Home again - but not for long

Glad to say she is home again - eventually! We thought it might have been last night, but (due to one or two "technical problems"), she was let out after lunch today.

Although the main purpose of going in was to have the two chemo drugs that are "dripped in", which they managed, there are problems with the Groshong (chestwall) line - as a result of which they have not been able to restart the 24/7 pumped chemo. To see what the problems are, they need to do a special sort of xray - and unfortunately they could not manage it while she was in hospital. The hospital have however just rung to say could she go to the xray dept on Monday at 10:30. So back we will go!

Still, it will be good to have a weekend at least without wires.

Praise the Lord for His goodness in allowing all this technical stuff - and for all the prayerful interest in this little family. Thank you!

Finally, some readers may find the following of interest, taken from John Piper's latest emailed sermon (see http://www.desiringgod.org/ - "Ask your Father in Heaven") ...

One Final Question
One final question: How shall we understand these six promises in verses 7 and 8: "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened"?
Does this mean that everything a child of God asks for he gets?

I think the context here is sufficient to answer this question. No, we do not get everything we ask for - and we should not and we would not want to. The reason I say we should not is because we would in effect become God if God did everything we asked him to do. We should not be God. God should be God. And the reason I say that we would not want to get everything we asked is because we would then have to bear the burden of infinite wisdom which we do not have. We simply don’t know enough to infallibly decide how every decision will turn out and what the next events in our lives, let alone in history, should be.

But the reason I say that we do not get all we ask is because the text implies this. Jesus says in verses 9-10 that a good father will not give his child a stone if he asks for bread, and will not give him a serpent if he asks for a fish. This illustration prompts us to ask, "What if the child asks for a serpent?" Does the text answer whether the Father in heaven will give it? Yes, it does. In verse 11, Jesus draws out this truth from the illustrations: Therefore, how much more will your Father give good things to those who ask him.

He gives good things - only good things. He does not give serpents to children. Therefore, the text itself points away from the conclusion that "Ask and you will receive" means "Ask and you will receive the very thing you ask for when you ask for it in the way you ask for it". It doesn’t say that, and it doesn’t mean that.
If we take the passage as a whole, it says that when we ask and seek and knock — when we pray as needy children looking away from our own resources to our trustworthy heavenly Father — he will hear and he will give us good things. Sometimes just what we asked. Sometimes just when we ask it. Sometimes just the way we desire. And other times he gives us something better, or at a time he knows is better, or in a way he knows is better.

And of course, this tests our faith. Because if we thought that something different was better, we would have asked for it in the first place. But we are not God. We are not infinitely strong, or infinitely righteous, or infinitely good, or infinitely wise, or infinitely loving. And therefore, it is a great mercy to us and to the world that we do not get all we ask.