Preparing For Victory
Chapter 5
YEAR OF OPPORTUNITY
Starting out every year, Holly and I like to pray for the upcoming year. We believe that God sets up boundaries everywhere around us. Some of these boundaries include blocks of time. Each day has its own boundary. Each week and month has its own boundary. Every year has its own boundary. We feel like it’s important to pray at the start of each of these boundaries.
As we were praying at the start of 2020, we felt like God was telling us that this year was the year of opportunity. We didn’t know what was in store for us specifically just yet, but we felt like God was going to be preparing us for something big.
Throughout this year, we started or went through so many new things or habits. We didn’t know just how vital these changes would be until much later.
DETOX
Starting a couple days after the Super Bowl, we started on a new detox journey. A good friend of ours, Jamal, was marketing some health and nutrition products and we decided to give them a try. Through this detox program, Holly and I saw drastic results in weight loss and overall health. I personally dropped 42lbs through this program.
Not only did we see awesome results on this detox, but we saw drastic changes in our mental, physical, and spiritual health as well. Getting deadly toxins out of our body was great, but getting the deadly toxins out of our thought-process and spirit was even greater.
Long story short, as we went through a full body cleanse, we got closer to God and we got closer as a couple too. Our spiritual lives and our marriage was beginning to thrive.
CHURCH
Another change we made came in the beginning stages of the c0vid hysteria. We both felt God was calling us away from the church we had been attending for the past 15 years. While we were both on the same page of God calling us away from this church, we just weren’t sure to where He was calling us.
A few weeks into the lockdowns, we found ourselves in a drive-thru Easter event that was put on by a local church we saw advertised on F@cebook. As we were driving through I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit. While it could have just been the free Chick-fil-a they were handing out, I thought God was telling me there was something special about these people.
I noticed a man and woman standing and waving at the passing cars and I asked Holly if she knew who they were. She said that it was Gary and Drenda Keesee, the pastors of the church putting on the event. It was then that I told her I felt God was telling us to attend this church whenever they opened back up.
Over the next couple weeks, we received multiple confirmations that indeed God was pointing us in the direction of this church. Though we didn’t fully know why yet, we started going to this church when they opened their doors a couple weeks after Easter.
ENTREPRENEURSHIP
Holly and I have always had a heart of entrepreneurship. We always try to support local businesses and business owners. We know the sacrifice it takes first hand of owning your own business. We also know all the rewards and benefits that owning your own business and provide.
This being the year of opportunity, we started our own business this year. Whether this particular business explodes or not, we know that creating multiple streams of income, especially passively, will provide so much for our family and allow us cool opportunities to bless others as well.
We’ve been business owner’s before, but this renewed spirit of entreprenurship came at just the right season for us.
THE WAR
If you’ve read this far in this story, you know full well that we faced the most difficult challenge of our lives in August of 2020. When Holly got diagnosed with a brain tumor, it normally would have knocked us out flat.
Looking back on this year, it’s clear to see that God was really preparing us for the battle we were about to face. Any other year and we wouldn’t have had the faith to overcome.
It wasn’t easy going through the detox program we did. It was the most intense and grueling diet or weight loss program I’ve ever attempted. But we made it through and as a result, we were able to cleanse our body and spirit of toxins that would have weighed us now in the midst of our battle.
Attending our new church put us in touch with people who were the biggest prayer warriors for Holly and our family during our battle. We also learned spiritual truths about healing and the authority we had as members of the kingdom of God. I had heard none of these things in my 15+ years of being a “Christian.”
In hindsight, it’s so obvious that God was setting us up to be succeed when the battle started. He has been equipping us all year with tools that we were able to pull out and use during the war. It’s only by the grace of God that we were able to overcome all that we did this past couple of months.
God is so faithful!
UPDATES
In the past couple of weeks, we’ve gained two praise reports in Holly’s journey.
First, we got full confirmation from the doctor that Holly’s tumor was in fact benign — non-cancerous. Praise God!
Second, Holly had a follow-up CT scan to check the progress since her surgery. Not only had the tumor not grown back at all, but the doctor said there’s only a 5% chance that it ever will!
Because things were progressing so well, he also informed us that Holly would NOT need to have ANY radiation treatments! After her surgery, he said that it was likely she would need to have radiation to remove the minuscule fragments of the tumor that had been stuck to a major blood vessel. We stood on God’s promises and had faith that radiation would not be needed and once again, God came through!
The only other follow-up Holly will need will be an MRI once a year to make sure that the tumor doesn’t come back.
THANK YOU DOESN’T SEEM LIKE ENOUGH
It wouldn’t be right to close out this story without giving out a few thank-you’s. I could write an entire book of all the stories of people who blessed us and helped us out through this process. I’ll just highlight a few things here, but just know that every single person who prayed, thought about, reached out, cooked a meal, sent a card, donated, visited, and so on has a special place in our hearts. We will never forget any of you!
I want to give a huge shout out to a few specific people, but this isn’t to take away from anything anyone else did!
Al, Kathy, Jeff, and Marj— you guys are such wonderful and amazing parents and in-laws. Thank you all so much for praying, watching the kids, and all of your financial blessings through this journey. You guys are all such great examples of God’s love! God bless you all!
To Adam and Connie, your friendship to us has been such a blessing. We will never be able to repay you for all that you’ve done for us this past couple of months. Thank you for the prayers, gifts, food, words of encouragement and for ALWAYS willing to drop whatever you were doing to rush to our side during this time! God bless you and your family.
I also wanted to say thank you to our friend Meredith who organized the Meal Train for Holly and our family. So many people donated food, gift cards, money, and visited as a result of the hard work you put into this. God bless you and your family!
To Mitchell and Christy — thank you guys so much for all that you did for us. From the gift basket of goodies to showing up to pray at the hospital to the professional home-cooked meals….thank you, thank you, thank you. You guys are awesome friends! God bless you and your family!
Another cool story that touched my heart and brought me (and my mom and dad) to tears was from the Grove City High School class of 2005 girls. I went to high school with these ladies and even though I usually only see them once a year at our alumni softball tournament, they came together on some gift cards for us. While I had known they were planning on doing this, I was floored when the card came with $250 worth of gift cards to some of our favorite restaurants. We will never forget the blessing you poured out on us and the enormous love you showed our family during our time of need. God bless you all and your families!
I mentioned in a previous chapter that receiving is one of the hardest things for Holly and me. We’re just not good at asking for help or receiving help from people. I think we mostly just don’t want all the extra attention on us. The examples i listed above are just a few of the many things that happened over the past couple of months that left us almost speechless. Thank you just doesn’t seem like enough.
Again, I just want to thank everyone for everything you’ve done for us. If we’re not able to repay you for everything, I believe that God will bless you because He loves a cheerful giver. I know not everyone could be by our side or visit due to location and other circumstances but, we thank you for your continued prayers and gifts you’ve sent. I know not everyone has the ability to give abundantly, but know that every penny donated blessed our family tremendously and we thank you all from the bottom of our hearts.
My final shout out is to everyone in Holly’s Prayer Warriors group on F@cebook. You consistent praying and words of encouragement kept us focus on God’s promises instead of our problems. I can’t begin to thank you all enough.
IN CONCLUSION
Friend, if you’ve made it this far, I commend you. You’ve read about the goodness of God at work in Holly’s situation. You’ve witnessed God’s faithfulness through every step of her journey. You’ve seen first hand how the power of prayer.
I want to leave you with three final thoughts.
First, know that there’s a war going on right now for your soul. There’s an enemy lined up on one side who comes only to steal, kill, and destroy. The bible tells us to put on the full armor of God so that we can take a stand against the devil’s schemes. While most of the armor is for defense, our one offensive weapon is the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. I encourage you to read your Bible and stand on the promises of God.
Second, and this goes hand-in-hand with the first point, God didn’t give Holly her tumor. There’s a common misconception, even amongst Christians, that God allows bad things to happen to teach us a lesson. I think there are many ways God could teach us something without giving us cancer or some other illness. All sickness and disease comes from the devil. Every good and perfect gift comes from God. God is good all the time. God will use what the enemy meant for evil and turn it into good.
Lastly, know that there’s nothing special about Holly or me. Everything blessing and promise of God that has manifested for us through this journey is there for you as well. Call upon the name of Jesus. Make your requests known to God. Pray without ceasing. In doing all of this, you give God access to enter into your situation here in the earth realm. God is always faithful.
If you’re reading this and you don’t have a personal relationship with Jesus, now is as good a time as any to call upon his name. Ask Him to be the ruler of your life and repent of any past sin. You will become a new creation in Christ and start your new journey with Him immediately. All of heaven will rejoice at the news of your decision!
Thank you for coming along and reading about God’s Faithfulness Through Holly’s Journey. May you all be blessed by reading these words and sharing in our experience as we walked this out with so many of you.
God is faithful.
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