David McPherson

Welcome to my CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated.  We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement. Thank you for visiting.


I will give some background information here and add updates as journal entries.  This may be too much information for some folks. Please feel free to skip it and go to the journal entries.


I have a rare autoimmune disease called Relapsing Polychondritis that has attacked my airways and caused scarring.  Normally, I manage it well enough that folks don’t know I have it.  When I catch a cold or the disease “flares up,” my breathing becomes difficult.  I usually can treat it with steroids, but every couple years I have a flare that requires hospitalization.  The last big one was three years ago and you can read about it here: thedigitaldisciple.net.  It was a long journey that involved a heart attack, dying, coma, and learning to walk again.  This time has not been as “exciting” and that’s OK with me.


This flare started a couple weeks ago,  I thought it was a cold at first, but started getting symptoms that it was more.  I began treating it at home until I started a fever on December 11.  I was admitted to the hospital in Cincinnati and they were not able to get me into remission.  I was admitted at the Cleveland Clinic yesterday, where I was diagnosed and am usually treated, and we have a plan in place that will get this managed.


I appreciate the prayers and support that have begun and I hope this site will be a good way to keep you updated on my condition, feed you information, and ask you to pray for certain specific things.  Please pass this link on to people who would like the information and to people who will add me to their prayer lists.


Prayer Requess:

If you are a praying person visiting this site, here are some things to pray about.

Surface things:  There are a lot of short-term things to pray about now and that’s a good starting point:
1. Wisdom - for the doctors and staff.  There is no playbook for managing flares.
2. Healing - for this flare and for the disease.
3. Timing - I would prefer not to be in the hospital on Christmas Day.  But, it takes time to go from 1 gram of steroids to a “home dose” that doesn’t require an IV.
4. Help and support for Mary Ann and Sarah - They are left in Cincinnati to run things without me.  
5. Details - It’s all in the details.  Pray that God will work all this together for my healing and recovery.
6. Provision - There are always consequences to these visits, financial and other.  Pray that God will continue to meet our needs, as He alway has.

Deep things:  This may be more than you want to sign up for.  But, if you’re game, these are the big things.
1. Thankfulness - Scripture teaches me I should be thankful in all things.  Not just the good and happy things.  I am tolerating this experience.  I am thankful that I made it to Cleveland in time to manage it.  I have not reached the point that I am thankful for the experience.
2. That God will be glorified through this situation - I don’t have an outcome in mind here.  God could be glorified in my healing or recovery.  He could be glorified through what, on the surface, is a “bad” outcome.  If you see God’s hand in this and are drawn closer to Him, He is glorified.  If you ask, “how can David think that way?”  and start looking for an answer, He is glorified.  There is no limit of possible responses and the impact will go far beyond me to people I don’t know and will never meet.
3. That in my weakness, God will be made strong - If you have studied the life of the apostle Paul, you know that he had a serious physical afflication that he carried all the time.  Though God used Paul to heal others, and rescued Paul over and over again, God never removed that affliction.  Instead, God told Paul that His power is made perfect in Paul’s weakness (2 Cor 12:6-10).  I want God’s power in my life.  If His power is made perfect in weakness, I’ll take the weakness too.  That makes the next request so important.
4. That God’s grace will be sufficient for me - In the passage I mention above, God begins by telling Paul His Grace will be sufficient for Paul to handle the weakness.  If I know the power that comes from weakness, I want to know the grace that sustains me through it.

Please pray.  Let me know you are praying.  Tell others to pray.  If you believe you have insight or encouragement for me, pass it on.

Press on,   Keep the Faith. Run the Race. Finish Strong.





David