Category: Miscellaneous

Sep 29

How God is Like a Cross Country Mom or Dad

I don’t know if your family ever had a cross country athlete, but our middle daughter Bethany was one in high school. She didn’t excel at the long-distance event, but decided running would help keep her in shape for her favorite sports of basketball, and track and field.

What I initially didn’t realize was that her choice was going to require my husband and me to be in shape too.

Watching a cross country meet is far different than viewing other sports because the action is not confined to a  field or court. Instead, participants run 5K (3.1 miles) up and down hills on a twisty, dirt or grass trail.

As parents we had three chances to see our daughter running. First, we stood at the starting line and when the gun went off, we loudly hollered her name. Then we jogged to a spot midway along the race route where we caught a glimpse of her as we shouted encouragement that she, indeed, could complete the race. Finally, we dashed back to the finish line–which may or may not have been the same as the starting line–and wildly cheered when Bethany crossed it.

Bethany donning her varsity jacket for me yesterday 🙂

Then we all went home and took showers.

Why did we do it? For the 60 seconds or less we actually saw her run? No way. Because it was so enjoyable to watch her face turn beet red and her uniform get soaked with perspiration? Hardly.

We did it because we deeply love her and wanted to convey that she was worth the sacrifice it took to root for her. Whether Bethany’s time was fast or slow didn’t matter to us–she had persevered and we always celebrated her.

And that’s why I think God is like a cross country mom or dad– He celebrates us on life’s journey.

As author Max Lucado puts it:
“God is for you. Turn to the sidelines; that’s God cheering your run.
Look past the finish line; that’s God applauding your steps.
Listen for him in the bleachers, shouting your name.
Too tired to continue? He’ll carry you.
Too discouraged to fight? He’s picking you up.
God is for you.”

Whatever you are facing on the race set before you–ups and downs of a serious illness, twists and turns of a rocky marriage, rough terrain of financial struggles–God is right there with you; not just cheering you on like a cross country parent, but also equipping you by the power of His Spirit to have what you need to stay the course.

As Lucado concludes: “God is for you. Knowing that, who is against you? Can death harm you now? Can disease rob your life? Can your purpose be taken or your value diminished? No. Though hell may set itself against you, no one can defeat you. You are protected. God is for you.”

“If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since he did not spare even his own Son,
but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else?” Romans 8:31b-32

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Be sure to open in your browser to hear the song “God is for Us” by CityAlight.

Jul 07

Some days you’re the pigeon, some days you’re the statue!

 

Image by Jon Hoefer from Pixabay

Perhaps you feel a little like a pigeon-covered statue these days or maybe you simply would like to experience a measure of calm in your harried life.  Either way, here are some words to the weary taken from “leftover” quotes (including the blog title), which I ended up not using  when writing my last book. I hope at least one  lifts your spirits, deepens your faith or somehow encourages you on life’s journey.

“Corrie ten Boom, ‘The Hiding Place'” by Corrie ten Boom Museum is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

“Don’t pursue trials, but don’t flee from them in a panic either.”—Chris Tiegreen, One Year Walk with God Devotional

“Thou hast made us for thyself, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.”—St. Augustine, Confessions

“Worry is a cycle of inefficient thoughts whirling around a center of fear.”—Corrie ten Boom, Dutch Christian Holocaust survivor

“We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.” Martin Luther King Jr. in his sermon “Antidotes to Fear”

“God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.”—C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

“Joe Castillo, C.S. Lewis 1” by timgrable is licensed under CC BY 2.0

“Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”—Corrie ten Boom

“Don’t waste your cancer.”—John Piper, pastor, written on the eve of his prostate cancer surgery

“If God be our God, He will give us peace in trouble. When there is a storm without, He will make peace within. The world can create trouble in peace, but God can create peace in trouble.”—Thomas Watson, Puritan noncomformist teacher and author

“If I could hear Christ praying for me in the next room, I would not fear a million enemies. Yet distance makes no difference. He is praying for me.”—Robert Murray McCheyne, pastor, Church of Scotland

“All their life in this world and all their adventures had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read, which goes on forever, in which every chapter is better than the one before.” ― C.S. Lewis, Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle

“The real problem is not why some pious, humble, believing people suffer, but why some do not.” C.S. Lewis

“(God) doesn’t say, ‘Into each life a little rain must fall,’ then aim a hose in earth’s general direction and see who gets the wettest. He doesn’t reach for a key, wind up nature with its sunny days and hurricanes, then sit back and watch the show. He doesn’t let Satan prowl about totally unrestricted. He doesn’t believe in a hands-off policy of governing. He’s not our planet’s absent landlord. Rather, He screens the trials that come to each of us—allowing only those that accomplish His good plan, because He takes no joy in human agony.”—Steve Estes, When God Weeps

And finally, this gem from missionary Jim Elliot prior to his martyrdom at age 28 by the Waodani tribe, whom he had befriended and attempted to share the gospel with: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”

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Be sure to open in your browser to hear the music video “Peace” by Bethel Music, featuring We the Kingdom

 

Mar 17

Heard any insensitive remarks lately?

 

“Oh, my grandmother had that kind of cancer—she didn’t last long.”

“My neighbor has what you have—he’s in so much pain.”

“I thought you’d be over this grieving by now.”

Heard any such insensitive (dare I say “stupid”) remarks?  I think I’ve heard them all and then some.

I remember bumping into a church friend at the grocery store shortly after I my cancer diagnosis in 1990. She apologized for not being in touch with me.

“I thought I heard you were going to die. I didn’t know if that was true, so I just didn’t know what to do,” she quickly spit out.

She kept babbling for a while, and I remember I ended up trying to comfort her in the fresh vegetable aisle.

Ken ready for the annual Ride For Roswell Cancer Center fundraiser.

I think relatives, friends, and acquaintances are usually at a loss for words when they hear about someone’s diagnosis or recurrence, so they say something to either a.) try to identify with the person or b.) try to lift their spirits. Often they succeed with neither, especially when they immediately begin spouting Bible verses.

Someone started quoting scripture to my western New York friend Ken just moments after he was given the devastating news of tongue cancer requiring life-altering surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy.

“I only heard the first few words and wanted to scream at my friend, ‘Stop! Just stop!’” Ken still recalls 19 cancer-free years later.

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt

I’m willing to bet you can remember some not-very-helpful comments made to you or your loved one. How do we handle such insensitivity?

I like the advice attributed to first lady Eleanor Roosevelt: “To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.”

Do you think my friend at the grocery store saw me standing by the romaine lettuce and thought, “I’ll walk over to Lynn and say something that will make her feel really bad?”

Of course not. I’m sure her heart was feeling love for me and concern over my well-being, however poorly she expressed it. And the same was surely true for Ken’s Bible-quoting friend.

Think about the last  life-struggle conversation you had with someone that left you feeling worse instead of better. Ask yourself whether you think that was the person’s intention. If yes, I recommend you speak with someone who can help you establish healthy boundaries with a spiteful person!

But if you answered no, then ignore that person’s words and just hear his or her heart for you.

Photo by Humphrey Muleba on Unsplash

We always want people to give us the benefit of the doubt or cut us some slack, but we have to admit, it’s not always easy to do the same for others—especially when our world has been rocked by a life-altering event. Our emotions are fragile, our bodies are hurting, and our spirits can be wounded easily. That makes it hard to be patient with well-meaning but insensitive folks.

So if you want to find peace in the face of life’s difficulties, use your head to handle yourself and your heart to handle others. And most of all, keep both your heart and mind open to receive the Lord’s perfect peace.

I am leaving you with a gift—peace of mind and heart.
 And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give.
So don’t be troubled or afraid. –Jesus speaking in John 14:27

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Be sure to open in your browser to hear the music video “Perfect Peace” by Laura Story

Oct 16

Navigating Life’s Storms

 

So how are you feeling today? Happy? Frustrated? Overwhelmed?

Popular psychology tells us that feelings are “neither right nor wrong.” But I want to tell you that feelings do not necessarily mirror the facts.

I witnessed this firsthand a few years ago when my husband and I headed out with my boss, Dr. Marc Hirsh, and his wife, Elizabeth for our annual Labor Day weekend cruise on their thirty-two-foot Bayliner. The weather looked rather foul, but Elizabeth had checked with her brother who lives right on the Gunpowder River leading into the Chesapeake Bay, and he assured us the weather reports didn’t look that bad despite a hurricane that was heading northward up the coast. (We later learned he had accidentally listened to the wrong forecast!)

So we took off anyway, knowing that Marc and Elizabeth were seasoned boaters—although the whitecaps on the usually calm river should have been our first clue it wasn’t a good idea.

We had a short two-hour cruise ahead of us, but it wasn’t long before the white caps turned into three-foot waves. The wind whipped up, and then the thunder, lightning, and rain came. At first we all laughed and enjoyed the warm rain soaking us as the boat pounded through the waves. But then I stopped laughing and my stomach started rebelling. Elizabeth handed me a supply of Ziploc bags, which I started filling.

The waves were now five feet high and crashing clear over the top of the boat’s windshield, drenching us. It was nearly impossible for Marc to see out the rain-splattered windshield, and my husband and Elizabeth were trying to read the navigational charts and look for the numbered buoys, which would keep us in the correct channel away from large shipping vessels, shallow water, and crab pots. We were too far out to turn back toward home, yet not sure we could make it to our planned destination.

And then it got really bad.

Marc announced that according to the boat’s compass we were headed in exactly the wrong direction: south when we should have been heading north.

We all were sure we hadn’t turned around—Elizabeth was especially positive we still were pointing in the right direction. She was convinced she would have noticed if the boat had made an about-face. From past experience I knew she usually was right whenever the two of them had a boating disagreement.

The three of us looked at Marc, waiting to see what he would do. (Well, I didn’t look long because I was busy praying there were enough Ziploc bags.)

After a long pause, Marc posed his now-famous question: “Should I trust my wife . . . or the magnetic poles of the earth?”

It wouldn’t have surprised me if he’d gone with Elizabeth’s feelings because she was so adamant about them, but his scientific brain won out and Marc turned the boat 180 degrees.

Within a few moments, we sighted buoys, which confirmed that we, indeed, had been going in the wrong direction despite all of us “feeling” otherwise.

The storm raging around us had distorted reality and our feelings had fallen fickle.

The same thing can happen in the storms of life. We can feel as if we’re unable to cope or that we have no hope. These are the times we need a compass—something that always will steer us in the right direction. A magnetic compass always will point you to the North Pole, and God’s Word always will point you to His unchanging truths and promises.

Isaiah 40:8 “The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of our God stands forever.”

Like Marc as he captained our boat that stormy trip, it’s your choice whether or not to trust the magnetic poles of the earth.

The grass does wither. Flowers do fade.  Troubles will disrupt lives. But God’s Word stands forever. Open up a Bible and let God speak the truth your anxious heart needs to hear.

Jun 19

Are You Slamming the Door in God’s Face?

Over the years this quote from author Norman Cousins became a sort of rallying cry for my cancer support group members who were facing especially difficult circumstances. These are the kind of folks who realize shock and disbelief—although understandable reactions to a diagnosis—can’t really do anything to change the situation. So they decide to take the bull by the horns and refuse to give in to any statistics on a piece of paper or doomsday predictions from a doctor’s lips.

So just in case you or your loved one has been given some not-so-great cure odds or perhaps even no odds for a cure, I encourage you to quit fighting against the diagnosis and instead try and fight the verdict. Even if you or your loved one has great survival odds or your trial is something other than cancer, I think you’ll be blessed by today’s story of a patient defying the odds.

My German-born friend Jutta (pronounced YOU-tuh) was diagnosed with Stage 3 pancreatic cancer at the age of 38. It’s an understatement to say that cancer of the pancreas is not a “good” kind of cancer and it’s especially scary when your children are only 6 and 10. But that was the situation in which Jutta found herself in July 2003.

She felt fine and hadn’t even considered that the jaundice she was experiencing might mean she was seriously ill. The day after exploratory surgery discovered a malignant pancreatic tumor already spread to the lymph nodes, Jutta’s surgeon came into her hospital room and told her: “You better get your act together. You have cancer and you’ve only got two years.”

Jutta was shocked not only at the diagnosis, but at the less-than-compassionate way the news was delivered.

“It took me at least a month to get over that,” she says. Eventually she decided the doctor’s prediction was only that—a prediction—and she would not live believing it had to come true. Good thing—it is almost 16 years later and Jutta (far right in the photo) has never had a recurrence and remains cancer-free. 

As she reflects on her cancer journey, she says, “You don’t stop living just because you hear the word cancer. That’s the worst thing you can do. Even if my cancer had been stage 4, I would have still set goals and gone for them. I believe that somebody who sets goals lives longer.”

Jutta says she still has a goal of being “an encouragement to other people.” (You can bet I tell every new pancreatic patient I know about her!)

You need to know and believe that cancer–or any illness–is not an automatic death sentence. Doctors do their best at predicting cure rates and odds of survival, but these predictions are just educated guesses. I’m very glad that my oncologist does not regularly dole out predictions about how long patients have to live. He feels those predictions become self-fulfilling prophecies in many patients’ minds. I know zillions of people who have lived longer—some many times longer—than doctors or medical science predicted.

Predictions are just that. They do not have the last word. Please remember today that your and your loved one’s times are in God’s hands and He ­doesn’t need “good odds” to heal.

In the words of the late pastor/author Charles L. Allen:

 “When you say a situation or person is hopeless, you are slamming the door in the face of God.”[1]

Lord, Please help us all from slamming the door in Your face; from refusing to believe that you are the God of the unexpected, the improbable and even the impossible. Thank You that You don’t need good odds to do mighty works and that no statistic or white coat has the final word over our lives. Thank you that You have power over everything—over every errant cell in our bodies, over every discouraging word on our lips and over every hopeless thought in our minds. We open the door to You and the healing touch You want to bring to our lives. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

[1] All Things are Possible through Prayer, pg. 51, Charles L. Allen, Revell, 2003.

Be sure to view this in your browser to hear the music video below “All Things Possible” by Mark Schultz