A Day with Zoe - A Prayer for Ellen

Yesterday, Zoe came to stay with us for the day.  Ellen is receiving cancer treatment in Spain, so therefore, several of us have stepped up to help Jon with Zoe.

Zoe is such a sweet girl.  She is so quiet, so shy.  She loves her mama and so this is hard on her.  Best we can do is help her to feel loved.

I pray so hard for Ellen.  It seems so unfair that she should be going through this. I have had 3 cancer scares (cervical, skin and breast) and they all turned out ok.  But the sheer panic and desperation I felt until I received my test results was a kind of fear I never want to relive.  It pains me so much that the fear I felt became a reality for Ellen.  

Ellen.  She is one of the kindest, gentlest, most loving people I have ever known.  She loves God and she loves her family and friends.  She would do anything for anyone.  Whereas I am a terrible gossip, have a rocky past and am brash and unfeeling at times, she is none of those things.  She never says a negative thing about anyone.  She has led a pure life where her biggest sins are things like not reading her bible enough.  But she is fighting cancer and I am healthy. It doesn't seem right.

God is the great healer.  He knows all of our thoughts, our anguish, Ellen's.  He knows how much Zoe needs her mom.  He knows that Jon lost his mother to cancer when he was well old enough to understand the evils of cancer.  God knows.  Even still, will he spare her?  We can only pray.

Look at this little girl.  This is a little girl who needs her mommy.  She needs her to help her when kids are mean.  She needs her to give her confidence in her teen years, when she starts dating, when she picks out a wedding dress, when she becomes a mommy herself.  Ellen has to be there for all of it.  She just has to be.  

My prayer for Ellen is that she beats this, that she comes out the other side and can tell of God's mercy and His grace.  That she trusted and had faith that He would heal her, that she did not listen to doctors, family, friends (myself included) when it came to her treatment.  Maybe it was all because she was being guided by the Holy Spirit to make this decision.  People that beat cancer can always say chemo saved them.  If When Ellen beats this, she can proclaim to the world that it is God who saved her.  Please God, let it be so.  Give this little girl the amazing gift of having her mommy in her life for decades to come.

Amen.