December 9

Barbara’s journey towards healing of one kind or another has been an amalgam of positive and disheartening events. After several days of progress, she has taken some steps backwards again.

On the up side, her lungs continue to clear. In fact, they are now setting her respirator to a normal breathing pattern and reducing her sedative substantially. As of this writing she still continues to be mostly non-responsive, though.

The down side is that she has had a high temperature (103) for quite a while now. Her blood pressure was quite low and heart rate quite high this morning. However, they seem to have them moving a little closer to the range they desire. The lung doctor told us that he now believes she is in septic shock. This basically is a whole-body reaction to infection. If you are curious to find out more about this, here is a link that I used:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000668.htm

Her lungs are doing so much better, and her oxygen levels are strong. But the mysterious infections are still raging inside of her, and the doctors are still trying to help her body fight.

Please pray that these infections will be immediately lifted, and that her body recovers from the septic shock.

Also, continue to pray for her lungs, kidneys, and of course – the neck surgery.

Tomorrow I will continue the sermon series, “Do Not Be Afraid” (considering that my last series was about being thankful even when your world is falling apart, it seems God’s providence is once again apparent). I will be encouraging our people to examine the lesson of Zechariah, and to not be afraid of the big things of God. One of the big things that I find in Zechariah’s story is to PRAY BIG. Thank you for your continued BIG prayers for Barbara’s complete healing.

Greg