Category: peace

Feb 08

Wanna see my first selfie?

 

 

 

 

True confession: I am 63 years old and this is my FIRST SELFIE. When I took it two nights ago and sent it to my three daughters, one responded that she wished more people my age had never taken a selfie. Hmmmmm……..not sure exactly how to take that.first copy

Nevertheless, here it is–didn’t comb my hair first, freshen my makeup, put on an lipstick or change my sweatshirt . Obviously didn’t know how to make sure there wasn’t a reflection on the cover. Nope, no preparation whatsoever. I just held it up, grinned and took the photo because I was SO excited to show the FIRST copy of my new book to my girls. (I am pretty proud that I actually knew how to turn the camera around to take the picture!)

However, the more I looked at the photo yesterday, the more I wanted to retake it, because it’s obviously blurry, my eyes look a little crossed and I really want some lipstick. It’s definitely not perfect, and I am a perfectionist. But if I retook it, then it wouldn’t be my FIRST selfie, would it? So I left it alone and I’m sharing it with you because you probably needed something to give you a little smile today.

 

I’ve noticed that the more books I write, the more I relax and the more of my personal–not just professional–self shows through. This is book number five, (not counting the inspirational commentary for the He Cares New Testament), so I’ve really chilled on this one.

I’ve gone ahead and let my quirky sense of humor show. For ages I’ve used it with cancer patients and their caregivers as a way to lift spirits during difficult times (#yesimayhavetakenafartmachinetothechemoroom), but that’s easier done in person than in a book. So I hope when you read this book, those meant-to-be-humorous  comments make you smile and not just wonder about my sanity.

I  also wanted the format of this book to be different from my other books, so I began each chapter with a quote from a famous person or character. You’ll hear encouragement  from Snoopy, Anakin Skywalker, Bob Dylan and Steve Martin to name a few. Don’t worry, I’ve also included some more traditional founts of wisdom like Mother Theresa, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Corrie Ten Boom. Of course, as always, the main source of inspiration will be the very Word of God.

 

Because I’m a newspaper reporter turned author, when I write I like to start with facts and let them create feelings. I am not good at making things up. (How people write fiction is beyond me!) In my books I tell true cancer survivor stories and share true biblical hope. I like to think of myself as a passionate encourager who always is a truth-teller.

At the end of this book, I’ve added three bonus chapters for those facing cancer that is not considered medically curable. I know so many people in this situation of “chronic” cancer/cancer-for-the-long haul that I wanted to address some of their particular needs.

Each chapter in the book also ends with what I call a “Path to Peace”–a few words intended to pour truth into your mind and peace into your heart. My prayer for all who will read this book is that you’ll discover how to foster peace in your own home and life, as well as how to find God’s supernatural peace in your heart and mind–regardless of your or your loved one’s medical prognosis.

 

Peace in the Face of Cancer will be released next month and available in bookstores and online. I’ll be posting excerpts in the coming weeks and asking some of you to hep me launch its release.  Thanks for reading today and I hope you join me in thanking God for what He has amazingly done with a four-finger typist who never really wanted to write any books.

 

Because of God’s tender mercy, the morning light from Heaven is about to break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to guide us to the path of peace. Luke 1:78-79 NLT

Shalom.

 

If the video below doesn’t automatically load, please copy and paste this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbrNFxiHuYg

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

 

 

Dec 07

Missing Someone at Christmas

 

 

 

 

 

I thought it wouldn’t.

But it did.

It happened again this year.

Kenny G was belting out jazzy, holiday cheer. A burning candle wafted a delicious candy cane scent. I was home by myself happily decorating our house for Christmas. I  pulled a yellowed and torn rectangular box out of the large Rubbermaid storage bin and chuckled to myself. This box has to be nearly 60 years old.

Carefully wrapped inside was a slender, shiny tree topper that graced my parents’ Christmas trees for decades. It wasn’t the original which came in the now-yellowed box, but a replacement topper that my folks must have decided to store in there after the original one broke. ( I can just hear my Mom saying: Why throw away a perfectly good box?)

My Dad passed away in 2010 and my Mom in  2013, so afterward my only brother, my three girls and I divvied up their ornaments. I gave my brother the raggedy little cloth Santa figurine we both used to fight about hanging on the tree every year.  My poor Mother used to keep track of whose turn it was. I have no idea why we thought that was the best decoration–I stopped believing in Santa as a 2-year-old when I easily recognized one of my Mom’s brothers dressed up in the red and white suit handing me my gifts. After that my parents apparently didn’t even bother trying to fool my little brother.photo

But he and I  both remembered the tree topper–Dad always put it on because he was the only one who could reach the top of our freshly cut tree. My brother said I could have it–after all, I’d sacrificed the Santa.

So this year, for the second time since my last parent has been gone, I pulled out that shiny green ornament. I  didn’t put it on our tree, but instead lovingly placed it in an antique glass pitcher filled with a bunch of my parents’ old, brightly colored ornaments. I added a strand of beads which used to encircle their tree, stepped back and surveyed my decorating work.

Perfect. Classy. Very antique-looking and out of the reach of our six grandchildren under age six. And then it started. A lump in my throat. I swallowed hard, but it grew. I felt my eyes misting and then quickly hot, tears began to sting as I tried to hold them back. Within seconds I went from happily satisfied to sadly sobbing.

I miss my Mom and my Dad. I don’t want their ornaments…I want them! 

I sat down on the couch and wept. Big tears and loud sobs followed by necessary nose-blowing.

And that’s what grief does to us. It sneaks up on us when we’re not expecting it and it won’t let go until we’ve allowed it to have its say.

**********************************

Have you experienced grief sneaking up on you this season? A sound, a smell, a word, a photo–something– triggers a memory and you come undone.

There’s someone special you are missing this Christmas. 

Maybe it’s the first Dec. 25 that a certain smiling face won’t be in your home or maybe it’s the second or third year you can’t buy them a special gift. Or maybe it’s been 20  or 30 years, but you still yearn for just one more holiday with that loved one around your table.

I get it. I had my parents until they were in the 80s and I was in my  late 50s and somehow I thought it would be less painful to say good-bye. But my love for them wasn’t lessened because of their ages–it just kept growing. And actually now that they’re gone, it keeps growing even more as I realize anew all the things they did for me and I come to truly appreciate the gift of their love. I expect to keep grieving them for the rest of my life.

And if I am feeling such intense grief over my parents, I can only imagine the sorrow some of you face while missing a spouse this Christmas or the deepest, most unnatural pain of all experienced by those of you who have buried a son or daughter.

Or maybe the person or persons you’re missing haven’t passed away, but miles or circumstances are separating you this year. As hard as you try,  it just doesn’t seem right with them not here for the holidays. That’s grief you are feeling, too.

Maybe you can’t even get out the Christmas decorations this year. It’s just too painful. That’s OK.  My friend Connie whose husband Brad literally dropped dead of a heart attack at age 47 recalls that she didn’t feel like celebrating Christmas just three months after his passing.

“I felt horrible because I did not want to celebrate Jesus’ birth because of Brad’s death,” admitted Connie.

But a good friend gave her some insight which really helped her ease that holiday pain.

“Do you know what Jesus is doing this Christmas season?” the friend asked Connie.

Connie shook her head “no.”

“He’s weeping. He’s weeping with you.”

Connie said that mental image of Jesus shedding tears with her helped her to stop worrying about all the holiday celebrations. Instead, she prayed: “Just for today, I need to see Jesus. Just for today, I need to seek Jesus. Just for today, I need to serve Jesus.”

Are you missing someone this Christmas? Jesus–yes, the whole Reason for the season–is weeping with you. Go ahead: acknowledge and feel your grief. Remember that Jesus understands your sorrow (Isaiah 53:3) even if no one else on earth really does. And then join Connie in her prayer that today you will see Jesus, that today you will seek Jesus, and that today you will serve Jesus. It’s a prayer He longs to answer for you.

“The LORD is close to the brokenhearted; he rescues those whose spirits are crushed.” Psalm 34:18

I’ve included two music videos of the same song below because I really loved both very different renditions. The first is a beautiful harmony by Vocal Point, an all-male a capella ensemble and the second is an angelic sounding a capella boys’ choir called Libera.

(If the music videos don’t show below, please  copy and paste to listen at:

 

Sep 14

Hope is the Thing with Feathers

 

 

If you had asked my friend Carollynn what gave her hope throughout her cancer journey, she would have smiled and quickly answered: feathers.

She loved Emily Dickinson’s poem “The Thing with Feathers” which begins:

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all

And when she was first diagnosed with a brain tumor in 1995 at the age of forty-six, Carollynn stumbled upon a verse in the Bible that became her favorite:

He will cover you with his feathers.
He will shelter you with his wings.
His faithful promises are your armor and protection. Psalm 91:4 NLT

Even though medical doctors and treatments at that time gave her no hope of surviving more than a few months, this verse gave Carollynn incredible hope. It also started a real fascination with “feathers” and the number 914.

“Whenever I see a feather it reminds me of God’s protection for me,” she told me shortly after moving to the area and joining my support group. “And I like to look for the number 914 on signs to remind me of God’s constant care for me.”

I had to chuckle when eight years after her initial diagnosis Carollynn’s first grandchild was born on her birthday weighing 9 pounds, 14 ounces! When Carollynn passed away just a few months later at 4:19 p.m., her husband, Ed, said he had to smile at what he felt was a last gift from Carollynn to remind him of her special verse.

“One final example of her fabulous humor,” he wrote in an email to friends and family. 

Some of Carollynn’s amazing life under God’s wings was told in a children’s book called Sea Feather, named after the first of many wild ponies she purchased on Chincoteague Island and donated to deserving children. More of her “feather-filled” life was shared in a video that aired on the television network Animal Planet in November 2003, just a month after her passing. (The nonprofit Feather Fund has been established to continue her work of donating wild ponies to children.)[i] When I see feathers today, they remind me of my beautiful friend Carollynn, but they also remind me of my God whose “wings” protect us even in the face of cancer.

Keep me as the apple of your eye;
hide me in the shadow of your wings. Psalm 17:8, NIV

Let me live forever in your sanctuary,
safe beneath the shelter of your wings! Psalm 61:4 NLT

Because you are my help,
I sing in the shadow of your wings.
My soul clings to you;
your right hand upholds me. Psalm 63:7-8, NIV

Of course God the Father, who is Spirit, doesn’t have real flesh and blood wings, but He is able to protect us by His awesome power.

Can you feel those “wings” over you—protecting you, shielding you, drawing you close? Have you trusted God enough to truly let Him cover you? He longs to do that for you.

How often I have wanted to gather your children together as a hen protects her chicks beneath her wings, but you wouldn’t let me. Jesus speaking in Matthew 23:37

Please let God love you today. Let him draw you close.

 My heart has heard you say, “Come and talk with me.”
And my heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.” Psalm 27:8

Heavenly Father, Thank You that You love us so much. Thank You that Your loving arms are far bigger than any diagnosis or prognosis. Wrap my friend in that love today. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

[i] Read more about why feathers and Psalm 91:4 meant so much to Carollynn at http://www.featherfund.org/the_story.htm.

Aug 17

How do you find peace in the face of cancer?

 

 

For years I’ve been wishing there was a book offering hope to those facing cancer which is not expected to be cured—not one on how to get ready to die, but one on how to keep living with cancer for the long haul. I wanted it to be a book for both patients and caregivers because when anyone in the family has cancer, it can feel like everyone does. And I really wanted it to encourage believers to trust in God despite life’s trials and to point seekers to a relationship with Jesus.  But I couldn’t find such a book.

So I wrote one.

Eib wrapPeace in the Face of Cancer is slated to be released by Tyndale House in March 2017 and I’m so excited for the lives it will touch. And I’m especially excited that my editors pushed me to write it not just for those with incurable cancer, but for anyone, anywhere on a cancer journey. That made my writing task more difficult, but because of this broader scope, it’s a far better book with a far bigger audience—an estimated 14.5 million of us living with a history of cancer in the U.S. alone!

I heard a speaker at a recent Christian writers’ conference advise authors not to share a book cover until a month before its release because people will forget. But I am so happy about the cover I just couldn’t wait! (Besides I’ll “remind” you later.)  The cover is soft imitation leather like 50 Days of Hope and is just a little bigger (5×7 instead of 4×6). I love the shiny, gold foil stars and believe that looking up through the trees at a starry nighttime sky is a very peaceful feeling.

I’ll be sharing excerpts as the release date draws closer and more about how this is going to be the first in a new series by Tyndale. The second “Peace in the Face of…” book already has been contracted to a famous NY Times bestselling author! Stay tuned for details.

Because of God’s tender mercy, the morning light from heaven is about to break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to guide us to the path of peace. –Luke 1:78-79 NLT