It is Christmas 2018 and I was not planning to be writing holiday cheers from my husband’s hospital room but such is life. This is the 3rd hospitalization since the 1st week of November and two of them were so serious he had to be treated in the Intensive Care Unit.

This time we are still here after four days because they cannot find what caused his blood pressure to drop dangerously low and many other abnormal vital signs. The doctors are perplexed and are calling in an infectious disease specialist since this has been going on for several months. All we can do is wait and pray.
In the midst of all Ralph’s health issues I ended up in the emergency room and they found a 5 pound growth the size of a grapefruit and I had to have an abdominal hysterectomy. I have done most of my healing at Ralph’s side in the hospital. .

This is life on life’s terms. In other words, it is what it is. All we can do is accept the things we cannot change, change what we can and trust that God has our best interest at heart and that no matter what happens here on earth God’s plan is for us to be faithful servants sharing our HOPE in the God who created us.
Our purpose here on the night of Christ’s birth is to be examples of God’s grace and love and reflect to others our belief that that this too shall pass and we are committed to God as we are to each other, in sickness and in health, for better for worse, until death we depart but in our Christian faith death is where real joy begins!
Mary and Joseph had no idea what to expect when they were called to parent the Son of God. I am sure they had many doubts and fears and questions as they wandered toward Bethlehem, had people try to kill Jesus and watch him die. But through it all they trusted that God would work all things together for their good. We must trust that He will do the same for us.
So as we think about sitting in this hospital room at Christmas, not knowing when or if we will ever know why Ralph has had recurring infections for months that nearly killed him, we will trust God. We will rejoice in knowing that whatever happens we have a much better destiny in heaven than we will ever have here on earth.
We will cherish every moment we have with our loved ones and we will make the best of serving others with what time we have. God created us for a purpose and that is to be his Faucet’s of HOPE to the world allowing his love to flow through us to others.
We will pray for all of you reading this and all of those you have the opportunity to share God’s love with today and in the days to come. We pray for faith and boldness to share your experience, strength and hope. We pray that you will truly know the reason for this season and it is not about buying a bunch of presents and running around like crazy trying to please others. It’s about God’s love, family and sharing what we have with others.
May God bless you and may we be a blessing to one another in the years to come using every moment of every day as though it is our last because it just might be!

 

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