The Valley and Courage

Acute Myeloid Leukemia.  Cancer.  Words a parent never wants to hear.  We heard those words yesterday.  "He'll need chemo - right away".  Jacob needs chemo. Who would have thought this boy who has already faced being abandoned - thrice, watched his friends get adopted while he stayed behind, who finally found home would be told "-cancer".

As I sit here in Children's Hospital in Denver, my son is in surgery, getting a 'central line' added to his chest. Through this line will pass medication that will make him feel terrible while saving his life.  Six months of chemo perhaps - a very, very long road ahead. He's heroic this boy.  He came out of his second of perhaps many more procedures and the first thing he says is "are we done already?"

Jacob at Denver Children's Hospital

We are stunned.  Our lives changed forever in one meeting with a doctor.  We are stunned - he is peacefully eating jello as I write this.  We love this boy.  He gets tubes in his chest - we cringe, we empathize - Jacob watches Tom and Jerry.  He gets blood drawn, pressures taken - we wonder when it will end - he plays a round of madden  on X box making Denver actually beat the Seahawks. All this since Saturday mind you. This convinces us that Jacob will not just get through this - he going to thrive. He
is courageous and it makes me so proud
to be his Dad.

We've seen our share of valleys and here is what we know:  it is there and only there that you get to walk right next to Jesus.  We're now on the edge of one of the scariest valleys we have ever seen or imagined - We know Jesus is there, waiting to walk with us through it.  And as we stare down into the unknown - Jacob goes running past us, yelling at us to catch up -he's running right down in there.  We're going.  It seems like Jacob already knows that's where Jesus is and that is where he'll meet us - down there.   We know that no matter how hard this gets we will NEVER be alone.

"Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you."

Joshua 1:5

We will keep you informed in the coming weeks.  This is going to be a marathon - not a sprint.