A Faith that Changes Everything.

I got a message this week from a friend. She knows someone who was just given six months to live. The person is riddled with cancer and my friend was simply hoping I knew of organizations that could help.

I read with a growing lump of familiarity and a heart flooding with compassion. 

But the initial response that popped into my head felt like a foreign imposter. And yet it was undeniably me.

Who says he has 6 months? Has anybody prayed that he would be healed?

Amanda 2 months ago would have jumped straight to not only trying to help build a #terminalaintterrible bucket list, but also providing hospital item suggestions and helpful words of comfort for the dying.

I have learned over 2 years how to prepare to die.

And yet, here I am. 

So, I guess over the last 2 years I’ve also learned how to survive.

And 2 months into this crazy journey of praying for a miracle, of hoping for more, of seeing this place that God has brought me to as preparation for what He has next, my mind and spirit have made a shift that still catches me by surprise: I am beginning to believe I will live.

Exactly one year ago I was given my most immediate and dire prognosis of this entire couple of years after nearing the end of an extreme, isolation based antibiotic protocol and treatment for a non-healing, non-closing wound that had turned from draining to cellulitis to sepsis. This was my third hospitalization for sepsis and this time, I was sent home with nursing and IVs and the idea to keep me comfortable because it wouldn’t be much longer. One year ago Madison texted me about Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy. I somehow managed to get myself on a plane, I started low pressure sessions and after 4 treatments, unprecedentedly and miraculously my non-closing, non-healing wound had scabbed over and was healing. And the evidence of that wound healing was just a small representation of what was happening inside my body as it began healing of sepsis and regenerating cells.

It was the kind of thing you wouldn’t believe if there wasn’t a picture. It’s the kind of thing even I couldn’t believe except that I watched it on my own body. I know hyperbaric oxygen therapy can work, because I’ve experienced it. And almost immediately after seeing the unprecedented results, I began to share about it. I wanted anyone that might be helped to try it. I felt personally responsible to get the word out about something that could save or change a life.

I was in a hospital bed with hepatitis when I messaged Oceans Church 2 months ago. I could hardly get out of bed. But with the same conviction that led me to hop on a plane to Hawaii, I signed out of the hospital a

couple days later and made my way to the first event offered. What has happened over the last 2 months has filled my instagram and stories and real life conversations… because what I have experienced is something I never expected

It’s been a long 28 months. To recount the number of dire situations, undeniable triumphs, disappointments and surprises could fill a book (I hope someday it will) but here’s what’s changed in the whirlwind of the last few weeks. Here’s my dangerous declaration, from a place of deep resolve:

I believe that God brought me to this point, sustained me this long and allowed me to walk this journey so that at this time I would be healed. 

It’s not that He didn’t heal me because He didn’t hear me, or that He couldn’t do it, but He has been strategically building me. 

The Amanda of 28 months ago was hopeful. Hopeful for Heaven. And I still don’t think there’s anything inherently wrong with that. But just this week someone close to me said that my own recent change has allowed her to finally feel like she isn’t going against my wishes to pray for my body to be healed here on earth.

I have made a choice that at any other time felt more impossible than my heart rate increasing or my body weight going up.

I have chosen to believe.

I have chosen to have faith.

I have realized that the healing may be a big miracle… but it pales in comparison to the miraculous journey of a sovereign and all powerful God being so personal and strategic to weave every miraculous moment into the most beautiful story. The one I never expected to write. 

I have learned to CHOOSE faith. Over and over and over again.

And the evidence of that choice is something equally as hard to believe as a non closing wound scabbing over. 

I’m dancing in worship. Most every person who encounters me says they can visibly see a difference in me. People can see the power of a healing that is happening in my body even though we don’t yet have the evidence of the miracle on paper. God’s power is being proved in the midst of the promise I am walking out. 

Because this miracle is not just for me.

And whatever you are walking through, whatever trial you are facing or seemingly hopeless circumstance you might be wrestling with is not just for you.

My healing will bring life to others. I believe it. And your story will encourage someone else. If you let it.

Faith does that.

It causes your first response to a message from a friend to be different. I have faith that this guy could be healed, even as I am praying for my own miraculous healing.

This week I celebrated life because I “shouldn’t”

be here. But I believe the impact of the miracle of me not dying will give others the faith that they too, can live. Through any trial, any disappointment, and prognosis or diagnosis. You… can live.