Warriors Lynn and Dennis

This past week has been an emotional week for many reasons but underlying it all I think is the letdown I feel for the end of October. As I mentioned it has not been the October I planned for, but it has been a good lesson in letting go and letting The Lord order my steps. Specifically, I thought that my participation in 31 Days would have been more than the six warrior stories I have gotten to share this month. However, it has been incredible to experience the ways that each has come about. There have been many personal battles and victories in the writing of each one. Thank you so much to those who guest blogged for Pinked Perspective. I am certain there are many that have been touched by your stories.

For today’s post, the last of the 31 Days of Warrior Stories, I wanted to introduce you to the first loves of my life. When one walks through treatment for breast cancer, she does not do so alone. At least I hope that anyone facing this kind of journey never feels as though they are doing it alone. Along the way I have highlighted many of the key players in my story, those that fought right alongside me. But as I grow in my role as a parent to an almost eight year old and newly six year old so does my understanding of what it must have been like for my mom and dad to learn of my Breast cancer diagnosis. I am pretty sure there would be nothing more heartbreaking than to see my children suffer. Something tells me that that fact won’t change whether they are eight and six or thirty-three. So, in honor of and for inspiration in the battles that we, as parents, fight for the safety and health of our kids, I have asked Warriors Lynn and Dennis to share….

It is in the nature of being a parent that we want to protect our children from any and all hurt, from any and all difficulty, any and all adversity. Therefore, when we were confronted with the crushing news that Kara was diagnosed with breast cancer, the why questions flooded in …why her?  why should a healthy 33 year old mother of two small children have breast cancer?  LORD, this is not supposed to happen to her — no one in our families had ever been sick with breast cancer. Then we looked for the cause and began to play the “blame game”.  What did we do wrong in her upbringing? Did we feed her the wrong baby food, did we give her too many antibiotics, did we live in the wrong place, did we, did we, did we?? Of course, there were no answers.  There was NO reason, NO explanation.  At that point, we felt like we were in a CHECKMATE situation — we had no other moves to make — just like the Israelites as Moses led them out of Egypt and right to the shores of the Red Sea.  We could only fall on our knees in prayer and ask the Lord to part the sea and carry us on dry land through the unknown ahead.

We discovered that what we had heard in all those sermons, read in all those books and learned from all those Bible studies we had attended — in our 40 years of being followers of Jesus – it all came down to the truth we had come to know that GOD loves Kara more than we ever could, that He knows the cancer cells attacking her healthy body, and He has the power to heal her.  So here is where the “tire meets the road” and we can simply trust and obey, or our so-called faith is all for naught.  As Mordecai explained to Queen Esther, “and who knows but you have come to royal position [or a breast cancer] for such a time as this” (Esther 4:14).  If we truly believe in GOD’s sovereignty — that all time and all that comes our way is in GOD’s Hands — we had to keep our eyes on Him and Him only.  As Peter did, we had to get out of the boat, but not look down at the circumstances facing us, but keep our eyes firmly fixed on Jesus.

As we peer into the rear view mirror, Jesus shows us that what was “intended to harm [Kara], GOD intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done” Genesis 50:20.  The ministry of Pinked Perspective is the good GOD intended.  We  continue to pray for our precious daughter knowing that the Holy Spirit has given her the gifts of compassion, wisdom and love to encourage others on similar journeys as she has taken. Today, we are celebrating our Warrior Daughter.  Kara has taken an unexpected and unexplainable diagnosis of breast cancer and followed the LORD’s vision to serve others through the ministry she aptly calls her Pinked Perspective.