The Purse

When I went on vacation two months after Andrew's death, I did not intend to get my purse stolen.

I had mentioned to a neighbor, Melissa, who was really trying to reach out to me as Andrew was dying, that if he died, I wanted to be stolen away for a few days for a short vacation. I had more expected to go with my mom somewhere. But, Andrew ended up dying mid-winter, and anywhere local to Minnesota in February was icy tundra. When things began to settle down a bit, Melissa kept mentioning going on a vacation somewhere. She lives down the street and I only met her in September. I was surprised she wanted to go with me, considering it wasn't until Andrew died that I even had the time to start to get to know her, but really appreciated her kindness. Melissa loves Jesus and she has had such an eager heart to be there for me. So Melissa and I planned a trip to Florida. At the beginning of April, I went with the kids, Melissa, and her daughter to Clearwater, Florida for a short vacation.

In the meantime, around 6 weeks the daily crying began to subside. I had been surprised that the pain I was feeling was less fresh and sharp. It was about 7 weeks since Andrew's death when we left for Florida. And so I thought I would be fine when we arrived in Florida, as it was one place I had never been to with Andrew.

As we rode on the airplane, AJ suddenly looked very downcast sitting in the blue seats of Sun Country Airlines. He said, "I just feel so sad because I don't have my Papa." It didn't matter where we were going. We were in the blue seats without Papa.

I was completely unprepared for the memories that would blast me in Florida. When we arrived Wednesday evening, I couldn't figure out what was so familiar about standing outside the airport in the humid air amidst the palm trees. Was it LAX it reminded me of, all those times flying in and out of the Los Angeles airport to return home to New Jersey or arriving back in LA for school? And the last several times being joined by my new love as we travelled to our homes in New Jersey together? How could the Florida airport remind me of that, if LA is dry desert and Florida's air was thick with moisture?

We arrived at my aunt's condo right on the Florida gulf and instead of feeling I was in unexplored territory that could not remind me of my love, every memory I had of every vacation I had with Andrew flew at me. They began to coincide into one memory, so that I would have to think through them, separate them, organize them into the proper time and place. My aunt's condo was right on the beach with a beautiful view of the water. Andrew loved views. The time we accompanied him on a business trip to Coer D'Allaine, Idaho and stayed in a hotel over the blue lake when Gracie was three months old and AJ was 18 months old the summer of 2006 melded into the memory when just he and I stayed in a hotel that overlooked the Pacific Ocean in Canada just after he recovered from his first time through radiation and chemo in the summer of 2007.

I had brought with me the book Heaven by Randy Alcorn. As I read from it each night, I began to long for the beautiful, vivid place my love was already enjoying. I read the part that said, "Perhaps you're afraid of becoming 'so heavenly minded you're of no earthly good.' Relax...On the contrary, many of us are so earthly minded we are of no heavenly or earthly good. C.S. Lewis observed, '...you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next. The Apostles...all left their mark on Earth, precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth 'thrown in': aim at earth and you will get neither.'"

On Saturday, it was a clear sunny day. The water had a gorgeous greenish-blue tint and the sand was white. It was our day to spend at the beach behind our condo. While we were leaving the condo, I discovered that I had been missing my purse since the night before. I had gotten distracted by the kids and was desperately missing Andrew, laid it down somewhere, and didn't think of it till morning. After realizing where I had left it and checking all possible lost and founds, it became obvious that someone had taken advantage of the opportunity and stolen my purse.

The most distressing thing about it was that I needed my license to be able to fly back to Minnesota Monday and I needed my cell phone that was in the purse because there was a voicemail on it that I had been saving for over a year.

The voicemail was of Andrew telling me about a conversation he had had with AJ, when AJ had told Andrew that he wanted to pray that Jesus would save him. A month after Andrew left that message, he was diagnosed with cancer for the 2nd time and our lives never were the same again. I called my cell phone company about suspending my plan until I switched it to a new phone. They said that if I switched my plan to a new cell phone, then my voicemail would be lost forever. I felt so hopeless and longed for Andrew to return to me so much that it felt like I could reach my hand through the veil of eternity and touch him.

That afternoon, I couldn't stop thinking about the movie Prince Caspian, that we had just watched with the kids the other night. How the kings were too proud, self-reliant and had too little faith to go to Aslan (the Jesus figure) with their hopeless situation. But when they were finally at the end of themselves and went to Aslan, Aslan simply roared and it was so easy for everything to obey him to defeat the enemy.

I cried out to God that He promises to be a Husband to the husbandless, and that He knew this would never have happened if I had had my husband. I told the Lord that I was in a situation that was too big for me but was so easy for Him to handle. Using Melissa's cell phone, I called my cell phone several times for about the 20th time that day. A minute after praying, Melissa's cell phone rang saying that "Grace" was calling. I immediately answered like a small animal that had just been run over and was gasping its last word: "Pleease," I answered the phone with. "My husband just died and I'm really having a hard time. Pleeease, I just need my license and my cell phone back. Pleeeease."

My sister had specifically been praying that they would have a change of heart, and, indeed, that is what had happened to these teenagers. They said, "Yeah, we'll return your stuff," acting like it was the most normal thing in the world. In God's sovereignty, He hadn't allow me to cancel my cell phone. If I had, they would have never been able to call me back on Melissa's cell phone.

At the end of the conversation I said, "Can I ask you why you want to return it to me?"

They said, "Why? Cause it's the right thing to do."

The Lord gave me a heart of compassion for them, and I felt moved to bring them something that would tell them about Jesus. I had them meet me at the security guard.

When I arrived to meet them, the security guard was already grilling them. They said it was their friend who had stolen my purse and they were just returning it. They gave me back my cell phone and wallet containing everything in it, complete with $2 bill and gift cards. I had brought Andrew's Bible with me to meet them (it was a cheap pew Bible that he had bought last year and he had carried around with him ever since then. He had written his name in thick black ink). I handed it to them and said, "My husband died two months ago at the age of 27 from cancer. If you had known him 10 years ago, you probably would have been friends with him." I told them to read the book of John or Romans. They lowered their chins and looked up at me, slowly nodding.

They felt so bad that they returned again to the security guard with Andrew's Bible, a few hours later and confessed to me that they were the real thieves. I made them keep his Bible and told them that's what Andrew would want them to have. They said that every lie they had said felt like a knife stab.

It was like the Lord had pursued them like an angry husband who was looking out for his wife, only this Husband was omnipresent and could follow them in their car and could influence their consciences.

What kept coming to mind as I stood before them was that nothing anyone could do to me, no matter how horrible that day was, could compare to what I did to Jesus on the cross, nailing Him there daily with each of my sins. I had been reading the book of Luke, and so many of the passages kept flying to mind.

"And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, 'Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?' And Jesus answered them, 'Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance' (Luke 5:30-32). What does this passage mean when Romans 3 says that "There is no one righteous, not even one." If we don't see ourselves in the same category as "tax collectors and sinners" and thieves who are all in desperate need of Jesus' mercy, then perhaps it is not because we are not sinners, but because we are in the same category as the self-righteous Pharisees, which Jesus thought was even worse. We are all tax collectors, sinners, and thieves, even if our sin takes on a different face. Before God, we are all guilty. I didn't feel angry at them, because Jesus wasn't angry at me. He forgives and accepts me every day. That was something Andrew had taught me by his own eagerness to forgive and accept me every day.

I mentioned that I forgave them to which one of them exclaimed "YOU DO???"

They said they had never done anything like this before and that they had stolen from the wrong person.

I said, "No, God allowed this to happen so that you could hear about Jesus and give your lives to Him." I told them that at the same time, though, God was not pleased with what they had done and that they would have to stand before God - any moment, we couldn't know when - and answer at His Judgment throne for stealing my purse from me. I said, "This isn't the first sin you've committed in your life -"

"No, it isn't!" one of them exclaimed.

"You have sinned against God your whole life. And you will either have to pay in hell for all eternity, or Jesus can pay for all of your sins for you if you ask for His forgiveness and submit your lives to Him. Then you can enjoy Him now and for all eternity."

I kept telling them about Jesus and that they could only find relief from a life of guilt in Him.

"Okay, we want to do that now, then!" one of them said. "But you pray for us," he said, "since you know how to do that."

I prayed for them - with my eyes open - again explaining how one can know Jesus. I said "Dear Lord, I pray for these young men, who's real names I don't really know -" they interjected their real names - and then I continued.

When I finished, I said, "Now, I can't save you. Only Jesus can. You will have to give your lives to Him yourselves. But there is a price. Any one who follows Jesus is promised suffering. But Jesus if far better than anything you are pursuing here. He is far better than any pleasures you are living for."

I shared with them Andrew's testimony and as I kept telling them the gospel in many different ways, one of them began to look increasingly angry, while the other one looked increasinly wide-eyed and attentive.

Towards the end of my conversation with them, I showed them in the Bible where John and Romans were. The attentive one said, "I've never read a book in my life, but I will definitely read this one!" I gave them my email address if they had any questions about what I told them to read, but that I wouldn't have internet access until I returned home.

When I arrived in Minnesota Monday evening, there were three emails from the particularly attentive one and that he had started to read the Bible. He said he didn't really understand it, but that he would keep reading it over and over until he did understand, like I had told him Andrew had done.

Eventually, he mentioned that his grandmother, who he lived with, goes to church (I looked it up and it is Southern Baptist), and she had helped him by telling him just to read and a passage would stick out for him.

I looked up some churches in the area and sent him to a Sovereign Grace church. He actually went on Easter! Please pray that He would give his life to Jesus.

The Keepsake Box

On Saturday, I wished I could hear Andrew tell me he loved me. You know how it is, wives, how we know that our husbands love us, but we need them to reassure us and hear it often? It's like we begin to doubt the obvious, no matter how many declarations of love or how many sacrifices our husbands have made for us.

I began to wonder, "Did Andrew really love me? Or did he just love me in obedience to God? Did he still have anymore real affection for me, even after five years of marriage had passed together? If he did, wouldn't he have written specific things he loved about me, rather than just saying the three words?"

I went upstairs to look at old cards Andrew and I had given to each other over the years. He had gathered them and put them in a file box of keepsakes before he died. I even found an old birthday card I had sent him two weeks late, September of 2002, in a shy, yet verbose, attempt to communicate with my secret crush. (It didn't cause him to suspect I had liked him, since, as I had witnessed, he thought birthday cards from random girls were the norm at the time. Apparently, he preferred my three-page soliloquy, cause it made it past the trash).

Even though I had looked in the box since Andrew died, I had missed something. Amidst the cards there was a sealed envelope: "To Grace and kids," it said on the front. "Only open if something happens to me."

Inside were three letters, one for each of us. I vaguely recalled that he had written them before his last surgery, March of '08.

3-19-08

My sweet sweet Grace. I love you so much. There is no other woman in the world like you. I wish we could take another walk together and hold hands like we used to do at night around the apartments at UCLA. I love to hold your hand and swing it back and forth and just listen to you talk about everything. I love watching you read your script off the top of your eyelids and all the facial expressions and body movements that help express your feelings. The amazing thing is that you somehow are able to get all of those rich expressions and emotions onto paper when you write. Keep writing and publish our book.

I love your smile, and your lips...You are such a great mom. Keep loving our kids and training them and teaching them about everything. When you correct them, remember that it is a gift of love to our children just as cancer is a gift of love to us.

I love you so much. I wish I could embrace you right now. Know that I am with the Lord rejoicing and praising God without the pain of sickness. Go on living like normal. The Lord will take care of you and the kids. He is a faithful, loving Father.

"Do not fear, for I am with you;
Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God
I will strengthen you, surely I will help you,
Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand."
- Isaiah 41:10

-- Superman


Tuesday, March, 18, 2009

Dear Andrew David Mark,

I'm going to have surgery this Thursday and I wanted to write you a letter to tell you how much I love you. The Lord has blessed me with such an energetic and curious young boy. I hope to be able to see you grow up into a strong young man. You have such a tender heart towards other people and I can see it in the way you love your mom and your sister. Today Gracie was going up the steps into the mud room and she dropped her cup. Since she has difficulty going backwards on the steps and we were all waiting for Gracie to get out of the way, you reached down and got her cup and handed it to her with a big smile so that she could continue up the steps. I also love how you pay attention to details like when you were just 2 years old. I kept calling you "Superman" when you were wearing a Spiderman outfit, and you politely corrected me. Or the time I put you in the wrong car seat and you kept saying, "I want that one," pointing to your car seat on the other side of the car. You're always paying attention!

I also love how you have so much energy. You wake up early and play in your room. When Mama gets you up, you run downstairs and get a pull-up and run back up and put it on yourself. Today you had so much energy, you were running in circles downstairs from the kitchen to the living room, to the foyer and back to the kitchen.

I can already tell that you are a very talented person. Keep your head on straight and keep working hard even if things seem to come easily to you. Stay close to the Lord, and pray a lot. Take care of your mom and yours sister. Love you so much.

Proverbs 3:5-12

Trust in the LORD with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight.

Do not be wise in your own eyes;
Fear the LORD and turn away from evil.

It will be healing to your body
And refreshment to your bones.

Honor the LORD from your wealth
And from the first of all your produce;
So your barns will be filled with plenty
And your vats will overflow with new wine.

My son, do not reject the discipline of the LORD
or loathe his reproof,
for whom the LORD loves He reproves,
Even as a father corrects the son in whom he delights.

-- Papa


Dear Grace Olivia Mark,

You have always been a bundle of grace in my life. Since the day you were born, I could always look at you and know that God is good. The first time I got to cuddle with you in the hospital, I was so happy that the Lord had given us another child. You were such a tiny baby wrapped up that I was able to hold you with just one hand. I love your smiles and your sweet kisses. Whenever I ask for a kiss you always give me one right on the lips.

You love to cuddle and press your cheeks against mine. Just a few weeks ago we found out that my cancer was much worse than we expected. That morning you had just woken up and your mom was crying and I was feeling scared. I picked you up and you hugged me and clung to me in my lap for about half-an-hour and comforted me. Right now you are learning to talk and you make up your own words like, "Mapa," and "Dat Un," or "Down Er." Since you love to eat one of your favorite words is, "Mo-a."

Perhaps one day you will be a performer. You already love to dance and you've got a voice that carries. Most of all, love the Lord, and learn all you can from your wonderful Mama. The Lord has blessed you with a very special Mom to learn from. And if I'm not around, please remember that the Lord is your Father and your Husband. Keep close to Him and you will be satisfied. I love you.

Psalm 68:3-19

But let the righteous be glad; let them exult before God;
Yes, let them rejoice with gladness.

Sing to God, sing praises to His name;
Lift up a song for Him who rides through the deserts,
Whose name is the LORD, and exult before Him.

A father of the fatherless and a judge for the widows,
Is God in His holy habitation.

God makes a home for the lonely;
He leads out the prisoners into prosperity,
Only the rebellious dwell in a parched land.

O God, when You went forth before Your people,
When You marched through the wilderness, Selah.

The earth quaked;
The heavens also dropped rain at the presence of God;
Sinai itself quaked at the presence of God, the God of Isreal.

You shed abroad a plentiful rain, O God;
You confirmed Your inheritance when it was parched.

Your creatures settled in it;
You provided in Your goodness for the poor, O God.

-- Papa

Andrew's Two Month Letter

On April 7, 2002 Andrew was baptized at Grace Community Church in Los Angeles, declaring to all that he had turned from a life of sin and living for himself and instead had surrendered his life to Jesus, the One and only true God, Maker of heaven and earth.

April 7, 2009 marks two months after Andrew went to see His Savior face to face.

This is Andrew's last letter until the one year anniversary of his death.

2 months

Dear Grace,

His mercies are new every morning. Satisfy yourself in God’s great love for you through the gospel. You are accepted as a beloved child, and there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. I’m sure life is still a little crazy, but if you are in despair just remember that this too will pass. You’ll get through each day one at a time. Keep a steady mindset, and put one foot in front of the other.

Remember to stay on top of training the children. Most importantly they need love, but sometimes love comes in the form of loving correction. Gracie most of all needs to know who is in authority. Now that I am no longer around, the children really need to see you take my place as the ultimate human authority in the household. You need to be intentional about having them submit to your authority, and ultimately God’s authority.

With regards to balancing everything that is on your plate you will need to really step back and trust God...You are not in the same situation as other women may be in where their entire job is devoted to caring for their children and husband's needs. You have now taken on a huge job of leading the family. You don’t know what that entails yet, but it is a lot of work... So we need to do things that will get the most bang for the buck in terms of time, money, effort and flexibility.

Firstly, you’ll need to pray and trust God that He will keep your bodies healthy and free of disease. However, He may afflict you or our kids anyways just as He did to Job...If you are reading this then we know that God has chosen to take me home at His appointed time, and we know that God is in control of your life as well....

AJ will continue to need male examples in his life, but I think hanging out with Noah and Billy [A.J.'s cousins] and being around people at church will suffice for now. As he grows older he should be proactive about spending time with the men in the youth ministry helping them out on a weekend or assisting in ministry activities. Gracie has lots to learn from you right in the home.

I love you will all my heart. Be strong and courageous.

-Your Love

Focus

I miss Andrew a lot, but truly feel God sustaining me each day beyond anything I thought possible. Gracie, who will be 3 on the 27th, is the same, always strong, happy, fearless. (My mom always calls her the "Survivor." She did afterall survive a potty birth). AJ, who turned 4 in January, has fussy days and it's usually because he's missing his papa a lot. He was really close to Andrew. He's so sensitive, aware, and has an amazing memory. Most of the time, though, he's pretty happy, loves playing with all our different neighbors, who we've been getting to know a lot since we've been back from California, and going to his new preschool 3 mornings a week that I enrolled him in 2 weeks ago.

I'm really thankful for the times we have together at night before bed. I have a lot of heart-to-hearts with AJ, and the kids really need a lot of affection and reassurance right now. At age four, I think AJ is old enough to possibly remember a lot of Andrew. I keep praying the Lord will preserve his memories. The other night he mentioned his last birthday in California and asked if I had eaten any of his birthday cake.

I said yes.

He asked if papa had too.

I said no.

He asked why?

I said, Remember? He had a feeding tube, and I pointed to my stomach.

He said, "Yeah, and he used to have one too in his nose."

And I asked when.

And he said, "'A long long long long time ago."

He was right. A year ago for several weeks right after Andrew's surgery, he had a tube in his nose to feed through before he ever had a bigger one put into his stomach. AJ remembers a year ago!

In general, all day long AJ has various questions related to death and heaven. They have been constant opportunities to talk about so many different aspects of the Lord. How He is always good, always is with us, is everwhere, anywhere we are, yet is in heaven with papa. How He hates sin, and yet is forgiving, and we are incapable of obeying Him on our own, but through His Holy Spirit He can change our hearts to grow us more like Him. How He promises to be a Papa to the fatherless and will take care of us and we can trust Him. How He is yes, even bigger than Spiderman, and can rescue even those Spiderman cannot.

I feel as if God is really growing me through this difficult time. I feel more sensitive to spiritual things than ever before. When I hear a song on the radio that mentions eternity, I listen to the words intently, looking for truthful images, wonder if it's giving me a clue into what Andrew is seeing right now. Even if my private worship (my time in God's Word and prayer) was cut short a couple of times or I even missed it, I realize at Sunday worship that my mind has still been meditating on spiritual things most of the week, because it is so easy to worship God in song with all my heart and listen to the message without being distracted, though it has always been a much greater struggle in the past.

It as if any and everything during the day makes me think about how it looks to God, how He would see it and interpret it, what it has to do with heaven, eternity.

I feel as if everything has become very clear-cut, at least for the time-being, and my vision feels clear right now too. God uses searing pain to cause everything to come into focus.

The letters of Andrew

Andrew's letters have really shepherded me so much through this time. Reading his letters almost nightly the first month, all of which I have posted so far (at least the ones I'm supposed to read. There are still the 2 month, 1 year, 1st wedding anniversary without him, and a few others as well as for watershed events in the kids lives), have guided me how to structure my day, such as using the kids two-hour afternoon nap to take care of the onslaught of paper work related to his countless medical bills, changing names on all kinds of accounts, logistical things having to do with death or not having him here (...still goin' at it). Him telling me to take a realistic time during the day to work on all those things, plus telling me not to feel overwhelmed but to take things one step at a time, have truly protected me from feeling overwhelmed the first month. God also answered his prayer that it would be easy and fun for me to take care of all of those things, which truly shocked me, because I have always despised paper work, particularly when it's related to messed up bills and insurance companies. The Holy Spirit really must have given him the words to write, because how could he know what I was going to go through and know exactly just what I needed to hear?

I'm learning so much from Andrew's leadership in his letters, despite how proud and stubborn I always was when he was actually here. I find that I always forget little things he wrote in the letters, and so certain phrases become new to me again when I read them or strengthen me anew or refocus me.

I never could imagine life without Andrew, but somehow there is. I can't explain it. How I can miss someone that I love so much and yet still be okay. My only explanation is that the Lord is really helping me.

"But you, O God, do see trouble and grief; you consider it to take it in hand. The victim commits himself to you; you are the helper of the fatherless." - Psalm 10:14

Prayer Requests

- that I would be consistent in my private worship. that the Lord would refresh me each day and continue to sustain me as a single mom. The kids were sick this weekend, so I had to say no to some invitations. Being sequestered all weekend drove me a little crazy.

- (for the same requests as in the previous post)

Verse of the day

"For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 6:23).

Glory

After the whirlwind of Andrew's memorial service, I found that each day, I generally felt fine. During those times, I thought, this isn't so bad. If this is what it's like, then I don't see how we can't get through this. And then some time after dinner each night, I felt the complete opposite for an hour or two and wasn't sure if I would make it through the next minute. I was grateful, though, that at least there was relief each day for most of it. I had always expected my grief would be a suffocating dark cloud, relentless without any sunshine to pierce it. Yet, each day I could breathe. But when the misery took over after the kids were in bed, it was like trying to breathe through a contraction. Each day felt a little better, while the misery contractions at night felt a little worse.

One thing I was forced to learn from our battle with cancer, though, was that panic, or any strong emotion related to misery, was always passing and that one should never put any stock in it. Once the panic subsided, then one could evaluate the situation, see that it wasn't completely overwhelming, and that one could then take the next step, rather than collapse in frustration. So I would breathe and wait for the contraction to subside.

My mother stayed for an additional week after Andrew passed away and I would cry to her each night. She would reassure me that indeed God was in control and I could trust in Him and rub my back like I was a little girl again and I would feel better and fall asleep. It was strange, as if I had gone from being my mom's girl, while being Andrew's for a few years was a slight hiccup, and then went back to mom's girl.

Week 3 after Andrew's Homegoing

I had bought a bunkbed from Ikea with a full-size bed on the bottom. I thought I would sleep on the top bunk, while still have the option to cuddle with one of the kids on the bottom when I felt like it, while the other one slept on the toddler bed. In the end, the top bunk always seemed too lonely and the kids always insisted I stay on the bottom. Even though they took turns sleeping on the other toddler bed, by morning, all three of us usually ended up squished together in the bottom bunk.

I put the bunk bed in their room, so the room is not too big and real cozy. I retired to the room at the same time as the kids, so I didn't have to endure lonely nights by myself and no longer had the evening bouts of misery. Even though they were asleep, I still felt comforted by their presence at night. So I started to have my bouts of grief at unexpected times in the mid-morning or after lunch. I would burst out crying, missing Andrew. The kids would each run for the tissue box, insisting that I couldn't cry, bringing me wads of tissues, their offerings to me. I would have to suck it up and hold in my tears. Since I'm basically always with the kids, I really had no opportunity to cry.

I still had to have my daily cries, even if they were only allowed to last a minute or two a couple of times in the afternoon. The kids are used to it now and no longer demand an explanation. They don't even turn from their toys all the time to overload me with tissues.

After the kids were in bed, I read for awhile, and usually fell asleep by 10. Not wanting to wake them up, I set my alarm for the latest possible time the kids might still be sleeping, assuming that I went to bed so early that I would probably be waking up way before them on my own. Not so. Grief is quite exhausting, especially if you're not allowed to express it as much as you would like to. I always woke up at the same time as them.

When I am missing Andrew, it feels so unreal that he could actually be gone. Like I'll glance a picture of him, see his familiar face, and realize, I had looked at it thousands of times, the slope of his nose, the angles of his jaw, his wide, almond eyes, the width of his cheeks. I'll think, How could he not be here anymore? He was just here. Three weeks ago. He was just here and I could look at that face any time I wanted as much as I wanted, so much and for so long, over and over day in and day out, that face, and that I thought I would always look at it. It's like saying you will never see the blue sky again. Or ever see another tree for the rest of your life. Like the mountains have fallen into the sea.

Like when some people in the World Trade Center on Sept. 11th got stuck in the elevators, collapsed down to the bottom floor and survived, but when they climbed out of the elevators, they thought they had died because they recognized nothing. The lobby was gone, ash and rubble floated everywhere like a thick fog. On the street, nothing was the same, and how could they ever imagine Manhatten could ever be recovered, restored, or look like it did just earlier that morning ever again. At that moment, the world that they had always known, was just, gone.

God is our refuge and strength,
A very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change
And though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea.
- Psalm 46:1-2

When I am feeling okay, it's like standing behind the glass in an aquarium. It's really strange how it feels when I am doing okay. It is so opposite than when I'm sad. It feels very literally as if the Lord is shielding me from the onslaught of grief. When I remember the misery of the previous day, yet feel so perfectly calm and fine, it is like I am looking at that giant aquarium of water, watching the grey shark swim by, and wonder what was ever the danger of all that water to me when there is a glass wall between us.

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
His mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is Your faithfulness.
-Lamentations 3:22-23

I have been reading old journals of ours, trying to find some meaning, some bigger picture to the last six years. I find myself lost in Andrew's old journals that I had never read and in our old emails to each other. Reading his words make me feel like he's still human and just on the other side of a computer.

Through this trial, I have found that I don't always understand my feelings, but feel no obligation to have to be able to know what all of them are or have to explain or articulate them. But I have found that when I pray about my concerns, the Lord reveals to me what's on my heart. During small group one night when a few of us were praying together, I confessed to the Lord how I would rather read Andrew's journals than read the Bible. It suddenly came to mind then that the reason I hide myself in Andrew's journals are because I miss him so much. That may have seemed obvious but it wasn't to me until that moment. I had never known what it was to miss my husband for more than a week or to this degree. Tears gushed from my eyes.

Week 4

That rhythm of daily feeling fine with an afternoon interruption of weeping continued until last week when on a Monday I noticed from across the room some file folders in our bookshelves amidst all our books, rather than in our office. "Hm. I wonder what I'll discover there," I said. And then I found photos taken of us two days after our engagement when we had gone to Joshua Tree in California with a friend. I had seen these photos months ago, but they were the only ones I hadn't reviewed since Andrew passed away, because they weren't on our computer since someone else had taken them. Additionally, earlier that morning an old friend of Andrew's had posted a memory that he had with Andrew. I had heard the story a couple of times before, but this time he added a detail I had not heard. That memory along with our pictures, just brought those years of young, healthy Andrew so vividly to my mind. I missed Andrew's old goofiness that had faded in the months just before his cancer was discovered, when he first began to get increasingly tired and more pale.

I always wanted to know more of Andrew, hold his heart in my hand, be able to grasp his essence. I wanted to ask him questions. What was he thinking that hilarious day he carried that refrigerator up the stairs with his friend? Tell me more, tell me more, tell me more about you. I never could get enough of Andrew. I couldn't even get enough of his name or saying his name. I loved the feel of his name reverberating from my vocal chords. That's why we named A.J., Andrew Junior. I had always secretly hoped A.J. would want to use the name "Andrew" when he got a little older and his little friends could call him it. Now I'm so thankful we still have at least one Andrew here.

And so all last week, I kept playing music of Andrew's that he liked to listen to when we were first falling in love and then he began playing constantly again in the last weeks of his life. He used to listen to two Third Day CD's, Time and Come Together, over and over and over again during both those times in our lives. I never understood why he liked them so much. I liked how they sounded, but I never could follow all the lyrics, so I didn't always know what they were singing about, since either my mind would wonder or the words were slurred. I wanted to ask him what he liked so much about those songs. What resonated so much with him? Why didn't I ask him before? And yet, many times I did ask him questions like that. Often, he'd say he didn't know. And that's why I never could get enough of him. I read in one of his early journals when we were dating that he felt like I understood him often better than he understood himself. And still, it wasn't enough for me. I have always wanted to understand his heart and his mind more, even though he himself didn't know all the answers. I thought I would have the rest of our lives to discover him.

I would cry to the music as it played and I prepared breakfast for the kids or lunch or dinner. I wondered why I felt so compelled to stare at pictures of Andrew, play his music, and read beautiful journals about us falling in love if all it made me do was cry. And yet, as miserable as it was, I almost relished weeping for Andrew. I loved taking care of him when he was sick. It was hard, but the Lord gave me so much joy in it. I wanted to do anything for Andrew, and now if I can weep for him, then I am thankful to do that too.

When I was de-cluttering some piles of papers, I discovered a booklet from the funeral home about grief. It said that some people think that time heals a broken heart, but that it actually doesn't if you refuse to grieve. So it recommends looking at pictures of your loved one, playing music he liked, or writing your feelings about him. When I read that, I understood then what I had been doing all that week. It really helped to have that validation. My sister told me that in the Old Testament grieving was a form of worship to God. Along with weeping and tearing their clothes, at a funeral they would even hire professional wailers.

Week 5

This week, I still played music that reminded me of Andrew. Some healing must have taken place, though, because the past few days it hasn't made me cry anymore. I just like to hear it, think of him, and feel just fine.

I think about heaven all the time now, because that is where my love is, wondering what it is like there. Heaven is the intermediary state where we are spirit, awaiting Christ's return to earth when we shall all rise again with new bodies. I feel like I love Andrew even more now, because he is literally perfect now. He is literally without sin and that is how I think about him when I think about where he is now.

Having your marriage cut short so unexpectedly from what you had always assumed and witnessing your husband's life cut short forces you to see that there is only a veil between you and eternity. Life is so short, whether you die young or you have many more years. I will see Andrew soon. I know it. Maybe not Tuesday, but some Tuesday, some day after a breath of a life. And so it makes me return to my old feelings about life, before I had married and my devotion to the Lord was undivided ("But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world—how she can please her husband." - 1Cor. 7:34). That my hope cannot be in this world or this life or wasting it on a pursuit of comfort that always evades you anyway and never satisfies. Nothing is worth living for except for Christ. So if life is hard or painful, just submit to God, and let Him use those things to make you more like Him, because that is the only thing He is after - making you into His image for His own glory.

The significance of Andrew's life

Many of you have expressed how Andrew's life was inspirational. I imagine he would love for you to hear the 2nd message delivered eight days after his death and the dangers that come with finding Andrew's life inspirational:
Listen Online
Download (10.77MB)

Prayer Requests

- that I would live for Christ alone and allow Him to mold me into His image rather than resist even the everyday little trials
- that I would seek my satisfaction in Christ alone
- that I would be consistent with the children, firm, yet patient. God has called me to the impossible task of being a single mom to these children to teach them about Christ faithfully. But I think the fact that it is impossible is the point. Christ is always calling us to the impossible, which is why I cannot rely on myself but only on God with Whom nothing is impossible.

Andrew's Letters 2-4

This week has probably been the hardest so far, as Monday I discovered some pictures from when Andrew and I and a friend went to Joshua Tree two days after Andrew and I were engaged. I would do anything to have Andrew back.

A.J. loves for me to read Andrew's letters to him and Gracie before bed. I haven't had a chance to post Andrew's letters from Days 2 through 4. They were short, so I'll post them all together:


Day 2

Dear Beloved,

I love you so much. Stay strong and be courageous. May Christ satisfy you today.

Ps 31:10-12
Hear, O LORD, and be gracious to me; O LORD, be my helper.
You have turned for me my mourning into dancing;
You have loosed my sackcloth and girded me with gladness,
That my soul may sing praise to You and not be silent
O LORD my God, I will give thanks to You forever.

Love,
Me

P.S. XxooXoxXXoooXxxXox


Day 3

Dear Lover,

Just a quick note to tell you that I love you and that I'm not in pain anymore. Remember to rejoice in all things today. By the way, you're beautiful.

"Rejoice in the Lord, again I will say rejoice. "

The Lord will lead you just as He did the Israelites through the wilderness. Ex 13:21 "The LORD was going before them in a pillar of cloud by day to lead them on the way, and in a pillar of fire by night to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night."


Day 4

Dear Grace,

I love you so much. I wish I could be there with you to know how you are doing. I trust that God is upholding you and others through this time. Be strong and courageous. The Lord will lead you to victory. Remember my favorite song?

E’er since, by faith, I saw the stream
Thy flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be ’til I die.

When this poor lisping, stammering tongue
Lies silent in the grave,
Then in a nobler, sweeter song,
I’ll sing Thy pow’r to save.

Your best friend,

Andrew

Andrew's Two Week Letter

Sorry for the reticence. I haven't had a computer this week. The Lord continues to sustain and comfort me. Andrew's letters get me re-focused whenever I start to fall off kilter. I will post when I have a chance. For now, here is Andrew's 2 Week letter:

2 Weeks

Dearest Beloved,

I love you. Remember that time when we went hiking in the mountains before going to the Clark’s house for dinner? That was like our second or third day dating. You must have been so happy that you didn’t realize that you were hopping and skipping along on slush and ice on the edge of a steep hill that dropped almost straight down. The path was only about 1.5 feet wide, but you didn’t care. You were practically in heaven. I was actually quite impressed with you that day because you seemed fearless and confident with each step you took. The Lord kept us safe that day, gave us a wonderful date, and even provided somebody to jumpstart my car just as it was getting dark. The Lord always takes care of us doesn't He? I want you to be fearless like you were on that date in the mountains. Don't look down, just keep your eyes focused on what's just ahead and you'll do just fine.

I’m not here to lead you, anchor you, and balance you in person anymore. But since you know me so well, step back and think about how we would work as a team in each tough situation you find yourself in. Be affectionate with the kids and remember to keep pointing them to God. If they seem to get out of control more since I'm not around anymore as the authority figure you will have to step in and take my place as the highest human authority in our home. Also, remember that they need clear boundaries more than ever before.

Your Kindness

I wanted to thank all of you for the comfort and encouragement you all have been to me, as well as to Andrew when he was still living, through all your notes, comments, physical help, the list is endless. I can't express how much strength I draw from all of your encouragement.

Thank you so much also to the many of you who felt compelled to give to A.J. and Gracie's fund. Many of you have been asking for more information on the fund. I met with some of the elders from the church last night, and we are still in discussion about what kind of fund we are going to set up. Perhaps something like a trust that they could use for college or something in the future. It still appears that checks are coming in, so our decision is largely going to depend on how much they total in the end. Many of you have expressed an interest in still giving to the fund, so here is the information.

Please make checks out to:
Redeemer Bible Church
Please put "A.J. and Gracie's fund" in the memo line
16205 Hwy 7
Minnetonka, MN 55345

Also, it is going to take a few weeks to get the video recording of Andrew's memorial service up. I really loved it and I hope we can share it with you, since it included some of Andrew's favorite songs. In the mean time, the audio from Andrew's memorial service is available here:
Part 1 - Invocation
Part 2 - Phillippians 1:12-21
Part 3 - Letter from the Doctor
Part 4 - Personal Remembrances
Part 5 - Personal Remembrances
Part 6 - Personal Remembrances
Part 7 - Personal Remembrances
Part 8 - A Letter from Andrew
Part 9 - Romans 8:28-39
Part 10 - Ministry of the Word
Part 11 - Benediction

Home

Pipers

At church yesterday, the last song we sang at church was about heaven. I pictured Andrew in heaven singing something akin to what we were singing. This made me weep. My sister tapped me on the back after the song ended and introduced me to Noel Piper. John and Noel Piper happened to be visiting our church for the first time, since Dr. Piper is on writing leave from his church and Minneapolis is only a half-hour from us. I did not know at all that they were at the church and was very shocked to be meeting her. All I could do was blubber. The Pipers had eaten dinner with my sister and brother-in-law for the first time at our house while we were in California back in November, because my sister's kitchen was being remodeled. Noel thanked me for that and said that at least in that small way they had a connection to Andrew. I simply wept and blubbered, "No, thank you for eating in my house."

A few minutes later, after I had composed myself, I shook hands with John Piper for the first time. I told him how during Andrew's last months we had listened to his sermons on Job and suffering repeatedly and how it had greatly helped and ministered to us. I said how Andrew would have considered it a great honor to meet him right then because of how Piper had impacted his life, since Andrew had a collection of his sermons that he had listened to over the years.

Later, when I told my brother-in-law about my encounter with Piper, I said, "I'm not going to feel bad, though, that Andrew missed out on that, because he's meeting with Someone way better right now."


The first week without him

Andrew was right in the letter I last posted ("Day 1") that God would give me strength I never dreamed of when he left us. I never knew it was possible to truly rejoice that your beloved was in the presence of Jesus, while mourning at the same time, for even that rejoicing to supercede your mourning.

Even though I fought his death tooth and nail, when we were finally in the hospital, the truth that the number of his days had been written before time was so real to me and such a comfort to me. I know that all the peace and thankfulness for the time I had had with Andrew was totally supernatural and not of myself.

In the following days, I was surrounded by Andrew's family as well as mine and all our relatives. I'm so thankful to all our relatives who came out to be with us during that time. It was such a comfort to me to see everyone.

Andrew's brother and sister and parents were staying in our house. As we stayed up late working on Andrew's slideshow and putting together collages of his pictures, it felt so good to look at hundreds of pictures of Andrew when he was still healthy and cancer had not yet invaded our lives. It was so fun to be able to say whatever flew into my head at the moment, while I still was processing my feelings. I'd exclaim, "I love Andrew so much!" and have someone to hear me say it. Or I'd say, "Andrew is so handsome!" and Andrew's sister's husband would say, "Yeah, he's a stud."

We still talked so much about Andrew and in the present tense, his pictures so clear and vivid, it felt like he had never left and that maybe he was just resting in his room, as he always was in recent months.

On the Wednesday evening of Andrew's memorial service as all our relatives were at our house for dinner, I began to feel anxious about what I was going to do after the mass exodus of all our relatives that evening. It was Day 5, so I read his letter for that day:


Dear Grace,

Don't fear the future. Just take it one day at a time. One foot in front of the other. Keep the big picture of God's glory in mind. Continue to serve Him by being faithful in the little things. Faithful with your time and energy. Smile at the future, the best is yet to come!

"Prov 31:25 Strength and dignity are her clothing And she smiles at the future."

Let me pray with you...Dear Lord, I thank you so much for Grace and the kids. Thank you that we got to have each other for as long we we did. Thank you for your hand which has upheld our family through thick and thin. Thank you that you will never leave us or forsake us. Thank you that you love us so much and want us to know Christ so intimately that you would take me home a little sooner than others. We beg of you to take care of this family and be a father and a husband to them. I pray that they would know your closeness in times of loneliness, and that they would run to you for their satisfaction rather than other people, movies, Internet or other things. Please help Grace to be able to handle leading this home without me. Help her to learn and do the jobs that I used to do. Please make it easy and fun for her. Please bring joy and laughter into this home, and turn their mourning to dancing. Amen.

Love you.


Week two without him

Andrew's mom and my mom are still here. As everyone else has left, each day has felt a little lonelier. Last night I dreamed about Andrew for the first time. He was dressed up a little bit wearing a blue button-down shirt of his that I liked and black pants. He was standing up tall and straight, his old weight, not skinny, like he used to in his healthy pictures. We were in Target together shopping for new bedsheets, but they told us they didn't sell them. I wondered around the store feeling so confused, swearing that they always had sold them in the past. I hugged him and told him I missed him. I thought someone else had died, then realized that he had never been healed of cancer, so he would have to die anyway. The new bedsheets were to replace the ones that had been stained and destroyed when he had his first bleed.

I woke up having to reassure myself that the last six years was not a dream and that what we had was real. A.J. woke up next to me screaming. I comforted him and said, uncertain why he was even crying, "You know that Papa loves you so much, right?"

He said, "No."

I said, "Yes, he does."

He said, "No, but I don't know that he does."

I continued to reassure him. Somehow A.J. often seems to say out loud what I'm thinking too. I had to whisper to myself that indeed Andrew did love me, even though I wasn't feeling like it.

I went to small group last night and was reminded again how Andrew's suffering and death truly has affected people, which emphasizes for me that this had been the Lord's plan all along and brings me joy. As the days go on and I forget how much Andrew suffered and instead stare at pictures of when he was perfect and healthy, it begins to hurt more that he is gone and the relief that he is no longer in pain is lost. When the reality of how much his suffering and death has impacted people does not confront me as loudly, my joy also dissipates and grief replaces it.

I think it was Jonathan Edwards who described his marriage with Sarah as an "uncommon union." Even though our marriage was far from perfect (mostly because of me) that's what I think of what Andrew and I had (mostly because of him). I felt so accepted and cherished by Andrew.

When I met him in the fall of 2001, seeing him felt like coming home for the first time (even though I didn't even know him and he was completely unaware of it). When I consider living in our home without the very one who made it home, I am perplexed. But then I remember what he said, "Just take it one day at a time." And I remember how God sustained me that first week and continues to shield me from overwhelming grief. That it hasn't been nearly as bad as I had imagined it would be. And as Piper always says, if God has always proven faithful, then we can be reassured that He will continue to be faithful.

Letters

Andrew wrote letters for me to read the first five days after he left us, as well as at 2 weeks, 2 months, and for the watershed moments for mine and the kids lives. I read one tonight to the kids. I thought I would share them also with you.

Day 1

My beloved,

Rejoice because God’s mercies are new every morning. Rejoice because I’m not in pain anymore. Rejoice because God is faithful and will never leave you or forsake you.

I believe that right now God is going to give you strength you never dreamed of. Our God will not only comfort you, He will lead you and take care of you like a father does.

I know there are many things that need to be done. Don’t feel overwhelmed, just take it one moment at a time. Perhaps you might return to a normal routine as soon as possible with the kids and take a portion of your day such as nap time to take care of some of these things. God has been growing you so much with not being overwhelmed. I trust that you will be able to mentally and emotionally put one foot in front of the other. Stay strong. What would Andrew do right now? I would be steady, stable and strong. I see that strength and steadiness coming through in you as you've had to trust more and more in the Lord during these difficult times. I love you.

You could sleep in the same room with the kids and enjoy them. Don't let them mourn. Let them just be happy to know that papa doesn’t have cancer anymore. God answered their prayers from then they were just 2.5 and 3.5. AJ said that he didn't want Papa to have cancer anymore. I would love to see them run around saying "Papa doesn't have owies anymore. Papa doesn't have cancer anymore. He is with Jesus!".

Deut 31:6 " Be strong and courageous, do not be afraid or tremble at them, for the LORD your God is the one who goes with you. He will not fail you or forsake you."

Oh yeah, and don't forget to eat!

Love you!

-Your Beloved

Funeral/Blog Letter after Passing

A brisk fall afternoon, the bright red and yellow leaves are falling from the trees at Round Lake Park, the sun is shining, I can feel the cool fresh air entering my lungs with every breath. I smell garlic and homemade Italian food in the wind. For you maybe it's a spring day and the flowers are blooming, or it's Christmas and the snow is falling and you are sitting with a warm mug of coffee by the fire. It's at those seemingly perfect moments that you know this all didn't happen by chance. It is not by chance that the leaves turn red in the fall, and it is not by chance that I'm not standing here reading this letter to you now.

After all the suffering I have seen thus far, there are only two things that I know are true. That I love my wife and kids so much, and that God loves me infinitely more than that. Thank you, thank you, thank you, to all who have loved, served, and prayed for us. I am so very sorry to leave you all behind, but at the same time I am so happy to be home with my Maker. Everything that I love about the fall and the leaves and the fresh air and Italian cooking in the wind, pales in comparison with what it is like in the presence of Jesus. I have not eaten in a very long time, but know that I hunger no more. There is no more pain or suffering, no more tears or sorrow.

Grace, AJ, and Gracie, know that God holds you in the palm of His hand especiallly now. Jesus will lead, guide, and protect you. I am confident that your mourning will turn to dancing.

Fight for joy in this. Rejoice because cancer can kill my body but it cannot kill my soul. Rejoice because my greatest sickness was cured in 2001 at the age of 20 when I believed that Jesus could forgive such great sins as mine. Rejoice because even through sickness and death God has done great things in my life, and yours. Rejoice because this is not the end, it is just the beginning.

Rejoice! Again I say rejoice!

I will see many of you soon.

Andrew W. Mark

Beloved's Suffering and Death Has Gone National

Wow. You can download today's national broadcast about Andrew's death on Way of the Master with Todd Friel here:  www.wretchedradio.com/podcast

Way of the Master

Pastor Bob's message from Sunday will be broadcast nationally TODAY on the Way of the Master radio program from 2 - 4 pm central time. Please feel free to invite friends & family to listen. Listen on the web or find your local station on their website: Way of the Master

Please pray that at the memorial service this morning, that Bob would preach the gospel with clarity and power and that the Holy Spirit would convict hearts. Please also pray that the impact of the message on the radio this afternoon would reach far and wide.

Listen to the message here: www.wretchedradio.com/podcast

Memorial Service

The memorial service for Andrew will be streamed live on our church's website, www.redeemerbiblechurch.com tomorrow at 10 am central time.

***For those trying to tune-in, its available now! (10:35 central)

Message from Sunday

The message from Sunday's service is now available online. It can be found here: "Reflections on the suffering and death of a 27 year-old man."

Sunday Church Service

Sunday church service tomorrow, February 8th, at our church has been changed to be about Andrew and all that has happened the past few days. If you go to our church's website, www.redeemerbiblechurch.com at 8:30am Central Time or 10:30am Central Time, you can listen to the entire service streamed live. The link to the live services only comes during that period of time, though, so you won't find the link if you look ahead of time.

Hope you can listen.

Love,
Grace

With Our Savior

Andrew is now in the presence of Jesus. We praise the Lord that He called Andrew to be His and that Andrew is now rejoicing before the throne of grace without pain or suffering. He went at 12:35pm Central time. All his family was around him to hold his hand as he went peacefully.

Please continue to pray for AJ and Gracie, his mom and dad, his brother and sister, and me that the peace of Christ would continue to be a comfort to us.

More details on the funeral will be forthcoming. We would love for whomever can make it to be there. The viewings will be on Tuesday at Washburn-Mcreavy Funeral Home in Eden Prairie and the memorial service on Wednesday at Redeemer Bible Church in Minnetonka, MN.

Details for airline bereavement rates are to follow.

Also in lieu of flowers, a fund will be set up for AJ and Gracie. More details on that to come as well, but if you are interested in contributing, please email fundforajandgracie@gmail.com and details will be sent to you when they are available.

Thank you all for praying and for your encouraging remarks and for continuing to lift us up in your prayers.

Washburn-Mcreavy Funeral Home
Eden Prairie
7625 Mitchell Road
Eden Prairie, MN 55344
(952)975-0400

Redeemer Bible Church
16205 Highway 7
Minnetonka, MN 55345
(952) 935-2425

A Gift

GRACE WRITES:

Andrew is still here. Perhaps he is waiting for his sister to arrive, who has been driving with her husband through the night from New Jersey. They should be here in less than an hour.

Even though his eyes have been closed the whole time, he usually is not sedated, so he seems to hear what we are saying to him. I think he has terrible bleeds when he gets emotional, then begins to hyperventilate, and then we sedate him. Please pray that would not happen when his sister arrives or ever again. It is really terrible that he has to suffer during those moments, and I don't think I can take another bleed. But what has kept coming to mind in those moments is that he looks like Jesus to me as he suffers. And I feel reassured that his suffering is not inconsistent with him being favored by God, because Jesus preceded Andrew in all his suffering. Jesus blazed the trail of suffering and went before us so that we could follow in His footsteps.

Thank you all so much for your prayers and words of encouragement. I am sorry that you all have to cry for him. Please pray that I would be ready for what is to come and that his family would be too.

I love him more than ever now. These 24 hours, everything reminds me of memories with him. Even the faded memories are vivid now. It is like our time together is flashing before my eyes over several hours, the way they say your life flashes before your eyes in the instant before you die. And yet, somehow, the Lord has shielded me from the grief that could completely overwhelm. I am so fearful of future grief, fearful that it will strangle me. But so far it has not come yet.

Andrew had said to me recently that we could be thankful at least for the time we did have together. I said I wanted more time and it wasn't enough. But as it all flashes before me, I just feel so thankful. So privileged to have loved so deeply and to be loved by someone so extraordinary that he could love me in spite of all my sin and despite how unworthy I was of him. He was such a picture of the gospel to me and taught me so much about Jesus' gospel love through the way he loved me. When we fell in love, I thought we might be the happiest people on earth. That is a gift. And I'm thankful to have ever tasted of it.

Update

Just got an update from Grace via txt. She says Andrew hasn't gone yet, but is on high doses of morphine and has not been conscious since the last text (which was at 3:30 am). His brother has just arrived. It should be any time now. She asks for prayer that he is physically comfortable in his final hours here.

Thank you all for your prayers. I have relayed to Grace that an enormous amount of people are praying and pouring out their concern and expressions of love via email and here on the blog. I don't think she's been checking emails or been on the blog yet today, but I myself have been encouraged by the comments shared and I know that Grace and family will appreciate reading them when they get to it.

Please continue to pray for divine comfort and strength for Grace and their family and for continued peace.

If you haven't had the chance to read any entries below yet, I encourage you to at least read Grace's last post so you can read her own words on how best to pray for her and hopefully you will also be encouraged by her courage and faith.

I will continue to post updates as I hear from Grace.

For HIS glory,

Georgia Lee

PLEASE PRAY

Hi everyone, this is Grace's friend Georgia writing.

I got a call from Grace at 1:30 am pacific time this morning from an ambulance on the way to the hospital. She asked me to spread the word to pray. Andrew had a major bleed which the doctors said would happen (see post on blog from 1/24). Pray that the Lord would continue to sustain Andrew's life and if it is in His will that He would show His glory through a miraculous healing. Pray that the Lord would give Grace strength and peace, and also the same for the family surrounding them right now. And pray for wisdom and clarity of mind for the doctors.

The paragraph above was from emails that went out at 1:30. It is now 3:30 am and my heart is heavy as I write this post and I just got a text from Grace saying that Andrew will be going soon. Please continue to pray for everything above, but with this new information in mind pray especially for comfort, strength and peace for Grace & family.

Refuge

GRACE WRITES:

Andrew is still here. We got a hospital-grade humidifier with a mask with an oxygen machine earlier this week, and he discovered that some of what was exacerbating his breathing problems was dried mucous. A cold has been going through our household and it's likely that Andrew got it too, but it wasn't obvious because his pain medications covered a lot of the symptoms. Before this discovery, it seemed like Andrew's breathing was getting exponentially worse each day and I wasn't even sure if he would make it to the end of the week. For that reason, Andrew's parents are now with us again. He says he still feels tumors causing swelling in his throat, but it's not increasing in size as rapidly every day as I had feared. Every day I wake up, look over, and see that he's still alive. I consider him living each day on a miracle now. Each breath breathed into him by God. But I suppose that's the reality that each of us live on every day of our lives, we just take it for granted.

So far, he has not gotten a trache put into his throat yet. We had figured that since his oxygen levels were still at a %100 and that his breathing had improved since getting the humidifier, he didn't feel ready yet to get the trache. There is the risk that he won't even make it through the surgery or that even if he does, will it even give him more time with all the trauma it will cause in exchange for the breaths, and will the pain be so unmanageable that he will be sedated to the point of it being like he's already left? Please continue to pray for wisdom for us, as he may still get the trache put in this Wednesday.

Please also continue to pray that Andrew (and the rest of us) will get good rest at night. He wakes often due to coughing, discomfort, etc. I spend most of the day in the room with him as he rests, feeding him his juices and the countless things that need to be done for him, trying to comfort him, and just be with my love. Grace Lindeman continues to make his 9 fresh juices, food, and various things. We continue to do the therapy.

My sister and Sam Jay took the kids a lot during the day each week. And now that Andrew's parents are here, they watch the kids. I miss the kids a lot, but at least I get to see them when I leave the room. By the way, my eczema has been clearing up, but please continue to pray that it will heal.

I can't explain the peace that God has given me through this time. I feel very literally as if His peace is guarding my heart. There are, of course, periods of crying when I think of my love being gone. The disappointment. How our recent 5 year anniversary seems to mean that we are practically newlyweds. Our hopes had been that we would spend the rest of our lives together. I had thought that knowing who you would spend the rest of your life with would seem scary and final, but found that the idea of spending my life with Andrew made me smile and feel relieved and excited. We had thought that our lives would be beautiful no matter what adventure life brought us, because we were together. Eventually, I pictured years down the road, a full, loud house teeming with kids, overflowing out onto the yard, the kids screaming as they played tag. I cry when I pause past our wedding pictures in the living room because they remind me of those hopes. We looked so happy and hopeful that day. It almost seems like we were fools from this vantage. Yet, those feelings of sadness, as pure as they feel, the pure feeling of sadness unmixed with other feelings, do not feel like despair. I cry and then when I'm done, I feel fine again. I know there is no other explanation except that the Lord is sustaining me with incredible peace that only comes at desperate times like these, where all else falls away, and all there can be is Jesus.

Don't think that I have spent the last almost year of this trial in peace like this. Trust me, there are times where I spent long periods walking in my flesh and not trusting the Lord, so deep in my flesh, I didn't even know it. I believe my peace now is due to all of you praying like crazy for me and and also that in unique times, times of emergencies, I believe God gives special grace to wives. It is His grace, definitely not something I have labored for.

I remember when Erik Greene from our church in Washington unexpectedly was rushed to the ER and was not expected to make it through the night. They did not know what had happened to him, except that he was not going to live. I could hardly think about Andrew who was about to go into his first cancer surgery January of '07, his surgery paling in comparison to Erik's situation. I was horrified at the idea of Erik leaving his wife and four children. I wept for three days pleading with the Lord for his healing. Erik survived the first night and spent the next few weeks in a coma. Despite the doctor telling his wife to unplug him after a few weeks, she continued to have unmovable hope. When I saw her, I couldn't believe the peace she had. Not only did Erik wake up from his coma, he's doing great today.

And so, I believe God has a special place for wives that are His, while those observing help carry the burden by taking the role of weeping and praying and maybe even having to suffer more grief than that of the wife for that time. So please keep praying for me, because the Lord is answering. I can feel you are praying for me, because this is definitely not of me.

Though Andrew's suffering is more than most anyone will suffer in their lifetime, and it may not feel or look like it, we all must continue to believe that God works all things together for the good of those who love Him, and that it is all for His glory (Romans 8). We must ask God to give us the faith to believe that. We can pour out our frustrations and griefs and questions honestly to Him, because they are no secret to Him, and only He can change our hearts.

"Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge." Psalm 62:7-9

Please continue to pray
- for REST at night especially for Andrew, but for all of us too
- that Andrew will be able to breathe easily and not need the trache. For wisdom whether to get it or not
- that the peace of Christ would guard our hearts, as well as his parents' hearts
- for a miraculous escape from death
- that our suffering would result in us knowing Christ more intimately (Phil. 3).

A rock and a hard place...

ANDREW WRITES:

We made it back safely from California last week and it was so great to be home. Everything went just as planned and we arrived home Friday night/Saturday morning a little before 1AM.

On Saturday we got things started with the Gerson Therapy and by early this week we were pretty much settled back into life in MN. I almost feel like we've been here all winter.

On Saturday we had a short open house for people to welcome us back and it was so encouraging and wonderful to see people again. I didn't miss the weather, but I missed the people so much and I was so happy to see everybody.

We've been so well taken care of since returning between our church and neighbors helping out and Grace L. from Canada doing much of the leg work for the Gerson Therapy for us. We also have a high school teenager from the neighborhood come several times per week to relieve Grace L. so she can get a break from the non-stop work.

The first few days this week I was totally exhausted from our trip home and spent 2-3 days straight in bed. By Tuesday I was feeling a little better and Wednesday I was good enough to get out and pay a visit to Dr. Yueh. I had been in contact with Dr. Yueh over the past several weeks regarding my breathing and the wound in my neck. I sent him pictures and he told me how to dress the wound while I was in California.

We knew this visit wasn't going to be a positive, exciting, happy one, so we asked Jason D. to come along for moral support and so we could have another person there to help us process the information they give us.

Basically Dr. Yueh's opinion is that given my difficulty breathing and the huge deep hole in my neck (click to see photo) which keeps getting bigger, my demise will likely occur one of two ways.

Either my breathing will continue to get worse until I gradually get to the point of suffocation, or the tumor invades the carotid artery, bursts it open and I bleed to death on the spot through the hole in my neck. To be honest, I was really hoping for something a little more pleasant but I guess that's not how the Lord has chosen for my cancer to progress.

Immediately after Dr. Yueh said that images started coming into my mind of me alone in my bedroom laying on my bed bleeding or suffocating to death. A look of despair in my eyes, arms flailing hoping to grab my wife's familiar hand, but nobody is there to comfort me. That would be a very sad situation, please pray that would not happen to me. If the Lord would have one of these things happen to me I would at least want Grace to be there to hold my hand as I go.

Since I'm already having trouble breathing suffocation is really a possibility and might not be that far away. To avoid suffocation I could have a tracheotomy which would place a hole below my Adam's apple with a metal tube that extends down my trachea a few inches to bypass the area where the tumors are pressing on my airway. I had this for about a month when I had my surgery in March.

It seems like this would be the right thing to do, but I'm extremely hesitant to do it because of the effect it would have on my quality of life. The hole in my neck extends to the spot where the trache tube would be placed, and that is the most painful part of the wound. When I change my dressing on my neck every day, even with all the pain medications I'm on, touching that spot will bring me to my knees wincing in pain. So the thought of placing a metal tube through that spot with a 1 inch square plate stabilizing it and rubbing my wound 24/7 just makes me shiver just thinking about it. Of course the doctors say that they could just give me more pain meds, but even if that did work, which is unlikely, I'll need so much that I'll be sedated most of the time. In addition, even if you cover the opening of the tube, there is still some air leakage around the hole in my neck so I might not be able to clear my throat well which will cause me to gag on my own saliva, and I may not be able to whisper anymore which my main form of communication right now. My gut feeling is also telling me that since my body rarely responds to invasive procedures and treatments the way doctors say that most patients typically respond (remember the 3 additional corrective surgeries in March, my jaw that never healed, prolonged pain and difficulties with my PEG tube and right leg skin graft site, and now the open wound on my neck), that this just isn't a good idea. Lastly, this is totally not as important and you might think I'm crazy for saying this, but it would be nice to preserve a little dignity during my last days on this earth. So these are all the reasons I could say no to a decision that seems like it should be an obvious yes on the surface. In fact, I really wish it was an obvious yes.

So I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. Please please please pray for wisdom what I should do. Dr. Yueh is not at all pressuring me one way or another, but he wants me to make a decision by early next week so I can have the procedure done before the tumors make it too difficult to place the trache. Some nights I wake up every 30 minutes gasping for air because mucus has dried up in my airway and makes it difficult to breath. Other nights I breath easily and I'm not worried about suffocation at all. So its really hard to know just how urgent it is for me to do the tracheotomy. I know a lot of my reservations about the tracheotomy are fears and anxieties about discomfort and pain and God can take care of all of that. But I still just don't know if that is the right thing to do. All the docs thought a second course of radiation was the right thing to do, but it turned out that it didn't work and caused huge complications including possibly being one of the biggest contributing factors behind this wound in my neck. We've done everything the doctors said we should do, but it typically doesn't work out the way we were expecting. So, I feel very uneasy about this decision. Please pray for wisdom and that God would make it undeniably clear which direction to go and that I would not regret or complain.

As I mentioned some nights I wake up gasping for air, usually because I had a bad dream that caused my heart and breathing rate to increase. Tonight my dream ended with AJ and Gracie sitting on some sort of bench at a park looking longingly at the playground area but they had to finish their food before they could go play. So I guess they scarfed down their food and took off running towards the slides then another boy sitting right next to them jumped up off the bench and took off after them in nothing but a diaper. Yup, a toddling baby boy! I woke up tonight happy from this dream, not gasping for air, and decided to write a blog. I'm not superstitious or anything like that, but I can pray that my dreams come true.

Please Pray:

1) For wisdom about whether or not to do a tracheotomy. That I would seek God's glory in the decision rather than personal comfort.

2) That my wound in my neck and my breathing would get better and not worse.

3) For complete healing and pain relief.

4) That I would not be anxious about all the things that I need to do but can't do because I have little energy.

5) That I would see this as an opportunity to be to learn humility as one who is helpless than be frustrated about my disabilities. I can't drive, lift anything heavy or even make my own phone calls.

6) For Grace, my wife, and Grace L. that God would sustain them as they take care of me and the kids. There is a little bit of a cold just starting to go around our household, Gracie and Grace M. got it, so pray that the rest of us won't get it.

7) That I would really be able to continue to have lots of time with my wife and kids and that I would use it wisely. Pray that God would provide enough help during these times so that we can be free to spend more time together. It just seems like it doctors appointments and phone calls and medications, and wound dressings and all sorts of distractions so we passing by each other but unfocused. Tomorrow we're going to try setting a block of time each afternoon for Grace and I. Pray that other things wouldn't crowd into it.

8) That God would provide an alternative speech device SOON so that I can begin communicating more easily with others and especially my kids. My kids are really good at picking up my slurred whispers, but they can't read yet so they miss out on a lot. I can't simply sit with them with a pad of paper and converse with them.

Pain in the Neck

GRACE WRITES:

Andrew hasn't been feeling well, so he hasn't been able to blog. So sorry for keeping all of you in such suspense.

Since Andrew's previous blog, Andrew's parents, brother, sister, and her husband were able to come out for the holidays and stay with us at the treatment center. The Stillings here at the treatment center let us have the whole place to ourselves, while they continued to perform the treatment for us. It was such a blessing and provision from God. Andrew was so happy to spend that time with his family. Andrew's voice slowly gave out while his family was here, but was at least understandable to me and the kids, so that I could interpret for him, if his family couldn't understand. Now, he can only whisper, and it is hard even for me to understand.

As soon as Andrew's family left, he became completely exhausted and spent most of the next eight days asleep in bed. Part of that was from him quickly increasing his narcotics dosages, especially the fentenyl, and part of it was just exhaustion from him being so active with his family. I have never seen him this exhausted before. I am so thankful that I can give him his juices and meals through his tube, because he truly could not have been awake enough to eat it himself if he had to do it through his mouth. Since Monday, he gradually has had a little more energy to get up during the day to at least go outside and take a nap, or nap in the living room.

Andrew has not been feeling well. He feels it is best for us to go home now. He was doing so well, but then a giant hole opened up in his neck towards the end of December, and has flung him back onto pain, narcotics, and misery. We are actually returning to MN on this Friday, via San Diego Airport (only direct flight on Sun Country Airlines available for that date). A couple from our church will drive the RV back.

Andrew says: "I'm in tons of pain and soreness which continues to slowly get worse. The pain meds unfortunately don't work that well for this type of pain. The best I can describe it is it's like my nerves ache from the inside and the pain meds numb the outside. So it's like this deep set pain in the core of my muscles and bones that I cant get rid of."

I do not know which will win out - the Gerson therapy or over-radiation, which is likely the main cause of his neck falling apart. The Gerson Therapy is most successful on people who have never done conventional treatments. So far, all of the patients that we have met over the past two months have never done radiation or chemotherapy.

Andrew says he feels like he is at a crossroads. Either this is the "getting worse before the getting better" part that Dr. Stillings kept warning about or this is the decline.

Dr. Stillings thinks that Andrew's analysis makes sense, and he continues not to give us false guarantees, but at the same time he still thinks that this all could very well be his body gearing up and fighting the tumors with all its got. He's always an encouragement to us, and helps us to keep on fighting day after day.

Dr. Stillings thinks the hole in Andrew's neck is the body's natural way of debriding the skin that does not have enough blood circulation from all the radiation, and that the hole will stop getting bigger once it hits viable skin. The hole opened up real fast in a week and a half. Since then, it has slowly gotten a little bigger. It is now about the size of his thumb in all three dimensions. It's awful, and I can't imagine how a person can be alive with a huge hole in his body, let alone in his neck.

I am praying that the Lord would provide a way to do hyperbaric oxygen therapy, what they use for burn victims and diabetics, who get huge holes in their bodies. There is research that shows that cancer cannot survive in an hyper-oxygenated environment. So in fact, hyperbaric oxygen is great for cancer patients in general. Some doctors, however think that stimulating blood vessel growth and circulation could cause the cancer to grow faster but in Andrew's case I think dealing with this horrific wound is worth that risk. I have been looking for alternative treatment centers that do hyperbaric oxygen in the Minneapolis area, as it is unlikely that a medical doctor will allow it for a cancer patient, but Google searches are never successful for me.

The narcotics, which tend to shut down autonomic functions and the swelling from tumors or the wound in his neck, causes andrew to wake up gasping for air at night. He does fine when he's sitting up, but if he's reclined at all, it bothers him. But he says he can't sleep sitting up because he gags on his own saliva. So sleep has been really hard for him.

As for me, my eczema has flared up 50 times worse than ever before in my life. It's possible that my body is doing the getting worse before it gets better thing that they say happens in holistic medicine, as I have been doing the Gerson diet with Andrew, only with less juices, or simply it's related to stress. I imagine it may be both. If one could die of eczema, I sometimes feel like it could be me. PLEASE pray that the Lord would relieve me of my leprosy.

At night is when I often have a sudden flare up into misery where my skin feels like it is on fire and I wish I could unzipper my skin and jump out of it. Medicines and creams that I had from my dermatologist that used to work are completely useless now. I drink over a gallon of liquid a day, and yet still, I wake up looking like I've been stranded in the desert. My skin soaks up lotion like I never put layer upon layer upon layer on. Sometimes, the lotion makes my skin even more itchy and I just want to leave it alone and not touch it. It's not food allergies, because I've already been tested for them, and I had been on this diet for over a month before this ever started.

My only relief has been to flee out into the night, taking A.J. with me as my protector, and to cry out loud to God. It's a quiet neighborhood, and so far no one has been outside to hear me. I pour out all my frustrations to God about everything and to rescue me from my skin. Between that, the cool air, heavy breathing, and the distractions of the cozy lights of the houses, by the time we return home, the burning has relented.

Waking when Andrew wakes and waking up due to my eczema throughout the night, sleep is extremely interrupted for the both of us.

The kids are the same as always. Going with the flow, playing together, and our consistent source of smiles. 16 year-old Grace Lindeman from Canada, who had helped us for a few weeks over the summer, has come to us again. She arrived at the treatment center last night to learn the therapy and so she can assist us on the flight back. Pray that the flight won't over-exhaust Andrew or be too terrible for him or my skin. Grace will be with us for a month to make all of Andrew's juices, foods, and other therapy-related things, while I try to find someone to hire to do the therapy in the mornings. I already have two teenagers who can do the therapy for us in the afternoons. I'm nervous to return to the icebox of America. Pray none of us get sick, because that could mean pneumonia for Andrew, which could be devastating.

It has been sooooo wonderful to be in California. For the first month it was as if God called a time-out in our cancer trial and we forgot about cancer and had the time of our lives. Andrew was on no pain meds, had energy, and felt great. It was so great to see so many old friends. You brought the old laughter and carefreeness back into our lives for a little bit. We will miss you all so much.

Thank you all for your prayers, concern, and concrete expressions of love.

Please pray for:
1. The hole to heal in Andrew's neck and for his body's healing
2. Pain relief
3. Sleep for the both of us at night
4. Healing of my eczema
5. That we won't get sick in MN

Treatment update

ANDREW WRITES:

We've been back at the treatment center for the last 3 weeks and will remain here at least until the end of December. The last week or so has been a real setback for me. My energy levels have been good, blood work is spot on, appetite is still increasing and my weight is up a few pounds, but my neck is literally falling apart.

Over the past several months I've been developing these very slow growing lumps on the right side of my neck. My doctors didn't know what they were and just left them alone since it was quite obvious that I already had cancer elsewhere in my body. In the past week or two some of those lumps have come to the surface and broken open and are not healing. There is quite a bit of drainage and my oncologist and surgeon in Minnesota don't really know why this is happening. One of the boils started off like a big blister, but after it popped it has grown deeper and wider, and is continuing to grow. I think the area was already quite irritated by tumors deeper in the right thyroid cartilage. I suspect that this is breaking apart so quickly and not healing due to the irritation from tumors combined with the fact that I've had way too much radiation which similarly caused a breakdown in my jaw in August. The radiation compromised the tissue and blood supply so much that things break down very easily and don't heal. In just a few days the wound grew so deep that I could fit the tip of my pinky into it. A few days ago I woke up with much more pain and noticed that it doubled in length and tore open along the scar of my surgical incision. I'd seen some pretty nasty wounds with all that I've been through, and my gut feeling was that this one is big trouble so we went to the ER to get it checked out.

The ER doctor and the wound care specialist on call at the time said that there isn't anything I can do to stop it from progressing at this point. I have a follow up with a wound care specialist next Monday. I wrote an update to our small group last week asking for prayer. At that time the wound was the size of the tip of my pinky. Now, a week later the wound is the size of my pinky, length, depth and height. If I literally took my pinky off my hand I could fit it right into long crater in my neck. I can see muscles in my neck moving around. My knees get weak just looking at it when I clean it.

Please pray that God would heal the wound, heal me of cancer, and relieve some of the pain. I'm back on a decent dose of narcotics to give me some comfort, but the pain breaks through the narcotics every few hours.

Despite this setback in the neck, the rest of my body is holding up ok. Other than being tired from the narcotics, I'm still doing much much better as a whole than I was doing in October when I was on narcotics. So praise God for that. Since the wound in near my voice box I am starting to really lose my voice. I'm not sure if this is from inflamation from the wound, or from cancer taking over things. Despite the pain, I'm amazed that I'm still able to spend lots of quality time with my family from NJ, who came out here to visit for the holidays. I love them so much and I'm so thankful to be together with them. They're even making the sacrifice to eat most of the meals with me here at the treatment center on this special diet!

Please pray:

1) For healing from cancer and from this wound.

2) That I wouldn't continue to be anxious or discouraged about this, that I would just see it as another way to have to trust God through this trial. I'm struggling with fears and anxiety of pain and suffering. I'm also fearful that this will cause my health to spiral down again.

3) That God would relieve my pain and give me rest at night.

Few good bosses...

ANDREW WRITES:

I sent an email yesterday to my old boss, Dave, at Motorola in Seattle to say hello to him. I had been meaning to send him an email for a long time, but I kept getting sidetracked by my health or treatments. Yesterday's email came back undeliverable, which made me wonder, because I know his email address like the back of my hand.

This week I was making plans to return to Minnesota sometime in January rather than stay the whole winter in California. I wanted to take the northern route to pass through Seattle to visit with him.

Dave was a huge help to me as I dealt with my first bout with cancer in 2007, since he himself had gone through cancer treatments a few years earlier. He totally understood what I was going through, and made sure to support me in any way he could. When I returned to work after my first round of treatments in the summer of 2007, I told him that I don't know what is around the corner in life, but I know that moving to Minnesota would be the best place for my family, especially if cancer came back. So he pushed to get me to Minnesota and still be able to keep my job with Motorola.

I was shocked this morning to find out the bad news. His cancer had returned soon after we moved to Minnesota. It turns out that he passed away last month.

When I first interviewed with Dave for a job in his office, I told him that I was going to get married pretty soon. As a good boss he was often thinking about the quality of my personal life, so he said to me, " Then we better fly Grace up here as well for a weekend, because if you're going to be successful, its going to be with the support of your wife."

When I first started working for Dave I was a proud, naive college graduate, but he bore with me and helped me develop despite all my flaws. In the coming years Dave continued to help me flourish as a young man and engineer. He had a profound impact on my life to say the least.

Things I learned from Dave:

1) Don't eat too many Yakima cherries at one time, they're explosive if you know what I mean.

2) Take your your work seriously, not your boss.

3) Work with the utmost integrity. It may not get you a bigger bonus or the next promotion, but its just the right thing to do.

4) To some work is their life. Dave always taught me that work is a part of life. Enjoy life and you'll enjoy work.

Encouraging

ANDREW WRITES:

Today at the treatment center I met a man that came here a year ago with stage 4 malignant melanoma. He had a huge tumor on his foot and cancer all the way up his leg to his thigh. A year ago they had to help him just to get up and walk to the back patio of the treatment center.

After doing this treatment for a year, he has returned. Doctors' scans show that there is only one little tiny lump in his thigh, and the tumor in his foot has gone completely away. He still limps some because there is non-cancerous dead tissue where the tumor was, but he's having that removed. He was able to take a 1.5 mile hike the other day compared to not being able to walk a year ago.

He hugged me and told me that it is a lot of work, but to stick to the therapy. If you create a good environment for your body to deal with the cancer, it can do it! Seeing his remarkable recovery and his happy spirit encourages me to keep fighting!

Please keep praying for neck and back pain relief, as that makes it difficult to sleep at night.

Thank you Lord

ANDREW AND GRACE WRITE:

This year we decided to spend Thanksgiving alone as a family. We got up early and started the normal routine for the Gerson Therapy, which means cooking oatmeal, juice, and starting lunch. We had family worship and then began preparations for a day at the beach.

We ate lunch and dinner at the beach. What I loved about it was having the day centered around the beach rather than a feast. The kids LOVED splashing in the water and playing in the sand. Around this time last year they had their shovels out playing in the snow with their hats, jackets, and gloves. This year it's sand and shirtless =).

My health is holding up still. I tried to get completely off over the counter pain meds (tylenol) but it made me miserable, so I'm going to still use a little bit to keep the sanity. The pain is centered around my neck and right shoulder. Even though I struggle with some pain, overall I'm doing much better than a month ago. I know that the reason I'm feeling better rather than worse is because God is answering your prayers.

Many of you are wondering what our daily routine is like doing the Gerson Therapy. The day starts around 7AM. Grace simmers an organic oatmeal breakfast, squeezes fresh orange juice, and washes whatever vegetables are needed for the day's juices as well as meals. After breakfast, we juice every hour until 6PM. There are 4 green juices and 5 carrot juices in addition to the fresh orange juice for my particular regimen. The green juices contain an assortment of veggies like escarole, chard, green pepper, red cabbage, red lettuce, and rommaine. The carrot juices are usually just carrots, or sometimes carrot and apple. To each juice, we add a specific regimen of supplements like pancreatin (digestive enzymes), potassium, dessicated liver, CoQ10, and Acidoll. The juicing is probably the hardest part because not only do you have to run the juicer every hour so that the juice is fresh and the enzymes don't die, but you also need to purchase and wash and cut an enormous amount of vegetables, then consume it 10 times per day. In addition, the meals are just as time consuming because most things have to be cooked fresh and then pureed for insertion into my tube.

We've had an extraordinary amount of help so far. Last Tuesday Grace had a cutting party. A group of college students who go to Grace on Campus, our old Bible study, helped wash and cut a week's worth of meals, sprayed the insides of the bags with Vitamin C to keep the veggies as fresh as the moment they were cut, and vacuum bagged them. Then Wed, Friday, and Saturday various people came from VOH, a church my friend pastors, to help in the afternoons to tidy up, help prepare dinner, clean veggies and set up for the following day. Many of these people are people we are meeting for the first time. Its almost like a restaurant the amount of stuff that is going on in the kitchen. It turns out the the kitchen in the house we're staying at in Cerritos is twice as big as our kitchen at home in Minnesota, so it actually makes things run much smoother than it might otherwise.

We know the Lord is causing this therapy to keep happening hour after hour, because so far I have gotten all of my 10 juices and all my fresh meals each day since we left the treatment center, despite how it usually takes two weeks to get settled into the therapy after leaving the center. Despite all kinds of obstacles and all the work required, by God's grace, each juice manages to come like clockwork.

Our plan is to return to the treatment center in Redlands for the month of December. It turns out the wonderful family that runs the treatment center are Christians. They saw how much progress I (and Grace too) was making in my health that they invited us back and offered us a great deal. We've been under so much pressure the past several years, that being at the treatment center is such a relief. They will take care of all the meals and juicing for us, while we relax, focus on healing and spend time with the kids. We're planning on staying in the RV with the kids for part of it, and then staying in the treatment center for the rest of the time. Then in January we're praying that the Lord will provide a place to stay and a car for a few months in the West LA area.

Huntington Beach - the weather forecast said cloudy with chance of showers. Guess they were wrong! Grace was smart enough to remember to bring all of our sand toys from Minnesota!

Lunch

The kids love waves and sand

We also got a catch the sunset