PERSONAL STORY

Faith, Feelings & Cancer

"PERSONAL STORY" pages are encouragement to help you realize you are not alone.  Others have traveled along the path; others have sought comfort from God Himself; others have found freedom.  So can you!  We invite you to let the experiences of others encourage you, and to begin to know, understand and feel Comfort directly from our Father in heaven.

This is a true, gut-wrenching real-life story.  The author had met Jesus as his own personal Good Shepherd, began to know more about Him each day, began to recognize His voice more and more, and was becoming more mindful of who Jesus is and what He is like.  Then one day everything became real!
 
It started as a routine physical on an April day, but my usual doctor wasn’t in town, so a substitute doctor was on duty.  In passing, he decided to do a certain blood test which I hadn’t had done in many years.  It was the very next day that the nurse called with the results, and told me to get to a specialist immediately, and I took the first available appointment.

During this waiting time, I started to experience some scary thoughts, as some of you can imagine.  But one day, as I was simply walking along, not in an especially deep prayerful state, I heard clearly these exact words: "You’re going to have some tests and some work done on your body, but you WILL BE fine. YOU ARE HEALTHY!!!"  Simple, short, loud, clear, easy to understand, reassuring.  Not specific on the "work done" part, but very specific on longer term hope and a strong belief in a basically healthy body.  These are the words I have remembered and repeated daily.  This was the first time I heard Him in such a way; other times would follow in which I “heard” Him but in different ways.  Each person is different.

A biopsy was done, and a few days later the dreaded call came, “You have cancer”.  Additional tests were set up, and after I hung up, my wife and I experienced every emotion we thought possible, as you might assume.  Somehow or another, we were able to remember the many Scripture verses that encourage us to give God thanks and even praise in every circumstance, regardless of the circumstance.  As improbable as it might imagine to give thanks from such a medical report, we did, and a peace came over us.

That very night at dinner I felt I sensed Jesus himself sitting there.  I blurted out in my mind, "What are you doing here?"  And what followed was seeing him through spiritual eyes as smiling and laughing, encouraging us that all would be fine, filling us with humor and reassurance.  What I remember especially is His vivacious, strong, full of life, vibrant face and voice.  See him as we did: strong, laughing, loving, encouraging, and right at our dining room table!

Did the peace persist 24/7?  NO!  We had to battle every minute to hold on to hope and faith, and we had to remember the encouragement about "… you will be fine.  You are healthy!".

During these various tests, I "saw" Jesus himself next to me, perhaps sitting on an extra stool in the hospital or wherever I was.  And at these times he wasn’t "God", but rather began to be my best friend who simply wanted to "hang out with me".  I remember blurting out many times words such as: "What are you doing here?  Don’t you have someplace more important to be?"  And the answer was invariably: "No, I just like being with you here."  Wow!  And the real point is that all these "sightings" were as normal and peaceful as you could imagine, nothing far out or weird. 

One of the decisions to be made was what course of medical action to take.  We decided strongly on surgery rather than radiation.  Little did we know then why we so definitely opted for surgery.

One aspect about the Lord that we never seem to emphasize is his humor.  Yes, I said humor.  You see, on the Saturday before the surgery, I was feeling apprehensive, and I was playing a certain song over and over on my I-Pod that basically said God is my "all in all".  A beautiful, uplifting and encouraging song indeed.  That night, we went to a local chain restaurant, and during dinner we saw a bus stop by the front door and a whole troupe of high school kids came into the restaurant.  Obviously, I thought, they were on their way somewhere and just came in for some dinner.

HOWEVER, they came into our section of the restaurant and promptly sang one song and only one song.  The same one I had been playing all day!!!   A coincidence?  Hardly, don’t you think?  Later after the song, I went up to the leader, and she said they were a youth group visiting Florida from South Carolina.  Wiping away tears, I told the leader that her group did NOT rehearse that particular song by accident, nor picked this particular evening by accident, nor this particular restaurant by accident, and told her my situation, and what song I had been playing all day.  There were tears of happiness and thanksgiving to such a kind Father, in sending this kind of encouragement for my wife and me, and as a witness to a busload of teens!  And here is what I did not expect … when I got back to our table, I saw Jesus himself across the room, laughing almost out of control, telling us "He really got us!"  He was actually slapping his knee with excitement at the "unbelievable" event he just pulled off.  Jesus the excited, full of laughter and humor, totally involved brother.

One "vision" we had then was Jesus placing his hand in my upper chest, and slowly lowering it to my abdomen, as if cleansing and healing.  At that point in time, I (as usual) didn’t understand the meaning of this.

Scripture was a constant encourager for us.  Isaiah talks about our adversaries (meaning cancer in this case) being "thrown out into the cold".  For the surgery, I experienced an operating room which was quite cold, and I remembered these words as I was about to go under. 

Sure enough, the surgery went fine and the doctor reported that he felt he got all of it out (later confirmed by the "path" report).  Healing was slow but sure, with strength coming back as the days progressed.  And then we found out just exactly why the good Lord wanted me to have a more aggressive option (surgery), and why we felt so strongly about this.

I had been noticing a hard lump in my left breast, and the nipple turned inside out.  No other symptoms.  I had taken no action yet.  I read that this condition could be due to heavy exercise; male breast cancer was not even on the radar.  Just three weeks after the prostate surgery, I was unsuccessfully trying to nap because I was beginning to think about my breast.   All of a sudden I decided to get up and go to a walk-in clinic that very afternoon.  I did not realize it, but my wife had been in earnest prayer while I was trying to nap, specifically asking God for wisdom as to what to do next.  The doctor there told me to get a mammogram immediately, and he also made an appointment with a local chest surgeon.  Tests were ordered, including a biopsy. 

I came out of there in a daze, still exhausted from the earlier cancer surgery and its aftermath, thinking, "Lord, I just can’t face a second round of whatever this is."  Then I sensed the Lord saying to me: "I’m all over this.  Don’t worry, don’t worry, don’t worry!" (repeated over and over again).  And then, “let me heal you just because I want to and because you are so loved and valuable to me."  No ands, ifs or buts.  No string attached.  No "have to’s" on my part.

A week or so later I had the second "very special" call in less than two months, this time telling me I had male breast cancer.  At that minute, I was just getting off the floor from the prostate experience, and I can remember telling God I just could NOT go through with this new challenge.  But the bottom line, exactly six weeks after the prostate surgery, I was back in the hospital for a mastectomy for male breast cancer!  I thought perhaps it was some kind of "two for one" summer.  Here again, little did I know what was to come later.

At this point in time, I was grappling with faith and healing, faith and trust, how does God heal, and so on.  I studied how Jesus himself healed, and I realized that he healed instantly, over time, in person, at a distance, directly, indirectly, using words, using mud, through the requests of others; in general, there really was no one way he offered healings.  I surely would have opted for a miraculous, quick cure, but I received something even better during this time: personal, one on one attention and care! 

The surgery itself went smooth, but they found cancer in a lymph mode, and this meant chemotherapy ASAP.  That hit me like a brick.  But along came Jesus again, telling me he was right next to me.  I experienced time after time of "seeing" Jesus, knowing his presence, hearing his encouragement, for our whole family.  These were experiences that I would not substitute if I could; they were priceless.

Chemotherapy began.  I was scheduled for 8 sessions, only two weeks apart, with shots and tests in the interim of the two week cycles.  The nurses usually had a hard time finding a vein, and they were wishing I had a "port" surgically inserted so that  they could inject the chemicals more easily.  I dreaded each chemo especially because of the difficulty in finding a vein.  And unfortunately, we could only use my right arm for chemo, the "non-mastectomy" arm.

Let me share just one vivid experience with you for your encouragement.  On one of the chemo visits, the head nurse simply could not find a vein after four tries.  She said she would ask another nurse to try.  When she left, I was in a panic with my "what if" panicky thoughts.  All of a sudden, after I decided to substitute a spirit of praising God instead of panic, for what He WAS GOING TO DO, I saw Jesus on the footstool only a few feet from me.  He grabbed my hand (by now bloody and sporting several bandages) to give me a handshake.  Weird, huh?  But then he wouldn’t let go, and he massaged my hand with his thumb while still shaking my hand.  Try to picture yourself giving a handshake, massaging the other person with your thumb as you shook their hand.  This lasted for only 10 seconds then he was gone.  Immediately the second nurse came, saw my hand, and could hardly believe the throbbing vein now in plain sight.  Within seconds she was "in" and the chemo began.  And the location of the throbbing bulging vein?  Right where the massaging took place!  What a gift to experience that!  Talk about tears of joy and thankfulness!

But there was still more to come…

I had a skin doctor’s appointment during chemo.  During my exam, the doctor noticed a suspicious looking mark on my right arm and she took a biopsy.  When the phone call came in a week later, since I was in the middle of chemo and was exhausted on even a good day, I was pretty much slammed when she said I had a melanoma, the most serious and nasty skin cancer, and that we had to do surgery ASAP.  So it wasn’t to be a "two for one!" summer after all; it was going to be a "three for one!" summer. 

Here again, my wife and I had to decide whether to just give up, or doing what seemed illogical: praising the Lord in all things.  We gritted our teeth and did the latter.  Did I FEEL like thanking God for this?  Are you nuts or what!  But we did, and it opened a door to get to know Jesus better.

Chemo rips up your immune system, so we had to carefully schedule the arm melanoma surgery around chemo, and we did.  However, a week after the surgery to remove the melanoma, immediately after I returned from chemo treatment, the phone rang and the skin doctor told me that for the very first time in her career, she did NOT get all the melanoma out.  It was deeper and wider than she thought.  It was kind of a stealth situation in that most of it was under the skin, rather than showing on top of the skin. We scheduled round two surgery with a surgeon a week later, again working around chemo and all its complications.  And by the way, the breast cancer chemo I was taking at the time was (by accident?) the very same chemo I would have to take for serious skin cancer! 

Pretty good timing, yes?  Perhaps a well thought out plan?  A plan we could only see a little at a time usually when some phase of it ended, yet a plan that in its entirety we now see was so well thought out and logical every step of the way, all intermingled and intertwined perfectly.  Now I can see the reasons to praise God at the beginning of these times in our lives; just because we can’t see more than a few days in advance does not mean there is no plan firmly and lovingly in place.

Despite all the encouragement from Jesus, by the time of the second arm surgery for melanoma came, I was struggling to continue.  But just when we needed another shot of strength, he gave it to us.  During round two of the right arm melanoma surgery, I was scared.  Then I “saw” Jesus himself sitting in the surgery room just hanging out, as was so often the case.  Finally I simply said: "Jesus, I’m scared.  Tell me something funny"!  Have you ever prayed a prayer like that?  I hadn’t.  I hadn’t made a habit of asking Jesus to do a comedy show!!!

So what did I hear?  Jesus himself began to tell me about his best friend Peter, and what a character Peter was, and how Jesus delighted in being with the simple, outspoken, blunt, foot-in-his-mouth, person.  While I don’t remember all the actual details of the words that Jesus used, I was amazed at the deep and obvious love for Peter.  I just couldn’t understand how God would be so delighted with, and so able to love, a simple fisherman!  What a lesson about God’s very personal care and love for all of us.  BUT MORE, not only are we loved, but more importantly, WE ARE LIKED!  It was obvious Jesus LIKED to be with Peter (and with you and me as well!).

Jesus sat on a corner stool for the length of the surgery until the end when he got up and looked at my arm.  At that exact point in time, the doctor showed me a piece of skin just removed that was the size of a man’s finger.  I would have passed out for sure, but I was watching Jesus staring so intently at the same piece of skin.  Then I realized that he was just making sure the doctor got it all, and I could see that it passed His inspection.  A week later the call came in that the doctor indeed got it all and the margins were healthy.  But I didn’t have to fret for that "waiting" week (until the lab results came in) but rather stood on faith because of that very vision in the surgery room.

As I write this, the chemo is done; doctor visits are becoming fewer and farther in between.  All tests indicate there is no sign of cancer anywhere.  Yet every day I have to remember the words: "I am healthy".  The battle is still in progress; the battle is what I will believe in my mind and heart!

UPDATE: THIS STORY HAPPENED IN 2006!!!

Be sure, however, that you understand you are not alone in whatever your particular battle is.  He is literally right next to you wanting to give you personal care and healing!


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PROMISES ..... short Scriptures to build you up and give you hope!

Even to your old age and gray hairs I am He, I am He who will sustain you.  I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.   (Isaiah 46, NIV)

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