Nov 07
In honor of November being National Family Caregivers Month, I’d like to offer some special encouragement to all the weary folks who faithfully attend to the needs of loved ones.
You’re physically tired. Probably emotionally exhausted. Maybe even running on spiritual fumes. Been there…done that. Way too many times. I’ve cared for relatives with dementia, others with cancer, COPD, and failing kidneys.
I spent several months last winter caring for my husband through his bilateral knee replacements, surgical hematoma evacuation and physical therapy. My caregiving turn should have been done for a while, right? Nope. Had to do it all over again this summer when one knee got infected, the prosthesis had to be removed and eventually replaced (after six weeks of immobilization and daily antibiotics administered via PICC line by guess who?) And it certainly didn’t help my caregiving stamina when less than 48 hours before my husband’s second surgery, I was diagnosed with Lyme disease. (I was feeling as if there was a bull’s eye on my back literally and figuratively!)
Did I mention that in the middle of caring for my husband, our 12-year-old cat, Ty, started losing weight and 
acting strange? I tried coaxing him to eat with all sorts of special treats and offered my best TLC for weeks, but it was cancer and we had to put him to sleep.
Still, I am a fortunate caregiver because all the sick folks I’ve cared for have been appreciative of my efforts and told me so. (Even the cat purred right up until the end. 🙂 ) Maybe you’ve been thanked for your efforts, but some of you are caring for people who either can’t or won’t express gratitude for your sacrifices..and that makes it all the more difficult.
I’d like to share with you Jesus’ words in Matthew 25:31-40 because I believe they contain wonderful encouragement for caregivers.
“But when the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit upon his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered in his presence, and he will separate the people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will place the sheep at his right hand and the goats at his left.
“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world. For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.’
“Then these righteous ones will reply, ‘Lord, when did we ever see you hungry and feed you? Or thirsty and give you something to drink? Or a stranger and show you hospitality? Or naked and give you clothing? When did we ever see you sick or in prison and visit you?’
“And the King will say, ‘I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!’”
Imagine that. Jesus says that He sees all the “little” things we do for others and promises we will be rewarded for those good deeds. And even more amazing, He tells us that every time we perform one of these actions, we really are doing it for Him.
When you took time off work to go to the doctor with your loved one, you did it for Jesus.
When you spent all that time fixing food you hoped would nourish them, you did it for Jesus.
When you got up in the middle of the night to get their pain medicine, you did it for Jesus.
When you rubbed a back, cooled a brow, cleaned up a mess or sat through yet-another tedious test, you did it for Jesus.
Whether or not you got any thanks from your loved one here and now, Jesus saw your kindness and He will bless you for it. After all, you did it for Him.
To enjoy Scott Wesley Brown’s “The Language of Jesus is Love,” open in your browser or use this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYucfd-5QUQ
Oct 31
May 8, 1977.
Mother’s Day.
The day before I had been excitedly opening” mother-to-be” cards and looking longingly at the maternity clothes I would soon need to wear.
Now I was lying in a hospital bed with an empty womb.
Really, Lord? A miscarriage on Mother’s Day? This would be awful on any day, but having it happen today seems especially cruel. Why, Lord?
Nurses came in and out of my room doling out attempts at consolation.
“You’re young–you’ll have other children!” appeared to be the favorite sentiment.
They all seemed to have missed the point that I already loved this baby, whom I would only hold in my heart and never in my arms.
I desperately wanted some encouragement so I did something I never did before. I just randomly opened up my Bible and began reading the first verse my eyes gazed upon.
James1:2: “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials,”
I thought about opening to another page, but instead kept reading: “knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”
Really, Lord? You want me to find joy in the midst of this trial? I had a lot more joy before this trial came along! This hurts so much. This doesn’t sound all that comforting.
I don’t really get it, but Ok, I will believe your Word. I will consider this trial a joy–not because of what has happened. But because of what will happen–how You will grow my faith through it.
I was sobbing as I uttered those painful words of surrender, just as I have every time since in the forty-plus years whenever my faith has been tested.
Bestselling author Chris Tiegreen says that testing is the “only way for our faith to get from its raw state to refined beauty.”
“Like a precious metal in a crucible, the impurities must be burned with fire,” Tiegreen explains. “It’s a painful process…(but) once circumstances, trials, the enemy’s lies, and our own doubts are through assaulting it. whatever remains is precious and pure.”
No pain, no gain isn’t true of everything in life, but it does apply to our faith. That’s why we need to endure…so the pain of refining can produce the gain of greater faith.
Joy is never my immediate reaction when a new trial comes along–like breaking my wrist and only being able to type with two fingers instead of my usual four! However, I have learned to trust God’s refining process. As Tiegreen says, “(trials) fit us for the Kingdom. They purify our faith and make it powerfully effective.”
And in that I can find joy.
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To listen to the music video “Refiner’s Fire” open in your browser or click on this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSIazjrA0Ls
Oct 26
So I said to my nearly recovered husband, “I’ve cared for you the last year-and-a-half with your four knee surgeries and I think it’s my turn for a little TLC!” 
But my knees didn’t need replacing, so Monday night I decided to just miss a step and fall on my wrist, badly breaking the radius and chipping the ulna. Surgery was yesterday and I will have a soft cast for three weeks, followed by physical therapy.
If you think this is rather unfair after all we’ve just been through, I heartily agree. Perhaps life has been unfair to you or your loved one recently or perhaps for a very long time. Maybe if you’re really honest you’ll admit you even feel disappointed by God.
In Philip Yancey’s book “Disappointment with God,” he writes about a man named Douglas whom he interviewed because he thought Douglas might feel a great disappointment with God. Life, as Yancey describes it, had been very unfair to Douglas. While his wife was battling advanced breast cancer, Douglas was in a car accident with a drunk driver and suffered a terrible head injury that left him permanently disabled, often in pain and unable to work full-time.
But when Yancey asked this victim of unfairness to describe his disappointment with God, Douglas said he didn’t feel any and instead told Yancey the following:
“I have learned to see beyond the physical reality in this world to the spiritual reality. We tend to think, ‘Life should be fair because God is fair,’ But God is not life. And if I confuse God with the physical reality of life—by expecting constant good health, for example—then I set myself up for crashing disappointment.
“If we develop a relationship with God apart from our life circumstances, “ said Douglas, “then we may be able to hang in there when the physical reality breaks down. We can learn to trust God in spite of the unfairness of life.”
Life often is unfair, my friends, but God always is faithful.
But you, O LORD, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. Psalm 86:15
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. Lamentations 3:22-23
(Now, honey, please pass the remote and bring me a cup of tea! 
)
P.S. If you don’t see a new blog every week from me, now you know why. I normally am a four-finger hunt-and-peck typist and now I’m down to two!
To hear Shannon Wexelberg’s “Faithful God,” open in your browser or use this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQqsK_R9iF8
Oct 17
Once upon a time there was a newspaper reporter who simply loved reporting news. She didn’t want to make up stories or even write non-fiction books. She just wanted to stick to the facts and report the news–hopefully someday for the New York Times. But God had other plans.
When she was 36, the doctors told her that she had cancer and the odds she would die were greater than the chance she would survive. But God had other plans.
This newspaper reporter recovered from her surgery and chemotherapy and went back to reporting the news. She was happy doing that. But again, God had other plans.
Her oncologist hired her to offer emotional and spiritual support to his cancer patients and their caregivers. She wasn’t sure exactly how to do that, but she faithfully wrote down many of the conversations she had with these hurting people. She thought it was silly that she couldn’t stop being a reporter and taking these “unnecessary” notes. But God still had other plans. 
A few years later an author-friend told the reporter-turned-advocate that all these notes would make a great book. She protested that she could never write a book. But God had other plans.
So she penned her first manuscript, insisting that every single detail be accurate–just like her news stories. She reported on amazing ways she had seen God touch people’s lives–emotionally, spiritually and physically. And she told the truth that sometimes God takes the cancer out of us and sometimes He takes us out of the cancer. She thought people wouldn’t like to hear this truth and wouldn’t read her book. But God once again had other plans.
One day the reporter-turned-advocate-turned-wannabe-author got a call from the acquisitions editor at Tyndale House Publishing saying she liked the manuscript and hoped to publish it. The editorial and sales departments gave it thumbs up too. However the publishing department turned it down, saying “It’s a good book, but the author is unknown and it will be lucky to sell 5,000 copies over its lifetime.” But God had other plans.
The editorial people played their ace-in-the-hole card on the wannabe-author, overrode the publication decision and in 2002 had 5,000 copies of When GOD & Cancer Meet printed. Everybody, including the publishing people and the reporter-turned-author knew it would take a long, long time to sell that many. But not surprisingly, God had other plans.
Within a few weeks, a second printing was ordered and this past week the reporter-turned-jubilant-author got word from Tyndale that the book’s 17th printing had been released, raising the total number of copies in print to just over 100,000.
Dear friends, I don’t know what God’s plans are for your life any more than I could foresee His plans for mine. I shared my story with you today in hopes it would encourage you that God is in control and more powerful than any earthly predictions, statistics, or roadblocks. No matter what happens–or doesn’t happen–in your life, don’t despair.
Instead do as Psalm 33:3-5, 10-11 says:
“Sing a new song of praise to Him;
play skillfully on the harp, and sing with joy.
For the word of the Lord holds true,
and we can trust everything He does.
He loves whatever is just and good;
the unfailing love of the Lord fills the earth…
The Lord frustrates the plans of the nations
and thwarts all their schemes.
But the Lord’s plans stand firm forever;
His intentions can never be shaken.“
And please join me in praising God that He had “other” plans for my life.
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View this email in your browser to hear the song “Trust” by Hillsong or use this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=En4LGz5N8T8
Oct 10
By Chris Tiegreen
“Our Bible is full of miracles. Sometimes, it feels as if our lives are not. The difference between the two can be disheartening, especially when a miracle is the only thing that can help us through a time of need. We pray to God and hope that He will answer, wondering where the miracles have gone. If we really listen, we will hear Him tell us to open our eyes.
“God’s dramatic miracles are scattered throughout history, sometimes in clusters (as in Acts), and sometimes spread out over painfully long years. But even when we don’t see the drama, God is always doing miracles. He redeemed us, after all–that was a miracle in itself. And He continues to work in our lives. Sometimes we see His hand, and sometimes we don’t. But the fact that He is working, whether behind the scenes or in plain view, should always fill us with hope.
“One of our problems is that we often anticipate the ordinary from God. We pray with realistic expectations, hoping He will answer us with obvious answers. Our minds confine Him to the predictable, forgetting that He is able to do infinitely more than we can even imagine (Ephesians 3:20). We underestimate Him.
“When you pray, trust that God is working. He may be working behind the scenes, or radically changing hearts in the midst of our circumstances, or waiting for the plot to unfold a little further before He intervenes in a visible way. But the key to seeing God work is to expect Him to work, He is–and always has been–the God of miracles.” 
Content taken from THE ONE YEAR AT THE CROSS DEVOTIONAL, by Chris Tiegreen. Copyright © 2011. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. (Bold added.)
Please open this email in your browser to enjoy the music video “He Still Does (Miracles)” by Hawk Nelson.
I’m a newspaper reporter-turned-author. And I’m a passionate encourager, but always a truth-teller. I worked for nearly two decades in a unique position as a patient advocate in my oncologist’s office and the Cancer Prayer Support Group I founded in 1991 is the country’s oldest such faith-based group.
