Joyful Ruins

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways submit to Him and He will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6

A beautiful unfailing quality of God’s word is that verses you have heard and read all your life can still hold freshness. I thought I had understood this verse to its fullest, but in the season I am currently in, God is applying it to me in a new way.

I was exposed to black mold a year ago. Not knowing some of the things needed to heal from it, I kept going along with my life without treatment. Some people can do this without repercussions because their body gets rid of the mold toxins on its own. Others, like me, have a body that can’t get rid of the mold toxins which leads to a lot of health issues as the body continuously recirculates the toxins.

Mold illness is both mysterious and overwhelming with information. Because it is not widely recognized or researched, there are a lot of unproven treatments, solutions, and such out there.

I’m not complaining that there are solutions. I am thankful there are, but as I embark on healing, I can be pulled 100 different ways. I can become overwhelmed at the many treatments suggested and honestly, at the different stories of other mold exposed persons, some successful in healing and some with a lifetime of pain.

I am currently getting help for my illness. I am currently taking treatment, eating a specific diet, and waiting.. a lot.

Yet, a question of, “Is this the right treatment?”, comes into my mind a lot. That same question brings doubt, worry, and fear with it.

Is this the right treatment? Am I doing the right thing, trusting the right doctor?

A similar question is, am I doing enough?

For me this morning Proverbs 3 answered these questions.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart means trusting in Him with all the unknowns of what you face, in the unknowns of the journey, when you can’t trust in the process or the knowledge or even in your body. It is so easy for me to make an exception right now to that command. Like, sure, I’ll trust God completely when everything lines up, when the answers are clear. BUT lean not on your own understanding!

Yup, my understanding is limited. I will never fully understand my illness, my body, my treatment. I can’t know, in my human understanding, whether I am doing it all right (And I am very likely not).

And this next part of the passage helped me the most.

In all your ways submit to Him and He will make your paths straight.

All I can do now, is submit everything to Him. I can submit doctors, information, weakness, supplements, timing, healing all to Him. And His promise, if I do that, is that He will make my paths straight.

I may not be on the straightest path for healing from mold, but in God’s hands this path can be straightened. It’s all in His hands. I do my part of obeying His direction on this journey, but He does the rest. He could have healed me already. Instead, He lead me to a specific doctor, a specific treatment, a specific path, and He will make it straight.

Take heart in knowing that no matter how lost you may feel on your journey, if you submit it all to Him, He will make your paths straight.