Oct 03
In recognition of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, I’d like to introduce you to my dear friend Polly, a cancer-free, five-time survivor–including three breast cancers, one of which was stage 4!
Polly’s personal cancer journey began more than 15 years ago, although her family’s trek with this dreaded disease stretches back decades. Her mother, several maternal aunts and her sister all had breast cancer and the nagging thought of it always was there in Polly’s mind, too.
So when she got the same diagnosis at age 48, she was anxious and upset, but not really surprised. The shock came four years later in 2007 when the cancer spread to her lungs and bones and was considered incurable . (And yes, this story is going to have a “happy” ending–keep reading!)
“I thought I was a goner!” she recalls. “I kept thinking ‘I hope I have another birthday’.”
Polly had the lung tumors surgically removed and started more chemo. We talked and prayed often and Polly kept drawing closer to God as she sat on her front porch each day watching hummingbirds, reading the Bible and talking with her heavenly Father in prayer.
Four months later, the PET scan showed significant improvement and two months after that, all signs of the cancer were gone. She stayed on “maintenance” therapy for a while, but eventually that was stopped and she still is NED–No Evidence of Disease.
“”It’s a blessing beyond my wildest dreams,” she says. “It’s been a wonderful journey of whole new closeness with the Lord. He just knows what I need right now—this minute, this hour.
“I have learned to seize each day,” she adds. “Every day I get up and say ‘you can have a good day or a bad day’ and I always choose good.”
I think Polly’s optimism and faith is especially amazing because she has survived four more primary cancers (two breast, one melanoma and one rectal), all caught early stage and cured with surgery.
“If this wasn’t my story, I might not believe it,” she admits. “But with God, (my oncologist) Dr. (Marc) Hirsh, and gumption, here I am!!! And I give all the glory to God, who has never left my side.”
I believe Polly has been experiencing what it’s like to walk with God as He goes before us and lights our way during the dark times. Don’t expect that He will light up your whole journey—He might reveal just the next few steps. And don’t imagine that His provision will arrive way ahead of time so you can stockpile it for later.
God’s perfect timing is wonderfully illustrated in a story shared by Corrie Ten Boom, the Dutch Christian 
concentration camp survivor whose family helped hide hundreds of Jews from the Nazis during World War II. The conversation she relates took place when she was a little girl and her father tried to console her fears that she would be unprepared when she had to die someday:
Father sat down on the edge of the narrow bed. “Corrie,” he began gently, “when you and I go to Amsterdam—when do I give you your ticket?”
I sniffed a few times considering this.
“Why just before we get on the train.”
“Exactly. And our wise Father in heaven knows exactly when we are going to need things, too. Don’t run out ahead of Him, Corrie. When the time comes that some of us have to die, you will look in your heart and find just the strength you need—just in time.”[1]
“Don’t run out ahead of Him.”
What marvelous advice. God needs to go before us into each day. We don’t yet have what we need to face all of our tomorrows, because we are not yet there. But every day as we come to our heavenly Father in prayer, He promises to guide us and provide for us in that minute, that hour, that day.
I’d like to pray Deuteronomy 31:6 for you today: Do not be afraid and do not panic before them. For the LORD your God will personally go ahead of you. He will neither fail you nor abandon you. Amen.
[1] Corrie ten Boom, The Hiding Place (Grand Rapids: Chosen Books, 1984), 44.
Sep 26
The above quote from 20th-century American author/pastor A. W. Tozer is for me a mind-blowing one.
What I think about God–who He is, how He acts, what He can and cannot do–is the very most important thing about me.
Our view of God shapes our attitude, our emotions, our responses, and our plans in unimaginable ways. And if we’re really honest, most of us have false views of God–images which are not taught in scripture, but have been impressed upon us by songs, movies or our religious upbringing. Contrary to that beautiful Bette Midler melody, God is not watching us from a distance and while Garth Brooks is correct that “some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers,” we are not just talking to “the man upstairs.”
And illness, suffering and the stresses of life can become even more difficult when we cling to these unbiblical views of God.
The best thing I learned from my cancer journey 28 years ago and my nearly two decades as a patient advocate is that I tend to limit God. I try to shrink Him to fit into my small brain. I attempt to figure out what He’s going to do and how He’s going to do it. Sometimes I even plan how to get one step ahead of Him!
But watching God work in my life and the lives of thousands of cancer patients and caregivers has enlarged my view of the Almighty. I have had a front-row seat to watching Him accomplish as Ephesians 3:20 says “immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine.”
So I ask you…how big is your God?
Is he “the man upstairs” who’s fairly nearby and helps out if we need a hand with something? Or is He the Creator who laid the foundations of the earth (Job 38:4) and whose power and presence cannot be contained in a building or a universe (2 Chronicles 2:6)?
Is he like Santa Claus making a list of who’s naughty and nice? Or is He the God of grace, giving us what we don’t deserve and of mercy, not giving us what we do deserve (John 1:16, Ephesians 2:4)?
Is the God of your mind a harsh dictator only looking out for Himself? Or is He the always good Father who
“loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16)?
Is your image of God one of a magic genie who might grant our wishes if we utter the right prayer or say the correct number of Hail Marys? Or is He the holy Almighty “beyond our reach and exalted in power” (Job 37:23) and for whom “nothing is impossible” (Luke 1:37)?
Ponder your situation or your loved one’s and ask yourself what you are thinking about God in relation to that situation. Is your image of Him found in the Bible or has it been pieced together from some less reliable sources?
Author Ann Spangler gives us a true picture of God: “With no failings or flaws, He is better than the best person you have ever met or read about. Because God is entirely good, there is never any room for improvement, never any need for change. Everything about Him–His thoughts, motives, intentions, plans, words, commands, decisions, and actions–is good.”
If that is what comes to mind when you think about God, it will change the way you face the trials of life.
No matter what happens–or doesn’t happen–to you or your loved one, I promise you that no one has ever or will ever love you as much as the one, true God does. Don’t limit Him.
Don’t miss the “Reckless Love” music video–open this blog in your browser or use this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sc6SSHuZvQE
Sep 19
Sometimes things move very quickly once you or a loved one gets a life-threatening diagnosis. I guess that’s good because you don’t have much time to think about it, but it also makes life feel a little like a surreal out-of-body experience: Can that really be me/us everyone is talking about?
My cancer was discovered on a Tuesday and in less than a week I saw the surgeon, had blood taken, got a chest X-ray, “cleaned out” my colon (again!) and had the tumor removed.
Three days later, at 7 a.m., the surgeon and his resident delivered the pathology report as I lay alone in my room. I could tell from their body language that the news wasn’t good. They stood against the wall at the end of my hospital bed, as far away from me as they could be.
“Cancer was found in five of twenty lymph nodes,” the surgeon explained matter-of-factly. “You will need chemotherapy and radiation.”
I cried, but no one moved to comfort me.
“Have you ever known anyone who underwent chemotherapy?” he asked, seeming to grasp for words to continue the conversation.
I nodded, recalling the two people I had known most recently—both of whom had died! I started hyperventilating.
Still, neither doctor moved toward me, but instead the surgeon called a nurse to help me breathe into a paper bag.
“Do you want me to call your husband?” the doctor asked, still at the foot of my bed. I nodded between sobbing gasps into my little brown sack.
Now I was really frightened. I desperately needed Ralph. But, for whatever reason, the surgeon did not telephone him. So for several hours I lay in the room alone with my fears.
Get a grip on yourself, my head told my heart. What are you so afraid of? Nausea and vomiting? You were sick night and day for six months with all three of your pregnancies. Mouth sores? You’ve had them before. Needles? You’re not afraid of them. Losing your hair? It’ll grow back. Don’t be so vain, my head stated matter-of-factly. But my heart didn’t buy it. I just cried harder as I stroked the waist-length hair that I desperately wanted to keep.
Yes, that’s what I’m afraid of, I admitted. I don’t want to look sick for my children and my husband. I can’t imagine watching my hair fall out. I disliked the vanity of my feelings, but it was how I felt.
I couldn’t even get my lips to form the word chemotherapy. The fear of facing that, for me, was worse than the initial shock of cancer.
My surgeon obviously did a good job operating on me as I’m still alive and well 28 years later, but his bedside manner wouldn’t have earned such a high grade. It was incredibly impersonal. And not to contact my husband for almost five hours was very unprofessional. I don’t think I should have gotten that bad news all by myself or been left alone for all that time.
But…God used that doctor’s “mistakes” to draw me closer to Himself and help me to face my deepest fears. As I named my fears, they lost much of their power over me and I began to find courage.
Name your fears and lessen their power. Then believe God supernaturally will give you courage to overcome your fears and to live with the uncertainties life brings. Fear is a liar. Are you going to believe a liar or the truth of God’s Word?
I hope Psalm 27:1, 3 can be your prayer today: The LORD is my light and my salvation—so why should I be afraid?…Though a mighty army surrounds me, my heart will not be afraid. Even if I am attacked, I will remain confident.
(Copyright 2012 by Lynn Eib, 50 Days of Hope)
[1] M. Scott Peck, Further Along the Road Less Traveled (New York: Touchstone, 1993), pg. 23.
To hear “Fear is a Liar” music video, open in your browser or use this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQTnREEtuNk
Sep 12
When you believe in a good God, it can be hard to come to terms with the fact that He has allowed adversity to touch your life or your loved one’s. Think about it.
If God knows everything, this diagnosis did not surprise Him.
If God sees everything, He saw the bad news coming.
If God has power over everything, He could have stopped it.
But He didn’t.
He didn’t stop you or your loved one from getting cancer or heart disease or dementia or whatever ailment has invaded your lives.
Would you like to know why?………….Join the club!
My journalist-friend Mike Dellosso 
was awaiting the release of his first novel[1] when his colorectal cancer was diagnosed.
At only thirty-five, with a wife and three young children, he wondered what God was doing (or not doing) in his life.
“Lord, in my head, I know You’re in control,
but my heart is wondering what’s going on here,” he said.
“You sure You know what You’re doing?”
My author-friend David Biebel talks about this dilemma in his book If God Is So Good, Why Do I Hurt So Bad He says there are two truths suffering people have to reconcile:
Sometimes life is agony
And our loving God is in control
In the beginning, it was hard for me to reconcile these truths. I honestly found that at first my faith made things harder rather than easier as I had to struggle with the fact that I loved and faithfully served God for many years and yet He let something really bad happen to me when I knew He had the power to stop it. I’ve heard some people without faith respond to cancer very nonchalantly because they have kind of a “que sera, sera, whatever will be, will be” approach to life.
But for me, it’s different. I don’t believe that life is merely a series of random events that happen to us. I believe I have a Heavenly Father who loves me, watches over me and has good plans for my life. So, why did a nice girl like me get a not-nice thing like cancer 28 years ago?
The reality is that God’s Word never promises that He will stop all bad things from happening to us. On the contrary, it promises us that He is prepared for each battle and will equip us, too.
The Message Bible paraphrases 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 this way:
We’ve been surrounded and battered by troubles, but we’re not demoralized;
we’re not sure what to do, but we know that God knows what to do; we’ve been spiritually terrorized.
But God hasn’t left our side; we’ve been thrown down, but we haven’t broken.
No matter how unfair life may be to you or your loved one, God will be faithful to you because He is good.
Psalm 34:8 “Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.”
Psalm 145:8,9 “The LORD is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love. The LORD is good to all; He has compassion on all He has made.”
[1] The Hunted, Realms, 2008. www.mikedellosso.com
If Chris Tomlin’s “I Lift My Hands” doesn’t automatically load, view in your browser or use this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c24En0r-lXg
Sep 05
Imagine someone takes you to a party.
You see a few friends there, enjoy a couple of good conversations, a little laughter, and some decent appetizers. The party’s all right, but you keep hoping it will get better. Give it another hour, and maybe it will. Suddenly, your friend says, “I need to take you home.”
Now?
You’re disappointed. Nobody wants to leave a party early—but you leave, and your friend drops you off at your house. As you approach the door, you’re feeling all alone and sorry for yourself. As you open the door and reach for the light switch, you sense someone’s there. Your heart’s in your throat. You flip on the light.
“Surprise!” Your house is full of smiling people, familiar faces. 
It’s a party—for you. You smell your favorites—barbecued ribs and pecan pie right out of the oven.
The tables are full. It’s a feast.
You recognize the guests, people you haven’t seen for a long time. Then, one by one, the people you most enjoyed at the other party show up at your house, grinning. This turns out to be the real party. You realize that if you’d stayed longer at the other party, as you’d wanted, you wouldn’t be at the real party—you’d be away from it.
Christians faced with terminal illness or imminent death often feel they’re leaving the party before it’s over. They have to go home early. They’re disappointed, thinking of all they’ll miss when they leave. But the truth is, the real party is underway at home—precisely where they’re going. They’re not the ones missing the party; those of us left behind are. (Fortunately, if we know Jesus, we’ll get there eventually.)
One by one, occasionally a few of us at a time, we’ll disappear from this world. Those we leave behind will grieve that their loved ones have left home. In reality, however, their believing loved ones aren’t leaving home, they’re going home. They’ll be home before us. We’ll be arriving at the party a little later. [1]
[1] Randy Alcorn, Heaven, (Carol Stream, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers), 2004, 441-442.
Chris Tomlin “Home” music video can be viewed on your browser or with this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twL3v5r8s6o
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.
