I had the wierdest thing happen the other day. A very good friend of mine has been having some strange symptoms. She is definately not a hypochondriac or the type of person that complains about the little stuff. So for her to even say anything really got my attention.

She beat around the bush for a few days, but finally told me what she was thinking. She thought that she might possibly have ovarian cancer. Woah!!! She was in tears thinking about what would happen to her kids and so on. I was just in shock. She is the kind of person that is really in tune with herself and I knew she wouldn't even say it out loud unless that was really what she thought.

She was going to go in to the doctor the next day to have an ultrasound to see and she asked me to pray for her. I began praying that evening, but it was different. I hate to say this, but I just had a different intensity. I felt guilty... I should be praying for every need with that kind of focus and intensity. I started to pray and naturally I prayed that this would not be so... and if it were so that God would do a miracle and just take this away... but this is where it got wierd....

I began to think back over the past. A year or so ago our pastor read from a journal of a lady that passed away from cancer. And in her journal in her dying moments she said that she was thankful for the cancer.. yes, you heard me right... thankful. It had given her such focus and clarity. She loved her family better. She loved the Lord better. Everything she did, she did at a greater level . She said that if given the opportunity to go back and change things that she would choose this same path. And not to long ago I spoke with someone who was terminally ill with cancer and they said the same thing.

I had this moment where I really didn't know what to pray. I know that God says that He wants to give us the desires of our heart, so it isn't wrong to ask for something. But I also know that sometimes God sends us down a path that we would never choose in order to bring about the change He has promised to complete in us... to be like His Son.

I am not sure what the answer is, but I know that God knows our hearts and He understands us better than we understand ourselves and in Romans 8:26 it says that "the Spirit helps us in our weakness, for we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself makes intercession for us with groanings that cannot be uttered." So for that I am thankful. The sovereignty of God is a mind boggling thing...but I am so thankful that I can count on it even though I can't completely get my head wrapped around it.

By the way, she had the tests and there is no cancer. God is good... but even if there had been it wouldn't change His goodness. It's like the song 'Bring the rain' says..... "can circumstances possibly change who I forever am in You?."