My body is the temple of the Holy Spirit

 It has been over a month since I posted and it is completely my own fault. 

 The internet has worked. 

 My time has been free enough to write. 

 God has even given me words, several times.

 Most of those words are simply gone. Some of them are saved in the notes section of my phone.... but most of them are just gone. 

Why? 

Hmmm....Good question.

I think the simplest answer is that I wanted to be the happy person. I wanted to only share good news and unfortunately good news hasn’t been as strong as I had hoped. 

 Sometimes in the middle of “not good news” the actual, true, undeniable good news gets harder to see. We have all been there and experienced that. JOY gets hidden under sadness and discouragement. Hope is buried under fear. 

 Which leads me to this word of truth...

Who do I think I am to plan my course? Truly. I write this blog about trusting my Savior so I think I better follow through on meaning it. 

 So here I am, five months out from surgery, fairly confident that it didn’t work. September and October were beautiful and full of hope. Then I had 3 seizures in November. Definite, old style seizures. Slightly different, but old style. There were at least 5 in December, and then 5 in January as well, and already 2 so far this month. 

 Which leaves me, as I said, fairly confident that surgery didn’t work. 

 The whole reason I started writing (again) was to talk about this journey, brain surgery. If I only write about what I want to happen then it isn’t really writing about the journey, only the scenic stops along the way. I can’t only write about the scenic stops. That is a cheesy novel, not a story of growth. I have to write about the parts of the journey that aren’t beautiful and aren’t turning out the way I wanted them to. So, I am trying today to write the less than beautiful parts. 

 Fear and trembling will win if we let them. 

 I suppose the simple truth is, we don’t beat them. 

 It is not us who win the battle. We, those of us who are holding to the promise of our Jehovah, do not fight the battle on our own. That means we don’t have to win the battle. Our Savor already has. 

 So, fear and trembling are conquered for us in the end. Pain and sadness are still here, now. Human bodies are broken and human souls make wrong choices. But we do not fight alone and that is enough. 

 That means I have hope my friends.

 I have hope that I, Bethany Ruth, can shine Joy with a broken body. 

 I have hope that I can give love even when it isn’t asked for or returned by the world around me. 

 I have hope that every single morning, no matter what epilepsy, graves’s disease or diabetes has done the night before I can wake up with the ability to share Jesus in a the simplest and purest ways.

 The fruit of the Spirit is truly the simplest goal, but oh so very much the goal. 

Last reminder....

 My friends, don’t forget that important last reminder. 

 Your body IS the temple of the Holy Spirit. 

 Healthy body or broken. Joyful body or mourning. Focused and on track or scattered and blown with the wind. 

 Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. 

 Be blessed my friends, then turn around and return those blessings to others.