THE JOURNEY - Day 10

 TUESDAY

Some years ago, before the Corona, I put myself on what I thought was a diet plan. It is called Whole30 and it is not a losing weight plan. It turned out to be one of the better diagnostic systems based on food items that I've ever encountered. I still use it as a base for my daily food intake.

About a year ago, I started to take some capsules made out of vegetables, fruit, and berries, by Juice Plus. After we ordered a second round, I added to it vegetarian protein and started the mornings with a shake. I kept avoiding the items that I knew were harmful to me and kept the base of the intake as I learned from whole30.

I also kept adding quality and quantity time to my prayer and bible reading and noticed increased improvement in my health. I am positive that God is healing me and He is using what I learned and what I implemented.

When the war broke out on Saturday, I did not feel surprised. I knew it was coming in my spirit. I did not feel panic, I knew then as I know now that God is keeping us safe. I totally trust in my Lord to accomplish what He ordained in my life.

Yet, I reached out, almost from habit, to my old comfort food. The first 3 days were too intense to pay attention to my body's responses. However, it talked to me today through strong pain in every joint, muscle and bone. I could barely move.

We had a long list of items that we were told we needed to purchase for emergencies and keep in our safe room. As we walked between the stores downtown, the pain increased and I found myself leaning on walls, hanging on doorways and barely able to cross streets. My husband's worried look woke me from the stupor, “I ate things I should not eat! I ate the old comfort foods. I didn't even talk to God about it!”

We talked while we walked. We decided that some of the items on the list were not needed. We have no safe room and no usable bomb shelter and we'll need to sit on the stairs during an attack. We don't need the extra items – we are fine as we are. Willie cut an extra key for the bomb shelter for the neighbours while I cooked a roast (a treat over here because of very high prices). After lunch Willie cut the roast into thin slices and I separated them into three piles and stored them in the freezer.

Now we have a new prayer, “God please keep the electricity working without interference so our little freezer will not thaw out and food get spoiled, Amen”.

During the afternoon, before I had time to feel sorry for us for having to sit on the stairs, I received a phone call from the pastor's wife. She offered us a shelter in Haifa where we would be safe, protected, fed, and loved for the duration of the war. Wow! The congregation is taking in refugees from the south where the heavy shelling and loss of life occur. But she remembered us up here in the North without our family and in need of some friendship and love. It felt like God himself reached down and hugged us. What a great love!

After prayers and discussions, we felt we needed to stay put. It is good to know that if it is very necessary we have the choice; however, God put us in Nahariya. It is His post for us that He commissioned us to fill 15 years ago. We need, even more than ever, to pray for the Northern Border. We are not abandoning the post. We are staying. On the stairs. Praying for and supporting Nahariya.