faith or denial?

When I received the initial findings from the ICU doctors regarding my daughter’s illness…I listened intently to retain as much information as I could…until I felt the walls closing in on me. I literally had to leave the room, because I felt the panic and fear swelling up inside of me. I walked to the nearest window right outside of the ICU doors and immediately the tears began streaming…

Through them, I managed to find my big sister Aisha’s number and I couldn’t say anything, but she heard my moans. I let out: “There’s a tumor, it might be cancer…” I remember feeling the weight of pressure, I was light-headed, and exasperated. She paused and said: “Hey, take courage, we ain’t new to this, WE TRUE TO THIS. We know God, we know prayer! We trust God and that’s that!”

Immediately I felt strength. Immediately I felt literal courage.

Thinking about this pandemic and this weekend commemorating the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ…I thought about the scripture in Acts where Peter and John were passing by the lame man and instead of giving him money, Peter offered him Jesus Christ.

And it could have been a simple prayer or words of blessings over the man’s life, but through the power of Jesus Christ, Peter “took the man by the right hand, lifted him up; and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength.” Acts 3:7 KJV

And in those moments that proceeded after I received my strength and courage…and after the lame man received his strength and courage…it was a journey of sheer faith.

When I went to sleep that night in the Ronald McDonald house, I had a made up mind to believe God fully.

Final answer.

I edited what I listened to. I carefully monitored what I watched. I was careful about who I solicited prayers from. I was careful about who I let pour into me during this time. I was extremely careful about what I kept my mind on…because my faith in God was ALL that I had. And that faith had to be protected at all costs.

So my face out or rather the strength that I wore during the process wasn’t an attitude of denial, it wasn’t “well-intended” words, it wasn’t even “positivity”…it was my core belief. The faith that I had in God was rooted in me believing who God is and believing His Word for my life, my daughter’s life, and trusting Him to accomplish a seemingly impossible thing.

I remember one of the attending doctors becoming frustrated with me because I kept telling her to go back and check the scans again and again because my FAITH told me what God was doing. I remember her words clearly, “Mommy Diggs, we checked, it’s still there, please stop asking.” Imagine what a blow that could’ve done to my faith if it was counterfeit? Instead, I smiled and I thanked her. And here we are today, FIVE years later, and the tumor is gone.

My faith wasn’t ignorant of her scientific limitations or her medical expertise. No. My faith wasn’t denying what the actual clinical presentations and indications were. Faith in God is hearing what “they say” and making a conscious decision to believe what God says and what He promises and most of all, praying for His complete will concerning the situation.

Faith is going at the Word to give God a sacrifice of your son and following all the way through with trust that if He takes it away, He can replace it. 

Faith is saying to yourself, “If He decides to take it away, He is faithful anyhow.”

It’s why the Bible says that Abraham was justified BY faith…NOT by His works, not by his gifts or giving or what he could do with his own power…but by The Power of God, he first believed that He was and also believed that He would…

I challenge you today, to take an inventory of your belief system. Is it faith or denial? Denial is giving up hope when the healing doesn’t come as “miraculously” as you thought it might…denial is the resentment, bitterness, and anger at God for what doesn’t come how or when you think it should.

Time out for the white-washed stories of victory and similarly the faithless stories of defeat.

Where are the warriors that will say: “The Lord gives and The Lord takes away…blessed be the Name of The Lord.”?

Where are the warriors that are choosing this day to stand for and with God’s report?

Where are the warriors that won’t let Him go until He blesses His people?

I know where I stand, do you?