master of the universe

I (Dan) think this is the third time I've had some sort of stomach thing since January. So today I'm just lying around moaning. I don't know who you should pray for more, me, or Daryl who has to put up with a sick husband again. Tomorrow morning the lab will be open, and I'll find out if I have another parasite, or bacteria, or amoeba, or something new maybe this time, that would make it more interesting. Then I'll tromp off to the pharmacy, buy my packet of pills, and begin to rid my system of critters.

Anyway, I was reading our last post, about life going well, and it really is, even with being sick 3 times in 3 months. In fact, it seems to be going better because I'm sick. I had been relatively healthy for the first 18 months here, it's just the last 3 or so that my stomach has become a top pick for parasite vacation spots. But it's also in the last 3 months that God has done some really incredible things in our family, ministry, friendships, and lives. I think it's related.

When I got sick in January, I mean, I was really really really sick. And God and I had this yelling session. I'm serious, I was walking around our bedroom, too sick to venture far from the bed or bathroom, and I began yelling at the ceiling. I was angry, confused, sick, miserable, and wanted some answers. There's something freeing in talking to God honestly. He can handle it. He can take it. Not that God gave me any answers. It's just that I connected with God, in a hard but deeply personal way, and concluded, if anything good happened in the next months, it would only be God, because I was just too sick and tired to accomplish anything.

A few weeks later the youth at our church wanted to start a "contemporary" early morning service, and they asked if I would share a short sermonette. It was Wednesday, I asked them to wait till Saturday, and in the middle I prayed. On Friday God gave me something to share for Sunday. This went on for the next 4 weeks, each week asking for something more, each week receiving an answer just in time to share it on Sunday. The same has been true with prayer requests about other ministry things, about our family, about our personal lives. I don't like being sick. But it's been really refreshing to catch a glimpse of God at work.

I like this comic posted above, reminds me that there is only one Master of the Universe, and it's not me :) And I was listening to this song by Steven Curtis Chapman, "God is God" and it was a good reminder this morning.

And the pain falls like a curtain
On the things I once called certain
And I have to say the words I fear the most
I just don’t know

And the questions without answers
Come and paralyze the dancer
So I stand here on the stage afraid to move
Afraid to fall, oh, but fall I must
On this truth that my life has been formed from the dust

God is God and I am not
I can only see a part of the picture He’s painting
God is God and I am man
So I’ll never understand it all
For only God is God

And the sky begins to thunder
And I’m filled with awe and wonder
‘Til the only burning question that remains
Is who am I

Can I form a single mountain
Take the stars in hand and count them
Can I even take a breath without God giving it to me
He is first and last before all that has been
Beyond all that will pass

Oh, how great are the riches of His wisdom and knowledge
How unsearchable for to Him and through
Him and from Him are all things

So let us worship before the throne
Of the One
who is worthy of worship alone

Happy Easter