or depression. But we have to focus on something positive, or else we will be getting a one way to the Pit of Despair. We don't want to go there.

By focusing on something positive, we can actually release endorphins, those chemicals that reduce pain and increase a feeling of well-being. 

Reaching out to God during these times is critical to our staying in control emotionally. But we must do it, in faith.

If the woman with the issue of blood hadn't reached out to Jesus by touching the hem of His garment, she would not have been healed.

I am not necessarily saying that you will get healed, even though it is possible of course. But you will be lifted up to a higher level of coping with it all.

Worship and praising God whilst suffering is the most exquisitely beautiful act of trust and reverence. It will lift us up and set the enemy of our souls to flight.

So, next time you are feeling you are hanging by a thread, make sure it's the hem of Christ's garment.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And suddenly, a woman who had a flow of blood for twelve years came from behind and touched the hem of His garment. Matthew 9.20

Dying for a hug

 

Ever since childhood, I have been a person who loves close contact. I needed to be loved, but sadly that was something that I longed for, but never received as a child, then as a young adult.

Now nearly 70 years old, I have been diagnosed with depression, post traumatic stress disorder, panic disorder and fibromyalgia, to which there is a link with childhood abuse. 

Like trying to lose weight after taking medications for hyothyroidism, my current happy marriage and constant hugs and demonstrative affection, has not been able to erradicate the damage that was done in my childhood.

Open affection was something denied to me until I left my abusive husband after 25 years of hell and met Chris. During the 4 years between leaving my ex husband and meeting and marrying Chris, I felt so very alone.

I was never alone, not even in the womb, and being solo was strange and difficult for me. I was enveloped by a loneliness that draped itself around my shoulders like a wet soggy cloak of despair.

The only physical contact I had was at church, where we passed the peace, hugged our friends and received a chaste kiss on the cheek. I lived for that brief time every week.

I have read of an experiment that denied newborns affection, and each of the babies died. Perhaps this lack of affection was something that effected adults too. I know it was a big part in my becoming pregnant at 16, taken in by a man who told me he loved me. He started his abuse as soon as the ink dried on the marriage certificate and still continued (long distance) even after the ink dried on the divorce papers.

It is a blessing that Chris knows all my past and understands me, for even today I cannot bear to be outside at night. This is due to the fact that we often had to vacate our warm beds in the early hours of the morning with Dad chasing us in a drunken state, throwing beer bottles at us as we fled. Once it gets night, I feel anxious if I am not home and settled.

I am talking to you about this not for pity but a warning that hugs, kisses, cuddles, affectionate voices and other demonstrations of love is critical for a child's development. To give a child a happy childhood peppered with demonstrations of love and oodles of hugs is the best thing you can give them- more important than expensive toys.

During this enforced staying at home, let's make an effort to be demonstrative in our affections. Let's hug our children often, hold hands with our husband and nurture the need for touch and feeling loved.

"But what if my husband is not the affectionate sort?" you ask. Love him anyway, even if he is surprised by it. It will benefit not only your marriage, but your children. And who knows, you might even find that underneath the hesitation to show affection, he is starved for it, and is dying for a hug.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

Titus 2:4-5 “That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children. To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.”

Travelling on the path of illness

It's amazing how when you aren't chronically ill how you take so many things for granted. Things like getting in and out of a bath, taking a shower, even toileting when your back is in spasm, bending forward to clean your teeth, standing at the kitchen sink, wiping benches in the kitchen, sweeping the floor or simply bending to pick something up....

It once was an easy task to climb up and down stairs, get on and off trams or buses, walk to the letterbox and push a shopping trolley around the supermarket. Not any more...

Everything we do has to be measured up and spoons metered out before a task is actually done. It certainly impinges on our spontaneity. For us, there usually are lots of ramifications when we have tried to be spontaneous. Pain and more of it!..

Once when we went to bed, we would expect to go straight to sleep, have pleasant dreams and wake up refreshed. Now we often watch the clock go round, drift off if we are lucky and dream of pain as we toss and turn in our sleep, only to wake up feeling like a truck has hit us.

Normals would probably view our hesitancy to do a task as procrastination or laziness, and before becoming a Sacrificial Home Keeper or chronically ill woman, I would have as well... but we simply are adapting to our new normal...

When our illness is invisible like fibromyalgia for instance, we just want to be respected and understood, but inevitably, we are judged. Especially so if we have become overweight because of illness...  it is us who suffer from guilt (false guilt really) that unkind judges of our body put upon us. This invariably leads to depression and overeating in an effort to gain energy to move more, or simply for comfort.

I am just so glad that God knows exactly what is in our heart and understands. He knows our frame and we are loved unconditionally- and this is so comforting to us who only know scathing remarks and criticism in this fallen world we are travelling through on the path of illness.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

The LORD will strengthen him on his bed of illness; You will sustain him on his sickbed. Psalm 41:3

We are His faithful Bride!

So much is happening worldwide right now with nearly every country impacted with the Corona Virus. 

Most countries are being put under lockdown but that doesn't preclude us from reaching out to each other via the internet and phone.

It is no light thing to say that even unbelievers are saying the world is coming to an end: it certainly is a time of darkness and fear. 

It hasn't taken God by surprise and He hasn't kept it secret that in the end times before He comes for us, His Church, His Bride, that troublesome times will come.

We have church meetings cancelled as well as secular events in an attempt to curtail the spread of this virus. It is as if Satan wants to stop the Word of God being preached and of people being within ear shot if it is.

What he forgets is that WE Christians are the Church. It's not a building or hall. It's every true believer. His Holy Spirit dwells in us and there is no way God's Word will be silenced.

Let us pray for boldness and anointing to preach and speak the Word. How can we from home? you ask. By posting uplifting pictures with scripture.  By blogging about God if you blog. By posting of Christ in your Face Book groups.

Let us be Christ's Hands and Mouth and turn this evil pandemic into the biggest opportunity in recent times of reaching the lost for Jesus!

Make no mistake: we are in the end times and the next event on the Christian calendar is the Rapture! We want to take as many as possible with us, but it depends on us as Christ's Church and Bride to continue to live fearless lives and preach the Word. We are not the Holy Spirit, but we can have people hear the Word that plants the seed for the Holy Spirit to work in their hearts.

Rise up, both normal and chronically ill believers and proclaim in any way you can that Jesus is coming soon. We may be ill, but we are faithful! A faithful Bride and Church of Jesus! 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

He that loveth his wife loveth himself. For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church: For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. Ephesians 5:23-30

It's not every day...

Over the last thirty years I have suffered from over fifty bi-lateral kidney stones. Sometimes after waiting agonising weeks, they would pass, but five times I required surgery to remove them.  At one time, I had surgery twice in a month. It is the most painful of pains and surgery.

At each occasion, no one seemed interested in finding out why I made them, and didn't send them off to be analysed. I was miserable and lived in fear of the onset of back pain which signalled a stone was coming. Of course, being in traction for my back two weeks at a time didn't help matters. I always seemed to get a stone after being in hospital.

Fed up, after passing a charming 6mm jagged stone, I changed doctors and at last I found one who was curious to know why I kept making them. He kept the stone I showed him and sent it off for analysis. But better yet, he sent me to see a kidney specialist who was at the time associated with our local hospital in Dandenong.

The renal specialist was Margot McIver, a very approachable older lady, who became a pioneer in renal medicine in Australia.  Margot spent a lot of the consultation questioning me about my health. She was interested that I had an identical twin. Then she noticed my maiden name,  her interest was piqued. 

Chalkley was a name that rang a bell with her. In her training days at the Queen Victoria Hospital Melbourne, she was treating my mother during our birth. Mum had pre-eclampsia and uterine inertia plus a bad kidney infection. She remembered our hurried delivery by high forceps- we were lying transverse and were both breech. She said she was in the observation gallery for trainee doctors and remembered it well. She said our birth was complicated and she learned a lot from her teacher doctor.

Margot was the only doctor ever to offer condolences for the still born twin girls I had given birth to in 1969 and to venture an opinion on the cause of their death in utero. Her opinion was an untreated kidney infection took their lives. Very common in multiple pregnancies, she said.

She had me do many blood tests and 24 hour samples of urine and later went on to diagnose me with calcium oxylate stones in uric acid. I was given allopurinol to reduce the uric acid in my blood and so give the calcium oxylate nothing to bind with. I have had no stones since taking it....

I was sad to read of her death in Queensland in 2012 at age 78 . She would have been the same age as my mother...

Margot will always be remembered for her compassionate and caring manner as well as medical expertise. I was amazed that I got to meet the doctor who looked after my mother and watched my birth at the training hospital. She touched me lightly on the arm as she said goodbye at my last visit and voiced what I had been thinking, "It was lovely to meet you: who would have thought?... it's not every day...!" 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

 So teach [us] to number our days, that we may apply [our] hearts unto wisdom.  Psalm 90:12

I couldn't live with myself

I have been grappling with writing what's on my heart lately. As a deep thinker, I ponder daily on what I feel God wants me to write about in this blog. I try to encourage and edify, but I know that sometimes what I speak of upsets some people.

As I looked at myself in the mirror today, I saw a woman whose life is spent mostly on studying the Word of God, praying and blogging in between bouts of chronic illness. It's all I can do now.

Writing's been a passion of mine for the last 30 years after three separate pastors at different services prophesied over me, saying that God has appointed me to be a spokesperson- actually the word was "mouthpiece" for Him throughout the world.

I really took this to heart and started writing Christian personalised verse and self published a book of poetry called "In Spirit And In Truth". It sold at various Christian bookstores, but somehow this didn't seem the way that I was meant to go...

With the advent of the internet, I started blogging and that and writing for various Christian magazines have become my form of service to God. As the blogs and articles circulated, I realised that that was where the "throughout the world" part of the prophecies were coming from...

Apart from obeying God by writing, I realised that I burn with the desire to see the lost being saved and that I do indeed love people. Christian or not. Coloured or not. 

As I combed my hair, I realised that I must write more of Christ and His offer of salvation than focus on our many illnesses and the Corona Virus. Times are short.

I know some who read may take offence, but please recall that I do so out of love and nothing personal to gain. I want you to be saved from the imminent wrath of God for people who prefer to live in their sin than to repent and serve God.

This world is getting darker and very soon Jesus will be taking the Church- His Bride, to be with Him. This is known as the Rapture and only believers will go. 

My prayer is that you will go with us and not be left on this earth which is going to be hell on earth. I need to say it, before it's too late. 

I don't want you to be offended, but saved. God doesn't want anyone to go to Hell, and neither do I. Times are short as I said and we have millenia of prophecies that have come true  to uphold this.

One must be saved or born-again to get to Heaven. Jesus is the only way and that choice must be made personally and voluntarily. Either we accept Jesus and go to Heaven, or we go to Hell.

I have written this post for those who as yet aren't born again, because if I didn't warn you, I couldn't live with myself.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God? Micah 6:8

So grateful tonight

So I have lit the lamps and drawn our drapes. The air outside is cold but our home is warm. The smell of cooking still hangs in the air: a fragrant reminder of a lovely meal eaten in quiet enjoyment.

We watch the flames of our fire and give in to reflection of the day. It has been a good day. With full tummies and grateful hearts, we hold hands and talk. There is contentment in our hearts and words.

Outside we have people in the front lines of health and security- police, doctors, ambulance workers in essential fields of service that ensure our well being and standard of living are taken care of. They are heroes.

But the peace inside our home is closely guarded as we turn off endless news programs and feeds in social media of conspiracy theories and death tolls and predictions regarding the Corona Virus. 

We know they are there, but they are not welcome in our home. Our thoughts are brought into the captivity of Christ. We think only of that which is true and good.

As we prepare to retire soon, we are grateful for electric blankets and soft pillows and even for the little cat who loves to snuggle with her family. So many the world over are living in fear of death from this virus, and many are homeless. We are blessed.

As I hold Chris's hand, I am grateful for the absence of violence in my life, for many are living in a place that isn't safe and this isolation for them is far more than inconvenient: it is dangerous.

We invite the Holy Spirit to fill our home, and I refuse to allow anxiety to weigh my heart and mind down: God has us in His Hand and even if I were to contract Rona, He would do what He wills with me.  I am ready to go Home in illness or in the imminent Rapture.

Tonight, when I turn off my bedside lamp to go to sleep, I will say what I say every time before I go to sleep or under the knife in surgery: "Father, into Your Hands I commit my spirit!" 

And I will fall asleep knowing that God has all things under control. I am so grateful tonight! 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.  Philippians 4:7

Fibro gets personal

Fibromyalgia has us unsure of where exactly our body is hurting, but for some of us, pain isn't the only symptom we have. There is one other that vies for our attention: itch!

My body itches everywhere.... my face is so itchy that I scratch at it until it bleeds. I use a ruler to scratch my shoulders, back and nape.

Sometimes in the morning my nails have blood under them where I have scratched my scalp. For this reason, I cannot get my grey hair dyed as I would get chemicals in my scalp.

Tags on my clothes cause me to itch unbearably so I cut them off. My hair blowing on my face or neck drives me insane with itch, so I keep my hair very short these days.

After all these twenty plus years of suffering with fibromyalgia, it has now gotten very personal. Very. And I have spoken to a few women I know well enough to ask, and who have fibro and they all agree that it has progressed from what we all discuss to now becoming very personal. You could say: intimate.

We have found that regardless of whether we have just showered or bathed, we suffer intense itching in our personal areas. 

So intense is this itch that it wakes us up and whips us into an itching frenzy. We are not satisfied until we have scratched ourselves raw.

Likewise, under our overhang on our lower abdomen, we have itch that drives us insane as well. And irregardless of hygiene- we have itching in the groins and back of the legs where the leg joins the groin.

It seems that fibromyalgia is a syndrome that annoys one to the inth degree and delights in attacking every phase and aspect of our life and body.

It gives one a new found compassion for the poor dog scraping itself along the ground with extreme personal itch.  One can relate.  Nothing gets more personal than fibro! 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

Beloved, I pray that you may prosper in all things and be in health, just as your soul prospers. 3 John 1:2

His Cloak of Peace

When my youngest child, Dianne had Acute promyelocytic leukaemia, she was dangerously ill and in ICU three times. At one stage her kidneys were failing. Her body was shutting down. 

They put her on dialysis three times and it was touch and go that she would make it through. You can imagine how I felt when they said they thought she was far too deteriorated to make it.

Naturally, I was asked to leave the ICU whilst they hooked her up, and to be honest, I just wanted to be alone. So I went down to the tea room for the patients and their family. 

It suddenly hit me that I may never see Dianne alive again, and the horror of the last few weeks during which she was on chemo and reacted violently to it, overtook me and I cried.

Slumping down in the corner of the tiny tea room, I gave my daughter to God. He had every right to take her Home, but being a mother, I asked Him to spare her.

Goodness knows, Dianne was only 35 years old, a wife, and mother to three young children. She was needed here. Although she was a Christian and I knew she would be with the LORD, I wanted her here with me.

I prayed fervently, agreeing that whatever be His Will for her, that He was God. It was worse than the despair I felt when I gave birth to still born twin girls at 32 weeks. Up until then, I thought that was the worst thing that I had experienced. But I was wrong. Losing Dianne was something I couldn't endure. 

Still slumped in the corner, I was overwhelmed with a peace that didn't make sense. Here we were in an emotional hell on earth, with Dianne's life hanging in the balance, and I was calm.

It was like a cloak of peace had been placed around my shoulders. It warmed me by routing the fear and it exuded a calm that permeated to my marrow.  I knew it was the peace that passes all human understanding that God promises to us.

Because I was calm, I found my legs could still carry me- they were giving way to me in the tea room. I returned to the ICU where Dianne was on the dialysis. 

I sat willing her to breathe and watching her breathing as if the very act  was too tiring for her. I kissed her hand and silently prayed whilst she slept.

Three days later, she was being taught to walk again on the floor of the ICU and her kidney function was restored.  Today, she is in remission for five years. They say it is extremely unlikely she will get APML back again...

This ordeal has shown me that we do have a Saviour Who is very involved in His childrens' lives. He is a good Father Who comforts His children when all else fails.

If Dianne had been called Home, I would not have lost faith in Him. But mercifully, He allowed her to live. 

The warmth of the Peace He gave me in my most extreme anguished pain, is proof to me that He is a God of His Word. He truly gives us peace that is beyond understanding.

Call on the LORD in your own anguish and see that He is a caring and compassionate Father.  There's nothing like His Cloak of Peace around your shoulders.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.  Philippians 4:7