The City Of God

There is a land where the beloved of God go to dwell for a short season. It's name is Beaulah Land. It is within sight of heaven's bright shore.

Oddly, we christians rarely speak of Beaulah Land. But I will speak of it for our beloved Valerie has gone there. God spoke of it through Isaiah. John Bunyan wrote of it in Pilgrim's Progress.

Ann Cousin's poem speaks of the joy of it's inhabitants;

The sands of time are sinking, The dawn of heaven breaks;

The summer morn I’ve sighed for, The fair, sweet morn, awakes.

Dark, dark hath been the midnight, But dayspring is at hand,

And glory, glory dwelleth In Immanuel’s land.

I’ve wrestled on towards heaven, ‘Gainst storm and wind and tide;

Now, like a weary traveller That leaneth on his guide,

Amid the shades of evening, While sink life’s lingering sand,

I hail the glory dawning From Immanuel’s land.

Beloved, the world we see, the Valerie we see, is temporal. The unseen world is eternal.Those of you who have been with Val this week think "she has checked out". You are right and you are wrong. She appears to be not totally with us because she is not with us at all. I know this because of the enlightening of God's Spirit and because of a question Val asked me on our trip home from USC last night. "Why", she asked , "have the sounds of the world become strangely quiet?"

She knows she is there but she won't tell us directly. But as the glory of God Most High draws closer to her, you will know it. By how she appears and what she says.

Some come back to us from Beaulah Land. I think Val is coming back to us. We cherish all your prayers you continue to lay at the throne of God Most High for Val’s return.

We who are her medical support team will continue to move forward with options, knowing that God honors all that is done using the best medical skills available.

Val had a CT Scan and bloodwork done at USC yesterday. Good news! her Ca19-9 tumor marker was down from 1,200 to 800. Bad news. Her Bilirubin was 8.4 and Potassium 6.1.

Dr. Lenz directed us to get Val's stents changed stat.

We have moved it up a week and are on the books with Dr. Simon Lo at cedars Sinai next Monday at 4:45 PM. Dr. Lo put Val on antibiotics today. Pray that we can keep Val with us until Monday and pray that Dr. Lo has supernatural skills.

Pray that Val can eat or drink protein shakes this weekend and can get ahead on hydration. It is a 16 hour fast before stent procedure so we must get ahead of the game.

Godspeed