May Day! ... for Me!

So I woke up on May 1st like any other day. While half of America is still battling large snowstorms, we are blessed here to have sunny, pleasant spring-like days. I am thinking to myself about all the terrible things I am seeing surrounding me at this time. The economy sinking, terrorism growing, politicians failing us, families disintegrating, nations crumbling, wars and rumors of wars. The list goes on.

I think about it. Maybe I could post about May Day. Yes, that might be catchy. Yes, for I knew that it meant distress in some way. I checked again the definition online at the Free Dictionary by Farlex.


The first definition that came up was:

"An international radiotelephone signal word used by aircraft and ships in distress signal"

How appropriate, hmmm, little old writer me, I'll use it. But I do get sidetracked. I was going to get a haircut after dinner and do a couple errands at our little shopping plaza. I sat down to eat with my husband, and I had two Very Important Things that I just had to tell him right then.

The problem is, I talk and eat at the same time and then I start coughing and choking. Sometimes it can be awful. Like last night. When I experienced my very own little May Day. Wait a minute, Lord, I was going to write about that...

Suddenly, when my husband and I realized I could not get a sip of water or any beverage down and I felt like a big air bubble was trapped inside my stomach but I could not release it, my husband, who had worked in a GI lab, said we needed to go to the Emergency Room right away.

May Day! It is a panicky feeling when your saliva gets backed up and it starts to make you sick. I started hyperventilating, and by the time we reached the ER, my blood pressure had risen higher from its normal low.

They took me right away, just as my husband predicted. They gave me some meds in my IV to help the sphincter relax. It did respond a bit, but definitely did not clear. It was kind of humorous to me (if you could be laughing at a time like that!)but the nurse called the attending ER Physician and said:
"I have a food bolus in Room 14"

Now I have worn many different hats in my life, but being called a "food bolus in room 14" was never one of them. We did manage a laugh or two between my spit up sessions.

Everyone on the GI team assembled. All we needed was my doc. Please, what was taking him so long?

May Day! I am still gagging.

While all this is happening, I think, "God are you showing me that Iam the one who is in distress?"

I have to admit that I have a painful situation that I have carried for many years. It has not resolved, and it probably never will, this side of heaven. It is a person close to me that I deeply love, that I have sought to reach, to restore a relationship with. That person does not want to requite my affection in any way. I am hurt beyond words. I am grieving and it manifests itself in illness that is leaking out in various parts of my body.

By the end of the evening, I have an upper GI. My husband is present and doesn't like what he sees.

I have to deal with this.

I love this person.

But I have to get over the pain that hurts me.

Then I think about the ONE MAN who knew this suffering a trillion times more than I ever could. He knew billions of years ago, when He looked down the corridors of history, that this very thing would happen, even though He did not cause it.
He was looking down in love at all of us involved. He saw every part of it. I believe He felt every anguishing tear that we shed. He is not just a God that is way off somewhere, watching us groan and squirm down here.(Matt. 28:20)

Yet I am on a path, I want to count all things loss if only I will gain Christ at the end. (Phil. 3:7)

It says in Isaiah 52:14: "So His visage was marred more than any man, And His form more than the sons of men."

Well, I can't say I have suffered like that or what Jesus did in Hebrews 2:9:

"But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone."

My suffering is probably caused a lot by my own failures to receive and apply grace in my own situation. So the Lord allowed me to suffer my own little May Day distress signal.

I was at the doc's mercy then. Who knows what would have happened if I didn't get treatment.

All I can say to my Gracious Heavenly Father today is:

Psalm 25:4 Show me Your ways, O LORD; Teach me Your paths

25:5 Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You [are] the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day.

One last note, this post was about suffering distress. If you have not personally believed in Jesus Christ, the most horrid distress of all is awaiting you, ending up in a place the Bible calls the Lake of Fire.(Rev. 20:15) But Wait! You DO NOT have to go there! For Jesus has also heard the distress call of everyone on this planet. He awaits your positive consent to the facts of the gospel:
Jesus came as your substitute and died as the perfect God-Man upon the cross, bearing every sin you ever will or ever did commit.(Romans 3: 10-17) He completely satisfied God's wrath against all the sins of mankind.(Isaiah 53:10-11) God proved His satisfaction by raising Christ from the dead. You can be a fresh, BRAND new creature forever and be rescued eternally from the Lake of Fire by receiving God's gracious gift given through His Son.(II Cor. 5:17) If you believe this is in your heart, you will be saved from the wrath to come.(John 3:16, Romans 4:5) I beg you, do not put it off.

Today is the day of His visitation!

Every day is a new gift from God. Whether you are saved or unsaved, every day is a gift. Every day God is calling to each one of us.

When I was in my teens, I got depressed because I didn't understand the love of God which I am beginning to understand now. (I am only beginning, however, I don't believe we will ever be able to plummet the depths of His love, even in eternity.)

The love of God was demonstrated two thousand years ago when the Son of God was lifted high on the cross at Calvary. As a blameless Lamb with no sin and no spot (I Pet. 1: 18-19), He became the sacrifice that God required to atone for all the sin that has committed been by every single one of us on this planet, except for Jesus of course. For those of us who have believed on Him, He knocks every day on the door of our hearts (Rev. 3:20), and wants to fellowship with us, moment by moment, each and every day. What if the President of the United States called us on the phone and told us he wanted to meet with us personally? How privileged would we feel? And yet every single day without fail the One who put every single molecule in place and holds them all together (Heb. 1:3, Col. 1: 17) is knocking on the door of our hearts. Could there be any higher privilege than that? Today is the day to answer Him!

I think of the words of Jesus as He wept over Jerusalem about the Jews missing the day of their visitation.(Luke 19: 41-44) In a way, we can apply this to our own lives. It is not in eternity that we will decide our level of reward, but right now, every day we choose. Whether we will be an overcomer in the next life or not is by our day to day choices to let Him live His life through us or to live for ourselves, which by the way, I have discovered is a very miserable way to live. I am reading an excellent book called The Overcomer's Handbook by Chuck and Nancy Missler.
They are explaining that not all believers will be overcomers and reign with Christ in the Millenial Kingdom yet to come. It is sobering, yet now is the time to effect a change if we are not going in God's direction. And as long as you are alive, it is never too late.

If you have stumbled upon this blog and you don't know Christ as your Saviour, there is no time like the present to receive Him. ("Behold, now is the accepted time: behold, now is the day of salvation. II Cor. 6: 2b) He came down to this earth in the form of a baby although He was God of very God. (John 1:14) He willingly took your sins and mine when He was nailed to the cross 2,000 years ago.(Heb. 2:9) He took the punishment we each deserved when He died there. God was very, very pleased with what His Son accomplished and is now forever satisfied with Christ's payment for sin (Heb. 10: 12-14). He extends an open invitation for anyone, anyone at all to believe on Him. "For whoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved." Romans 10: 13. Simply believe that Jesus was who He said He was, the Son of God, that died in your place. Surely there could be no greater thing you could do for yourself this day.