Category: disappointment

Oct 11

Responding to life’s disappointments

          I’m trying to keep in mind a saying my good friend Doris Martin often would use after something went wrong: “Well. if that’s the worst thing that happens to me today, it will be a pretty good day.” And for many disappointments in life, that phrase works well. It fits my dilemma today–once again I am having technical problems with my blog and it is not posting correctly to Facebook. Last week it also did not email correctly the first time to all of you and I apologize if you got it twice–or not at all! I have someone younger, smarter and much more techy than I am working on it, but every time he thinks he has it fixed…it’s not. So because of that hassle AND the fact that our middle daughter Bethany and her three kids, 3, 5, and 6 1/2 are visiting from Indiana this week (and the rest of our local family have been coming over everyday!), I did not get a blog done. I am very sorry not to have a special word for you today and am praying that God brings encouragement to you from many other sources. And I also hope you might be able to agree with my friend Doris that if not getting my blog emailed is the worst thing that happens to you today…it will be a pretty good day! I am including a song  which I pray reminds you that even though friends like me may let you down, God always will be faithful!  

Aug 23

Searching for a 100-percent Guarantee

 

 

 

 

 

 

I remember back in 1990 when doctors told me I had about a 40- or 50-percent chance of surviving my colon cancer, which had metastasized to several lymph nodes. I felt as if someone were going to toss a coin: heads, I live; tails, I don’t.

I desperately wanted some kind of guarantee that if I was going to put myself through a year’s worth of weekly chemotherapy; I was going to be okay. But there was no such guarantee.

There were plenty of “helpful” people who offered me other kinds of “guarantees:”

 

Eat certain natural foods and you will be cured.

Drink a certain tea and you will be cured.

Take certain vitamin supplements and you will be cured.

 

But I am at heart a skeptical former newspaper reporter and I knew there was no way all these methods really could deliver what they were promising, especially since many of their recommendations were directly opposed to one another!

I wanted to believe that one of them really was the answer, but which one was it and what if I picked the wrong one? Which had the 100-percent guarantee that I could trust?

And then I remembered.

“Some trust in chariots (food and drink) and some in horses (vitamins and herbs),
But we trust in the name of the LORD our God.” Psalm 20:7  (italics mine)

 

It wasn’t which had an ironclad guarantee; it was Who. My diagnosis, my treatment, my prognosis…and my future were in His hands and I had His guaranteed promise that when I put my hope in Him I would not be disappointed.

Then you will know that I am the LORD; those who hope in me will not be disappointed.  Isaiah 49:23

Don’t stress yourself out trying to find the “magic cure” for cancer or some other serious illness—it doesn’t exist. If you do add complementary therapies to your treatment, discuss them with your physician and choose things that will strengthen your body, mind and spirit.

And here’s a prayer guaranteed to supernaturally empower you on your journey:

Heavenly Father, Please forgive me for rushing about trying to find something that will give me complete assurance and guarantees. I know better than that. I know that the things of this world are very temporary—even cures for disease don’t last forever. I don’t want to spend my time chasing after these things, but instead I want to seek You with all my heart.

Help me to remember that no matter how many times I am cured, I still am going to die someday and when that happens if I am a true Christ-follower, I really will be more alive than I have ever been! Please keep me from putting my trust and my hope in anything but You. I humbly ask these things in the name of Jesus, the One who died for my sins. Amen.

(This blog is adapted from a devotional I had published in the book Praying through Cancer:Set Your Heart Free from Fear, copyright 2006 Susan Sorensen and Laura Geist, W Publishing Co., a division of Thomas Nelson Inc.)

**Don’t miss today’s original song by California youth pastor, Jason David, who had most of his tongue removed because of cancer and yet continues to sing God’s praise http://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2017/july/cancer-took-most-of-his-tongue-but-this-pastor-is-still-singing-gods-praise ) **

(If the music video below doesn’t automatically load, please copy, paste and click on this link to enjoy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga_m8wqg3us )

 

Aug 16

Is Jesus REALLY Enough?

 

 

 

 

 

My cancer diagnosis  in 1990 was especially upsetting to my husband because he had lost his first wife nearly 20 years before to ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) while they were still newlyweds. To watch me then face a life-threatening illness and an uncertain future was more than he felt he could bear.

One day as he was riding home from the hospital after visiting me during my post-surgical stay, he came upon a car with a bumper sticker that read:

As a seminary graduate, my husband theologically knew the right answer to that question. And as a longtime pastor, he often had preached the affirmative answer to that query. But that day he was so overcome with worry and fear of losing yet another wife that he wondered out loud: “Is He really?” “Is Jesus really enough?”

 

Have you asked that same question?

If I lose a breast…is Jesus enough?

If I get sick during treatments…is Jesus enough?

If I lose my hair to chemo…is Jesus enough?

If I have to quit work…is Jesus enough?

And worst of all, if the cure doesn’t come…is Jesus really enough?

 

My husband answered that question for himself two weeks later when he stepped into the pulpit on Sunday morning and preached one of his most powerful sermons ever, entitled “Jesus is Enough.” In it, he reminded all of us—and himself—that God doesn’t need to do another thing for us on this earth. He has given us His one and only Son, and in Him we have everything we need to cope with this life and every promise for eternal life. No matter what else does, or doesn’t happen to us, God doesn’t need to do another thing to prove to us that indeed, Jesus is enough.

 

Dear Jesus, It feels unfair to have to face this illness after I’ve tried so hard to live for You. And then I remember that You lived completely for your Father and life still was very unfair to You. I’m glad You understand what I’m feeling and most of all, I’m so grateful that Your presence living in me is enough for me. Please help me deal with the changes that this disease is bringing into my life/my loved one’s life. I pray they all will be temporary ones and that health will be restored completely. But even if it’s not, I pray that my soul will be satisfied in You alone. I pray all this in Your name. Amen.

Today’s Tip: Listen for the word “ENOUGH” in conversations and when you hear it, remind yourself that Jesus IS enough.

(This blog is adapted from a devotional I had published in the book Praying through Cancer:Set Your Heart Free from Fear, copyright 2006 Susan Sorensen and Laura Geist, W Publishing Co., a division of Thomas Nelson Inc.)

I know I included this same song recently, but I LOVE it and it fits better than any other I could find–please enjoy it again! 🙂 

(If the music video doesn’t automatically load, please copy, paste and insert this link to enjoy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6fA35Ved-Y&list=RDB6fA35Ved-Y )

Aug 02

How have you NOT wasted your cancer?

 

 

 

 

I love hearing from cancer survivors and their caregivers about ways they have found to not waste the suffering/trials/changes/hardships/sorrow cancer brings.

Some have walked in relays to raise money for cancer research. Some have volunteered to transport patients to medical appointments. Some have organized bone marrow drives to find matching donors. Some have started cancer prayer support groups, while others have attended those meetings offering encouragement to newcomers. Some have given away many copies of my books to hurting people in need of hope (thank you!)

Some of accomplished big endeavors like starting a boutique for women cancer patients or making thousands of cozy quilts for patients in treatment. Still others have accomplished small things with great love, like taking a meal to a weary friend or sending an inspirational card to another.

To all of you, I say thank you for not wasting your cancer–for allowing God to use this unwanted journey to mold you and make you more like Jesus.

To those who are still wondering how not to waste this trial, I encourage you to read the essay “Don’t Waste Your Cancer” by pastor/author John Piper, written on the eve of his prostate cancer surgery in 2006. ( http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/dont-waste-your-cancer ) In it he shares 10 ways not to waste your cancer. Below is #3:

“You will waste your cancer if you seek comfort from your odds rather than from God.
The design of God in your cancer is not to train you in the rationalistic, human calculation of odds. The world gets comfort from their odds. Not Christians. Some count their chariots (percentages of survival) and some count their horses (side effects of treatment), but we trust in the name of the Lord our God (Psalm 20:7). God’s design is clear from 2 Corinthians 1:9, “We felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.” The aim of God in your cancer (among a thousand other good things) is to knock props out from under our hearts so that we rely utterly on him.”

Lord,  Life has broken us. Please spill us out to be supernaturally used by You to help ourselves and others know and love you more.

(If the music video doesn’t automatically load, please copy, paste and click on this link to enjoy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiM57qZZuGM )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiM57qZZuGM

 

May 10

When Your Prayers Aren’t Answered the Way You Hoped

 

 

 

 

May is a tough month for me. It’s the month of mournful memories—difficult prayers which were not answered the way I hoped.

  • A miscarriage at three months into my first pregnancy on May 8, 1977—Mother’s Day of all things.
  • My father’s death on May 20, 2011, alone in his apartment except for a hospice nurse, as my family and I raced there from another state and as my mother—his wife of nearly 59 years—was being transported home after an extended hospital stay in another town.
  • My mother’s death May 31, 2014, just four months shy of welcoming two great-grandchildren.

And I’m willing to bet you have some months, holidays or seasons which remind you of prayers that were not answered the way you had hoped.

Even though it’s been years since these sad events touched my life, I still have more questions than answers about them.

Why, God, did I even get pregnant if the baby was never going to be born? Why couldn’t it have happened on another day besides Mother’s Day?

Why, Lord, did my Dad have to be without his family by his side? Why couldn’t he hang on four more hours until my mom got there?

Why, God,  couldn’t my mom’s infection have been found sooner and treated? Why couldn’t she have lived a few more months to hold these precious great-grandchildren?

I’m sure you have your own “whys.”

Why this diagnosis now? Why this recurrence? Why this financial struggle? Why this job loss? Why did they have to die now?

“I know the sorrow, I know the hurt
Would all go away if You’d just say the word.
But even if you don’t,
My hope is You alone.”

Those words are the chorus of the music video at the end of this blog. Usually I write my blog first and then spend sometimes an hour or more listening to songs and trying to find just the right message and music to share. But today I started with the song “Even If” by Mercy Me. I knew it had the message I wanted to share.

“They say it only takes a little faith
To move a mountain
Well good thing
A little faith is all I have, right now
But God, when You choose
To leave mountains unmovable
Oh give me the strength to be able to sing
It is well with my soul”

 Isn’t that what we all need? The supernatural strength to be able to sing “it is well with my soul” no matter what happens—or doesn’t happen—in our lives, our loved ones’ lives and in this world.

I can honestly say that even though God has not given me any real answers to my questions about the circumstances surrounding the losses of my loved ones, He has made it well with my soul.

The process actually started when I was in the hospital that May of 1977 following the miscarriage and D&C surgery. Alone in my room after all the well-wishers had left, I finally was able to cry. I know nurses and friends meant well, but their oft-repeated comment had not soothed my grief: “You’re young—you’ll have more children!”

Don’t they realize right now I didn’t want more children? I want the child I carried inside me for three months and already loved!

So in my despair and feeling as if no one really understood, I told God I needed to hear from Him. I randomly flipped open my Bible and looked a little ways down on the right-hand side of the page. (I do not normally recommend this method of scripture reading, but sometimes in desperate moments, we do things that aren’t exactly kosher!)

My eyes fell on James 1:2-4: “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, 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.”

Reading those verses in James that Mother’s Day brought me a peace unlike any other time I’ve ever read them. I was still grieving my circumstances, but I knew the God of the Universe had heard my cries and was at work in my life. I could put my hope in Him.

“I know You’re able and I know You can
Save through the fire with Your mighty hand
But even if You don’t
My hope is You alone”

 When my mother was in her last days resting peacefully in her own bed, I put a CD player on the headboard and a stack of CDs next to it—a mixture of music she loved: barbershop four-part harmony, instrumental jazz and worship tunes. I encouraged the nurses and aides to feel free to select and play a CD so that she always could hear soothing music.

She passed away just after noon May 31 as I was in the next room taking care of some bills. When I came into her room, I fell to my knees sobbing by her bedside and can honestly say it was the deepest sorrow I yet have known.  And then I heard it.

The CD playing was the “old” version of “In Christ Alone.”

“In Christ alone
I place my trust
And find my glory in the power of the cross.
In every victory, let it be said of me.
My source of strength,
My source of hope
Is Christ alone.”

 It is one of the two songs I have instructed my family to be sung at my funeral (in case you’re wondering, the other is Andrae Crouch’s “My Tribute.”) I had not put in that CD and honestly didn’t remember that song was on any of the CDs I had hurriedly grabbed as we were leaving our home.

But God “remembered.” He knew how much that song means to me and He supernaturally arranged to have it playing as He took my mom Home. I still wished I could have her for one more day. Or better yet for a few more months to meet beautiful Callyn Joy and Abigail Leigh (who shares her middle name). Still it was well with my soul.

“I know the sorrow, I know the hurt
Would all go away if You’d just say the word.
But even if you don’t,
My hope is You alone.”

So take all your questions to your heavenly Father. He will either give you the answers you need or the peace you need to live with the questions. Either way, it will be well with your soul.

P.S. I’ve also included the music video “In Christ Alone” below too, in case you are not familiar with this beautiful song.  Alsothere’s a short ad at the beginning of “Even If,” but you can skip it after five seconds!

If the music videos don’t automatically load, please copy and paste these links to enjoy  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6fA35Ved-Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lx82Q3nDPc

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lx82Q3nDPc