Over the past several weeks my life has intersected
with the lives of friends, past and present, as they have come face to face
with the trials and tribulations that you always pray to miss in your life. A
friend with Alzheimer’s got out on a winter’s night and wandered around in sub-freezing
temperatures with nothing more than a lightweight jacket and a blanket of
prayers. A young twenty-something man after spending time with a friend,
inexplicably went home and took his life. A friend of ours was in the hospital and
diagnosed with cancer at the same time last year that I was. Due to
circumstances and other health issues at the time did not live long enough to
begin cancer treatment. Ten months later his widow passed after experiencing a
fatal heart attack leaving an only child to pick up the pieces of her life.
Several other friends and associates have listened as a man of medicine
explained to them, “You have cancer.”
I am sure that everyone connected to any of these
storms has at some point thought, wondered or asked, “Why?”
I have said before and as I think back now on that
dreary, rainy, cold Friday afternoon when my cancer was confirmed, I simply
refused to accept the worst, being determined to find the best in all
situations. I decided to praise God, not only for my life but for all that came
with it. If cancer was to be part of that then thank you God for cancer. If it
takes cancer to bring me closer to you then every day with cancer, every chemo
treatment, every ache and every pain is worth it. I know and better understand
now that long before April of 1953 God knew that I would be and that cancer
would be part of my journey.
I always had praying parents. I was always in the
prayers of my parents. As a teen I was born again into God’s family. I always
tried to stay within God’s will. Because of these facts, I believe that
anything that happens to me is in God’s plan for me and I should praise God for
it. I recently told Ann that I am glad I got cancer after our parents were
called home. The anguish they would have felt for my disease would have been
very difficult to deal with. Even knowing and understanding that God is in control,
a parent never wants to see their child suffer or hurt in any aspect of their
lives.
They all play a part but the victories I am
experiencing are not coming because of modern medicine, doctors or nurses. My
victories are coming as a direct result of prayers. Prayers from family.
Prayers of friends. Prayers of strangers. I have been the beneficiary of them
all. I have felt the effect of each and every one of them in my life. This is
where victory is achieved. This is where battles are won, on the knees and in
the prayers of the faithful.
When storms come to your life, what do you do? Rage
against them in defiance? Yelling in your spirit, “Why me!” Withdraw from life
in denial and depression hoping that the storm will abate and disappear? What I
have come to know is that God doesn’t cause my hard times. He does allow the
storms of suffering to increase and intensify to build a stronger relationship
between us, to cause me to fall deeper in love with Him, to grow my faith in
Him, to be more consistent in my walk with Him, to bear more fruit in my
service to Him, to keep my focus on Him and to live for His glory alone. He is
not punishing me for something I did or didn’t do.
God provides the graces I need to glorify Him in all
I do. He uses me and my life condition to be a witness for Him. He uses me to
allow others to see Him through me. God uses me and cancer to draw others closer
to Him. Whether it is accomplished by changing their thoughts about God or by
drawing them to Him via a deeper more meaningful, sacrificial prayer life, His
purposes are accomplished.
Read the story of Mary, Martha and Lazarus. Before
commencing, ask God to open your eyes, your heart and your spirit to His words.
Their story shows me that the experience of this family from Bethany highlights
the truth that God’s picture for my life is so much bigger than my own.
When I don’t understand, “Why”, I have learned to
trust Him because God can lift me up to soar above the storms in my life.
So, "Why me?" So God can use me like He does the Moon. I never thought I'd want to be a moon.
Every day, I fight!
