Chet Mate!

As my cochlear implant surgery drew near I found myself getting more and more anxious.

Do not be anxious about nothing but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving make your requests known to God and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

I recited that verse in Philippians chapter 4 verses 6 and 7 over and over and over again.

Okay. Make your requests known to God. So, I decided to write my requests down. This is what I wrote: Let YOUR hand be upon me as I go into surgery. Let me come out healthy and whole. Intelligent with all my faculties one hundred percent intact. Let me see the light of day. Let healing come to my ears so that I can hear the whispers of YOUR world. The one that YOU spoke into existence. The one that YOU the CREATOR created for me to enjoy. Let me have many more healthy and whole days on this earth. Let this be a new beginning for me as YOU continue to give me the desires of my heart.

On the day of surgery I was so nervous. I dreaded being put to sleep. And the nurses and doctors and anesthesiologist were not helping my fears subside on that day.

I was so trying to keep it together. I must’ve gotten up to go to the bathroom three or four times. Heck, maybe even more. They finally wheeled me to the operating room and I am fit to be tied. I am thinking about the miracle, that I had sort of given up on, and it was soon coming to pass. I just need to make it through surgery. I look up and see the room number is 242. Crazy as it seems I begin to think two plus four plus 2 is eight. Eight. I am going to be fine. I breathe a sigh of relief.

The team rolls me into the operating room and then signals for me to move over to the operating table. I’m shaking uncontrollably. Someone makes a gesture to ask me if I am cold while placing warm blankets over me. As they are doing that I hear myself whisper, “No, I am afraid.” As soon as I hear myself say this I immediately think I need YOU Jesus. My teeth are chattering uncontrollably as if I’m in a freezer or out in the cold with no coat or boots on a below zero, windy, blustering snowy day. I cannot stop them. They have now placed the oxygen mask over my face and I am fixated on trying to get my teeth to stop chattering so I am in another zone. I feel someone touch my soldier gently so I look up only to see some guy standing over me and motioning for me to breathe. I remember that I was instructed once they put the mask on I needed to take deep breaths so my lungs could fill up with oxygen. I immediately start breathing in and as I exhale I say Jesus! Jesus! Jesus! I remember three repetitions of calling on the name of Jesus and then waking up. As I wake up I am thinking Oh LORD, thank YOU for allowing me to live and now I know I am going to be a-okay. As I sit up I notice I am not dizzy. My husband is now in the room and he has snapped a picture of me. He shows me the picture and I notice I am smiling. I can smile! I can smile! All my fears have now subsided. I am at peace. You know how I really knew that I was at peace? The fact that my husband was taking pictures of me, in the hospital, just coming out of surgery, and I hadn’t opened my mouth to start the next world war (between him and I). I didn’t even care and that was enough to let me know that I was truly at peace.

A few days later I go to write in my journal and remember the room number. 242 summed up as the number eight. I look up the number eight on the Hebrews4Christians.com website. Here is what I learn. Chet. The eighth letter of the Hebrew alphabet is Chet. It rhymes with mate. The pictograph looks like a wall or fence. Chet represents grace and the concept of new beginnings. Since Chet is formed from the Vav (number 6) and Zayin (number 7) connected by a yoke we can see that this letter pictures our relationship to the LORD Jesus as HE leads and teaches us on the pathway of life.

In closing I want to share with you what I jotted in my journal that day:

There is a wall or fence being taken down in my life. The wall preventing me from hearing. It is done. The operation took place in a room that symbolized grace. A room that symbolized new beginnings. And all I could do in that room is call out for Jesus. The ONE who leads and teaches me on the pathway of life. Totally Amazing!!!! 

​Room 242

Be Strengthened and Encouraged in HIM,
Liz

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear. Mark Twain

You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. Eleanor Roosevelt