Jo Update: Strength to Strength June 17, 2009

This week we have seen more of God’s faithfulness as Jo continues to improve.

Psalm 84 verses 4-7 says:

Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you. Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage. As they pass through the Valley of Baca, they make it a place of springs; the autumn rains also cover it with pools. They go from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion.

It is definitely true to say that Jo has her heart set on God’s ways, on this pilgrimage. She is one tough cookie!

Today’s news is that Jo has had a good couple of days. She had the staples removed fine, and was able to have a shower and hair wash yesterday – a big relief!

The physio has had her walking up some stairs and she will continue this over the next few days, and the surgeon is really happy with Jo’s progress. Her thought is a little slow – like an exhausted persons would be, so please be praying about that.

She’s still praying and witnessing… praise God for that!

Jo Update: Getting Better June 15, 2009

Thanks everyone for your prayers over what has been a good and encouraging weekend of news.

Jo had a quick trip back into ICU on Thursday when she wasn’t as chatty as they’d have liked and there were some minor infection worries, but they quickly got all that sorted and she was moved back onto the neuro-surgical ward.

Her head still hurts and her back is a bit achey, but she has clear thought, good colour and strong faith. She’s also a bit wobbly on her legs, but that’s just from lying down for ages, she’s getting stronger all the time, and sampling the delights of hospital food.

Yesterday we heard they were taking the staples out from the operation, so she can wash her hair and stuff. She was a bit drained yesterday, but generally good and everything is moving in the right direction.

Please keep praying:

- For her to continue to get stronger and for the residual pain from the op to lessen.

- For Ruth as she hass important exams this week.

- For the Boiler Room community as a whole at this time, as we work together to support Jo and Alan and each other.

Thanks again for all your prayers. God has been so faithful and we are thankful.

On The Mend June 10, 2009

What a lot can happen in a week! We were musing last night that, just seven days ago, life looked very different. This morning I’m thinking that, last Wednesday, things just looked pretty dire and hopeless, but from here we have so much to be thankful for. God has answered our prayers beyond what we could have hoped, he has brought hope and healing, and he is even working through what look like complications and set-backs. We remain faithful.

Today’s news is positive, and a testimony to the many, many prayers that have been offered for Jo.

Yesterday they took Jo’s nose-tube (I’m sure that’s not the technical term for it…) out, which made her much more comfortable. They also moved her off ICU onto a high dependancy ward. This is great news. Originally they were talking about her having to stay in ICU for a whole week after surgery, so this is fantastic progress.

Her face has started to swell up, which is a normal result of the surgery she had, and she is very bruised and tired, but everything is on course and she is in good spirits.

Some prayer points for today:

• Please continue to pray that the muslin acting as a cap to the aneurysm bonds well, and that the whole area heals well and quickly.
• Please pray for energy and strength for Jo, and that she settles into the new ward well.
• Please pray for the Norton kids – Ben, Sam and Ruth. They’re doing well  but it has been a lot of stress for them.
• Alan had his bike stolen yesterday, which is just rubbish and bad timing – he uses it a lot. Please pray for him, for strength and energy and that he will know God’s sustaining and provision through this time.

Thanks everyone for your support, comments, prayers and the unity of prayer and community we have experienced over the last seven days.

Post Surgery June 9, 2009

Thanks everyone for the faith filled prayers for Jo’s healing. Many people prayed and fasted yesterday, we’re grateful to you all.

The news post-op is that Jo has come out of the surgery well. She was chatting and moving all her limbs yesterday which is great and an answer to those prayers for safety etc.

She has a headache but is bright and hopeful.

The surgeons could not actually clip the aneurysm, as it was too close to certain other blood vessels and they would have risked inducing a stroke.

As plan B, they covered it in a mesh which should promote scar tissue to act as the cap.

We need to pray that this bonds it well and that natural healing processes take their course.

Please continue to pray for Jo – that the mesh bonds well, that there are no further complications and that she continues to improve.

Please also pray for strength for the whole Norton family at this time. Ruth has important exams next week, so please pray for her in those, especially.

Thanks for all your support, love and prayers. God is faithful.

Update on Jo Norton June 7, 2009

Just a short post to thank everyone for your continued and faithful prayer support. We have been overwhelmed, encouraged and amazed as we have seen God answering our prayers, and those of people from across the UK and the world.

The latest news has been really positive. Jo was bright and chatty Friday and Saturday, even cracking some jokes, and yesterday she managed two meals. It’s also been a blessing to hear her testifying that God is bigger than this situation, and to see how her strong faith is carrying her through. I saw Jo briefly on Friday evening, and she looked remarkably well considering.

The doctors say that 50% of people who experience the same thing die instantly, and only 20% of the remainder reach the point she has, so it’s incredible how well she is.

The next time when prayer cover is especially needed is tomorrow morning, when Jo will have an operation to clamp the bleed. Please pray:

- That the anaesthetisation etc will go well and that Jo will feel peaceful about it.

- That the surgery will go as planned, that there will be no complications, and that they will be able to clamp the bleed.

- For strength and swift healing for Jo in the days following the op, she will likely be in intensive care for a couple of weeks following the surgery.

- For the whole Norton family – for peace, strength, and a real awareness of the comfort of the Holy Spirit.

We gathered as a church community this morning for worship as usual, and again noted the value and strength of community, of holding each other up, of praying in unity together. We thought about the ways God uses suffering for good, and considered how to have faith during the hard times, a pertinent message for us all. At the end of the service we sang the song ‘In Christ Alone’. I don’t think I’ve ever sang, or heard that song sung with such gusto. In Him our hope is found. In Him we find strength for tomorrow. In Him we believe for full healing for Jo.

Holding onto Hope June 5, 2009

Late on Tuesday night I received news that my church leader had been rushed to hospital with an aneurysm (a bleed in her brain). I don’t think I can articulate how stunned we all were, and the feelings of unreality and denial that accompanied each text that came to update us with the news.

On one hand, when something like that happens, you go into coping mode: get people to pray, check everyone has heard, hug those who are sad and bewildered, maintain the ‘information switchboard’, encourage the community to believe for miracles, just keep going.

And at the same time, you’re expecting at any moment to get a message saying it has all been a horrid misunderstanding, that she’d woken up fine, with a bit of a headache, a bit worse for the wear but, fine, and cheery and, herself.

It felt like a daze. It felt like normal life stopped. It felt like things changed in an instant. I’d been with Jo just an hour and a half earlier and it had been incredible. We were both encouraged by the things that God is doing at present, she was buzzing with ideas fresh from an inspiring conference and a refreshing prayer meeting. She was exuberant, hopeful, energetic. How did things change so quickly? I found myself running through every stage of the evening in minute detail: the discussion we had about suncream, our complaining about mouldy blueberries, eating tea together, hugging on the corner of the road to say goodbye. It had all been so so normal, so everyday, and now things were very different, and very wrong, and very un-everyday.

And in some senses we’re still working through that as a community. We’re still praying and believing and daring to hope and trusting in our Abba Father and beseeching him for miracles and holding each other up through difficult and dark days.

But I wanted to share a couple of things that have struck me over the last couple of days, things I have held on to. And it’s not the time for deep wrangling theology, but there is still a ‘God is good, God is in this’, on my heart.

Working was pretty tough on Wednesday, and many times I found myself picking up my battered copy of ‘God on Mute’ – Pete Grieg’s starkly personal and honest exploration of unanswered prayer – from my bookshelf. He writes about the time his wife had a severe and life threatening brain tumour, and the wrangle and heartbreak and hope, and the place of prayer in all of that.

I picked it up because I found that I didn’t know what to pray. All I could pray was random incoherent sentences, like “Please heal her”, and “Oh God”… over and over again. And to begin with I felt bad – my job is prayer, I train people on it, but when it counted I was praying like a five year old. And I was comforted, opening the book, to read the same sentiments expressed there – the same bewilderment. And that made me realise that that sort of prayer is ok – is just as effective as a long well phrased liturgy. It reminded me that God knows my heart, so when I couldn’t even utter a word, my sense of pain and grief was a plaintive and amplified prayer that he heard directly.

I was blessed by this quote:

“Our hope in the face of suffering is not to reject God, but rather to rely on him even more, choosing to call him Father with a mix of desperation and hope, militantly believing that although our prayers remain unanswered, it is not because God is callous or uncaring, because he is love.”  

I think I’ve had to hang onto him tighter this week than I can remember. We’ve really experienced that mix of desperation and hope. And all we can do is keep relying, keep hoping, keep believing in his goodness.

The other thing I have noticed this week is the value of community. The Boiler Room and the wider Church have pulled together in a way I’ve never known it to before, the prayer chain multiplied and spread quickly, people in Iceland, Latvia, and the US heard the news and texted messages of support. God began to do surprising things – athiests prayed for Jo’s healing, people showed up at an inpromptu prayer meeting, others invited others for tea and support. It’s been incredible.

As I write, we hear that Jo is the brightest she has been- making jokes and smiling and testifying to God’s goodness. And he is good. We are praising him, we are believing for more, and we are holding on to hope.