Better

This word better has been rolling around in my mind since hearing a young man speak about getting better from a long battle with the terrible disease Lyme. I am so happy for him and his health journey to be better. I have friends fighting cancer aright now and I am praying for and believing for Healinfg for them today. I believe in the power of Jesus to heal the sick. But many times Jesus does not heal for whatever reason unknown to us why. I  begin to think about the this idea of " being better". For many chronically ill people the term better is a pipe dream. A thing we long for, chase after no matter the cost. We hunt down every snake oil that might bring us the allusive big foot creature of chronically ill people "The Better". It hides in the woods of our pain. Lurking where only the few can find. Terms like genetic defect or terminally ill, incurable scare away "The Better". This causes many of us give up the hunt. We just are left to wander in the forest of symptoms. Over turning every rock and stick hoping the Dr was wrong. Hoping seeking praying but never finding " The Better". As if the defeat of failing on the hunt for better is not painful enough, The well people strike you down with their kind words and wishful thinking, " I hope you feel better". Their good intentions can not see that all we do is pray for it , beg God for it. Every birthday wish is for it. More than anything we hope that somewhere in the dark woods of our illness we find the Better. Where are you better? And why can't I find you? What did I do to make you hate me so much? What bait should I use to catch you? What time of day is best to hunt? How did they get lucky and I am cursed? The cycle of chronic illness pain is never ended. There is no better for most chronically ill. It is a term for the well people. For myself my better is like trying to put out a million wild fires in my body. Every-time I get one under control or Better a new one pops up. Just as you have the flames calmed down a new fire will pop up somewhere else. Nothing is more discouraging than feeling like you at last have things under control in your body than BAM!  Something new flares up. Depression is a real struggle when you live in a endless cycle of being unwell, not yet better than before. I love Jesus and I trust and believe that some day the better will be presence in my body. I long for that day, plead
with him in the middle of the night for that day. I love my family and friends I love many parts of my life. But it is easy to get lost wandering in the woods of my mind for the better. The time when Ehlers Danlos did not affected my life like it does now. Even now I am ashamed at the hours I have spent thinking about how I can get better. Which is silly because I have a incurable genetic syndrome. But the hunt for Better can consume me. The problem with that is I miss out on life when all my effort is focused on getting better. So how do you live when being better is not part of your story? How do you feel better without being better? The apostle Paul struggle with some sort of torn in the flesh for years. He asked the Lord many times to take it. He wrote these words that have helped me to learn to be better when I don't feel better.

Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.
Philippians 4:11 ESV
https://bible.com/bible/59/php.4.11.ESV

Paul understood that in order to feel better in the flesh we must first tame the heart. I struggle often in my mind with the fact that my life is not what I want it to be. That the dreams I once had are now dead because of Ehlers danlos. When you rock a baby to sleep it will often struggle against you until it becomes content with the idea of sleeping. This is how I feel about the struggle to be content in the life God has painted for me. I am always wishing things were different, better. But this was true for Paul's life and it is true for us. Better is not always best. Paul spent most of his life running for his life from those who wanted to kill him. His life  Circumstances in occupation were not ideal. He was stoned to death many times, boiled in oil, thrown in jail always on the run from someone who was trying to kill him. It was rough for him. But Paul learned to be content in and through it all. Even when things could have been better, Paul trusted Gods plan. For myself Paul is one of the most relatable apostle. He spent a lot of time in jail. Being chronically ill is often feeling trapped inside your body. In a life sentence of pain. But for Paul jail was not a prison to hold him in but a mission field for him to win. Could things have been phyical better for Paul? Sure but spiritual Paul was so much better off. Better is a concept we humans have created based on our own ideas, wants and needs. But Gods ways are not our own ways. His concept of better compared to ours is vastly different. It is not based off our human thinking. It is not confined to the concepts of just this life. Humans idea of better is based off this human experience. Gods concept of Better is based off eternity. The two can not be compared. I am so thankful that when things here on earth could be better I have a hope that things one day, and forever more will be better. Praying you too understand what it really means to be better.