Monday Morning

Well, I hope that you all had a great Lord's Day yesterday, and are enjoying the start of a new week today.

We had a great Sabbath yesterday. We:
*Rested - just hung out in the hotel, read, napped, took a walk kind of day.
*Reflected - talked about God's goodness and provision for her regarding the cancer, but also concerning our whole family over the 20+ years we've been married.
*Read - Desiring God (Piper) and The Hidden Face of God (Michael Card), as well as Psalms.
*Ran - we had a nice 2-mile run along the river here in Rochester.
*(I need an "R" word for watching a John Piper sermon on the computer!) - we watched Piper's first sermon in a series he is doing on the intellect and emotion of God as seen in the Psalms. Great stuff!


Dee Dee is back in the labyrinth of hallways and procedure rooms in the Gonda Building here at Mayo, having the first big test of the week. In essence, this is the big test of the trip - endoscopy with ultrasound. This 2-1/2 hour procedure allows them to directly look at the tumors, and to measure their size, number, and depth into the stomach wall. We pray that the number of tumors has either lessened or remained at 22; that their size has decreased, particularly the one larger one that was almost 2 cm on the last visit (above 2 or 2-1/2 cm would point to the stomach surgery); and that they arenot projecting any further into the stomach wall.

She should be done by lunch or thereabouts today. I am praying that she feels well, and that she tolerates the procedures today without nausea. She has fasted since last night, so hopefully will be able to handle some food when we are done here today.

Thank you all for praying for us as we are here. My prayer this morning was not that God would remove our valleys, but that He would give us grace and faith and courage to walk through the valleys as children of the King would walk through the valleys of the Kingdom - without fear, and with a great sense of purpose. Psalm 23 does not say, "The valley of the shadow will be done away with." Rather, it says, "Yea, though I WALK through teh valley...." We all have valleys to trod; let us fear no evil, for He is our guide, He is our comfort, He is our shepherd.

Tony