Hope’s not the scapegoat
So often I feel like Hope gets a bad rap. When we decide to pray for something avidly, and then it does not come to pass in the way that we see fit… Our Hope takes it on the chin. I cannot tell you how often I have felt, this exact phenomenon occurring in my own life. As I have walked through the valley of the shadow of death in the last 3 and a half to 4 years, I have asked so many of you to pray for me so many times. I have shouldered the burden, that if those prayers don’t get answered the way that I think that we’ve prayed, I fear sharing what the update is. I am not God… This is not my will that I want done… It is only His… And I trust his plan.
All of that being said, I’d like to finally give you all an update about how surgery number six went. It has been nearly 4 weeks since the procedure to extract multiple nerve roots from my knee capsule. Mentally and emotionally, I felt like I had so much on the line with this particular surgery. I had so much invested in it being a perfect procedure… And one that I felt Would catapult me into 2024, where I saw myself actually running on a treadmill by the summer of 2024. While I do not know if that Vision is still one that will come to pass, what I do know is that we made progress, but there is still a road to be traveled.
I like to explain, and describe things in a bit of a metaphorical way. Often, I feel like words can convolute the exact specificity that is needed for true for understanding. That being said, this is the best way that I can explain surgery number six and its success, and its opportunities. Imagine you took a Silverdollar and you inserted it into your knee sideways in between the top part of your leg and the bottom part of your leg. That silver dollar area represents pain and in that pain you experience what feels like shards of broken glass, stabbing you when you walk. That is what I experienced for the first three years of this ordeal. Surgery number five cleared out about 60% of that glass. That still left about 40% of that area in excruciating pain. Surgery number six addressed probably another 25 to 30% of that area of pain. Progress. However… Imagine 10 to 15% of that glass still left in your knee. tough to deal with. Although progress has been made. Not to mention the infection in the incision area that I’m still fighting to this day.
Of course, I wanted it to be 100% free of the pain of walking. Free of the pain of weight-bearing. Unfortunately, that is not the case, even though I am making progress. The other issues that I have been afflicted with, due to my inability to walk correctly for almost 4 years, still need quite a bit of attention. I am still on the road to recovery. I will still run again. I still have faith that every single thing that I have gone through in the last four years is for the good of those who trust Him, and are called to his purpose. I still know that I will be healed.
I sincerely thank you if you have prayed for me. God has heard every single prayer that we’ve uttered. Every single one will come to fruition. Although my emotion and my mental took a hit in the last few weeks… my spirit is still strong. My faith in God is unshaken. I don’t even try to understand what he’s got going on anymore… But I still trust it.
Thank you… For supporting me, for praying for me, for supporting us, for praying for us. I could not imagine this life without the God that I love. I could not imagine this life without the prayers of people who love me.
I’ll leave you with this…
Don’t let hope become the scapegoat of the hard things of life. It’s not Hope’s fault, that life is hard.
Sincerely,
Joel.