Season – sea·son – /ˈsēzən/
“any period or time”

In case you missed last time, this is part 3 of a series. Last year was hard. Here, we’re digging into our experiences and what we learned along the way.

“Babe, I’m nervous,” she said with tears dripping through the phone. “I’ve been seeing flashing and weird vision changes so I called the eye doctor to check on it. They got very intense and told me to come in immediately.”

December was a lot for us.

Two weeks before Christmas we had Covid sweep through the family. Stuck at home with it rolling through each of us a couple days at a time.

Being sick is one thing. Being sick with sick kids is another.
(And every parent said…”amen.”)

Our stir crazy quarantine ended just in time for us to get out and enjoy Christmas with family. 

All was back to normal until three days before New Years.

The eye doctor was very concerned with my wife’s flashing vision. So she went in for an optic scan to see what might be the problem.

Swollen optic nerves. This only happens when there’s something in the head creating pressure that shouldn’t be there. Could be a symptom of some really, really scary things. We were told to get answers fast.

12:00 p.m.: 10 hours waiting in ER
12:00 a.m.: 2 MRI scans
2:00 a.m.: 1 lumbar puncture (the new way to say spinal tap)

No sign of the big scary stuff. Thank God.

She had intracranial hypertension—essentially high pressure in her spinal fluid. 

Left untreated: blindness.

We started the new year with quite a different perspective.

New meds were in order. The kind that you have to work up to because the side effects would mess you up if you took them all at once. 

BP checks constantly. 

Fear sitting on our shoulders.

And this is just what was happening at home. My work was in major transition as well. A necessary one that required my care as a leader. Missional alignment required change. With change came tension-ridden conversations.

I did what I could. Felt like a fraction of the man I was meant to be.

Just over a month after our New Year’s adventure I was at a company lunch celebrating my birthday. We have this really amazing tradition of speaking affirmations to the birthday individual. It was my turn! They went around and shared such encouraging things that I really needed to hear.

But there was one I wasn’t expecting to hear in this setting. 

“I know it may not seem like it, but I really respect your faith and how you carry it out. It inspires me in my life.”

What? Me? Now?

Lesson 3: My witness doesn’t stop just because I’m not “feeling it.”

If you would have asked me what my life was showing people at that time, I probably would have said: messed up, broken, tired.

I wish I could say I was mentally “on mission,” but honestly I was just surviving. 

My posture was broken. 
My prayer was simple.

“Lord, do what you will…”

“…in my home”
“…in my work”
“…in me.”

I know it almost sounds cliche—a classic Sunday school answer. But I couldn’t do much more than that.

And He used me.

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 
Matthew 5:3