Death Sentence!

  July 29th has been marked on my calendar for several months as today was the last of my wife’s chemo treatments. “One down and five to go” was the cheer at the first treatment 15 weeks ago. At that time she could still believe because of her lack of experience that it wouldn’t be as difficult as everyone expected. The first week would assure us however that this storm would only be weathered through prayer. “Week three is coming”, then became our cheer as in week three of each cycle she would taste food again, and enjoy the few days before the next cycle. With each cycle the effects were steadily taking their toll on her both physically and emotionally though she strived to hide that truth from all who encouraged her.
  I have stood watching, unable to really do anything against the cancer that has brought us to this day . Perhaps that was my lesson to learn through it all. I don’t have to always fix everything. There are some things God wants me to leave up to Him, and find peace in the reality that He is truly able to care for everything I entrust to His care. I would love to say the journey has been easy for me, but that would not be true. I am familiar with, and accustomed to fixing things. It is who I am as a pastor, and it is my natural way of dealing with every kind of struggle. You see I like fixing things, solving problems and feeling like I have some kind of opportunity to make the world a better place to be.
  As I have sat with my wife during her treatments I have been stunned by the numbers who are traveling this journey with us. Today the man next to us was Jack from Buffalo, New York. As Katie shared with him that she was taking here 6th and final treatment, his eyes twinkled as he smiled with a joy that came from the inside. He would have jumped up and down if he could have I am sure. Then he shared his hope that this would be her last. He knew the reasons she could never sleep the night before a treatment. He knew the dread of facing a journey on a path you can’t imagine until you have walked it yourself. He knew it better than anyone in the world perhaps , as he had not been on chemo for 15 weeks like Katie. No, he had been undergoing the same treatments now for 3 years.
  Before we left Jack said something I believe I will never forget. He said “you know when I found out I had cancer, I thought it was a death sentence. But the truth is that it was a life sentence, because now I know the truth of what in this world is really important. I now know what in this world is worth fighting for. I now know a whole new set of priorities. I now know where I am going, I just don’t know when I am going to get there.”
  It seems at times it takes a road filled with suffering to teach us the truth of what really is important. People! We attack, accuse and abuse people to get the things in this world that in the end come to nothing. We trade the eternal things of this world for temporal, in hopes of somehow getting ahead in a race we are running in the wrong direction. Recently I was encouraged by a member who feared that the Family Life Center project might discourage me. In the past it might have, but this is a new day, and the road I have traveled has shown me a better way. That building if it is built or not doesn’t really matter. The people matter! I am not concerned with protecting the building project, but the people as we walk through the process together. Building projects are difficult only because we forget that it is all about the people. The people who believe without a doubt that God is for it and have no fear. And those who are not yet convinced and are more than a little uncomfortable. The building project can fail miserably and be of little real world concern. It can also get done in record time, and under budget and be an abstract failure because it negatively effected the people.
  The true test of the process is to show the world that we as Christians understand the
importance of people over earthly things. To show the world that reality by our actions. To show the world that we will not be the one to attack, accuse or abuse anyone over something as
meaningless as a building project. Now maybe, just maybe, Katie’s cancer was a death sentence. I hope it put to death the idea that things could ever be more important than people.