Nothing is impossible —— with God

MOUNTAIN        Matthew 17:20

“He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

Our faith is often tested to ensure our complete trust in God.    He does not always answer our prayers the way we want. Part of our relationship with Him is knowing this and following Him more each day. Our prayers seeking our desires should then begin to match closer to what He desires for our lives. He may answer in ways we do not expect, and He may not always move the mountain we may perceive in our lives. We must see this as an opportunity to grow our trust and faith in God. Patti and I experienced some anxiety, and I did some reading about Parkinson’s. Based on our prayers, the reading and what we believed God’s plan was for us, we decided not to start with any medicines at that time. After my diagnosis was changed to Parkinson’s in 2005, I tried not to show my shaking in public. Eventually, I realized God wanted me to share my condition. I found everyone already noticed something was up with me. If you are in a similar challenge or struggle, I encourage you to share with others to get valuable encouragement and prayer support, as those around you already see something is going on. Through my sharing I was able to get in touch with others who have the disease to learn more about it. One patient had the Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) surgery which could be one potential possibility for my shaking. You could not even tell that he had Parkinson’s. I will explain later DBS in chapter six. My wife and I were wondering what our future would look like. As this was hard to admit we believed God had a unique plan for us.  

For the first 5 years, with God’s help, I managed without medicines. However, my motor symptoms continued to worsen until I could not keep my hands very steady and my left leg shook a lot. My energy level continued to drop due to my shaking as did my weight.  All this was very frustrating and discouraging. At this point, it became clear God wanted us to begin to start trying medicines. Some worked, some stopped working and some did not help at all. Some of them actually gave me symptoms of the disease. I continued as God moved me through the doctor visits and the medicine monitoring. As mentioned earlier, doctors still do not understand Parkinson’s disease.  My mountain (Parkinson’s) may remain, but He gave me the wisdom, strength and support from others to deal with the mountain. I was motivated to spend more time to know God better as this disease progressed.

Sometimes God will move the mountain and heal you. The God today is the same God performing miracles for His people Israel and showing His power in the Old Testament. We came to realize God’s plan for us was to deal with the mountain. We may not understand why some are cured of Parkinson’s or any health issues and some are not cured.  We must always remember, HOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE WITH GOD.