Cancer Saved My Life

With a sense of wonder and awe, our son said, “I just realized that cancer saved my life.”

“That’s a strange statement, “I thought, but upon reflection, I had to admit it was true. We had been reminiscing during the Thanksgiving season about the major physical challenges Dane has endured.

It all began when he was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. As you can imagine, our family immediately experienced the fear, doubt and questions about why God let this happen. Why did this healthy young man who had served God all his life be struck with cancer? In spite of our prayers, the cancer didn’t miraculously disappear. Unable, of course, to answer those unanswerable questions, Dane followed the doctor’s recommendation to have immediate surgery to remove the malignant organ.

Then, as if that bombshell wasn’t enough to deal with, the anesthesiologist found a problem with his heart. And that problem required open-heart surgery.

Open heart surgery? Really, God? What’s up with this? Hasn’t he gone through enough?

Probably others facing such life-threatening news or continuing problems can fully understand the wide range of emotions we all rode like a wild carnival ride roller coaster.

Once again, we prayed for a miracle. We hoped for a miracle. We believed for a miracle. But nothing seemed to change.

Dane still had to undergo two major surgeries and all the rehabilitation required afterward.

We didn’t fully realize that a miracle had happened until years later.

I believe that can happen to anyone. When you are going through struggles, especially ones that stick around, it’s hard to see that anything good is happening. How many people despair after years of seemingly unanswered prayers?

Are you still struggling with a health issue?
Do you have a dream that God has not yet granted?
Do you have other prayers that have not been answered?

You, like Dane, may not realize that God is working a miracle on your behalf. And this Thanksgiving that’s what Dane realized. First, it was a miracle his thyroid cancer was even discovered. The doctor said usually this condition is not discovered until it’s too late. Secondly, because he had to have surgery, the problem with his heart valve was discovered. Either one of those conditions was a silent killer, waiting to pounce suddenly, without warning.

But a miracle did happen and, as Dane declared, “ cancer saved my life.”

Don’t get discouraged when you think God has forgotten you; it may be years later that you look back and realize a miracle happened. It might even show up as cancer.

Barbra Russell, MA, LPC

Want to live to be 100? Live in a house with stairs!

As you can see, I’m standing on the stairs of our house. Well, I love our home and I’ve come to love our stairs. But it wasn’t always that way. When we were looking for a house, we weren’t looking for a house with stairs. We were looking for a rancher! We were thinking, “Oh, as we get older, we want things to be flat, on one level. We don’t want any problems, and we certainly don’t want stairs!”

But before we came to look at this house, our realtor said, “Do you know what people who live to be 100 have in common? They all live in houses with stairs!” Hah! Smart realtor, huh?

But that made me stop and think about it. I said to myself: “Hey! Let me look at this a little differently! You know, I could maybe run up and down these stairs, or at least walk up them! And if that keeps me in shape, I could go for living to be 100!”

And that’s when it hit me—that’s how we are in life. We want no obstacles, no problems. We want smooth sailing, we want ranchers! But that’s not the way God made us to live, as evidenced by the fact that I bet not one of you has escaped having problems in your life!

Rather, when He made us, he designed us to grow, to become better today than we were yesterday. The bad news, if you want to look at it that way, is this simple fact: we need difficulties to overcome, we need fears to face and we need to figure out obstacles. Because, as Romans 5:3-4 says: “…..tribulation produces perseverance, and perseverance, character, and character, hope.”

I think the writer was basically saying, “yes, you’ll have problems, but it’s going to create some good things in you!” So, from that point of view, it’s really good news, even though most of us don’t “consider it all joy when we face trials,” as James wrote.

However, as we tackle those difficulties, and we don’t give up in spite of being afraid or discouraged, little by little, we learn and we grow. As a result, our faith and confidence grows.

Every time we learn something, every time we’ve grown a bit, we become more of who God has designed us to be. And remember, we’re the ones who win when we become the person we’re designed to be!

So I encourage you today—don’t be afraid to take that opportunity just because it has challenges. Don’t be afraid of the obstacles in your life; just look at them in a different way. Say to yourself, “these are the stairs that are going to keep me going, that are going to help me in many ways.”

And hey! Let’s live to be 100--We just have to look at stairs a different way!