Brave Women Series
WHEN WE AREN'T GETTING THE HEALING WE WANT: BRAVE HOPE IN BROKENNESS
"I wanted the victory story... No one blamed me for wanting this, so no one held me accountable when this consuming desire gave birth to sin in my heart. Having an able body became an idol for me. My life did not feel worth living without it."
I have always been a “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” kind of girl. No matter what challenges life threw at me, I always managed to muster the grit to overcome them. I love the satisfaction of working hard at something and achieving a goal that, at first, seemed impossible. So when I received the diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis (MS) twenty years ago, I faced it head-on with this kind of “can-do” attitude. Through a lot of research and a ton of discipline I learned to push back my symptoms through nutritional strategies, supplements, and exercise. This served me well for many years, but over time the reality of my broken body has slowly chipped away my illusion of control.
For so long, overcoming MS meant not giving up when treatment after treatment failed to work. It meant refusing to give in to despair, discouragement, or depression. It meant adapting to each new limitation with a buoyant attitude that refused to let my illness become my identity. I would adjust to each new challenge without skipping a beat. I was determined to live as normal of a life as possible in spite of my constant decline in health and function.
I’m not saying that these things are necessarily wrong. By all means, we should all be good stewards of our bodies, stay positive, and do everything possible to optimize our health. However, as I examined my heart, I realized that my tenacious determination to keep moving forward was actually a resistance to accept what God was allowing in my life. I wanted the victory story. I wanted a healthy, functioning body and I was willing to do just about anything to get it. No one blamed me for wanting this, so no one held me accountable when this consuming desire gave birth to sin in my heart.
Having an able body became an idol for me. My life did not feel worth living without it. What many thought was a resilient, faith-filled response to adversity was actually a type of spiritual defiance. I was fighting for the life I wanted rather than accepting the life God has given me. In His sovereignty He has allowed my sickness and my decline. As R.C. Sproul famously put it, “There are no maverick molecules in the universe.” My circumstances are not a cosmic oversight that slipped under God’s radar undetected. What has felt like unanswered prayer has been His answer all along. It’s just not the answer I was wanting.
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