My Post from the Year I Survived Cancer…

Four days before Christmas, 2001. I should be talking with my son and his wife about their life, their dreams, and the joy of the holidays. That’s what we usually do when they fly home from their military duty station from somewhere in the world. Any other year our conversation this morning would revolve around the soon arrival of his sister’s family from Oregon and how great it’s going to be to spend Christmas just being together with the extended family

But not this year.

This Christmas, all we’re talking about is my deadly disease–my rash, the test results, the next specialist, what we’re discovering on the Web about chronic lymphoma, and the gloomy prognosis. I’m sick of talking about me and this disease. And it feels like Christmas will never be the same.

Has God Broken Your Heart, or the Heart of Someone You Love?

I titled my first book “When God Breaks Your Heart” because God broke my heart. I live with a chronic leukemia that almost took my life in 200o. I wish someone else could have written this book, but God chose me to suffer deeply so that I could help you trust Him, even when you feel He has broken your heart.

This is a book to help you or someone you love through the darkest days and nights.

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A friend asked me recently if I still wanted him to ask God to “Please let Ed live and serve.”

My response? “Absolutely! Why wouldn’t I want you to continue praying for me?”

He seemed surprised. “But we’ve been praying this for eleven years! Isn’t it time to stop asking or at least time to change the prayer a little? Don’t you think,” he wondered, “that God’s tired of hearing the same thing over and over again?”

His comment unmasks a common misconception about prayer: That we should communicate with God in adult ways—trying to figure out what He wants to hear and then making sure that we get it right and don’t bore Him.

When the Lord Jesus taught on prayer, He encouraged His disciples to relate to the Heavenly Father with childlike faith, words, and behavior. His central teaching on prayer, Luke 11:1-13, reads like a kindergarten lesson plan rather than a seminary course.

Model Prayer

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Yearly Physical

Yesterday I traveled to USC’s University Hospital for my yearly physical with the doctor who saved my life 10 years ago. He’s become a good friend and never fails to remind me how close I came to death. “You know, Ed, in all the years I’ve been here, no one as critical as you were that Friday night has made it.”

Dog trainers use a short leash when they want to make sure the dog knows who their master is. The short leash rules out a lot of options for the dog; it’s a constant reminder that it’s the master’s will, not their own that matters most.

Everyday Reminder

God has me on a short leash. I live with a deadly disease that rules out the option of thinking about next week, month, or year in ways I did before the diagnosis. Because of my chronic disease, I am keenly aware that all of my tomorrows depend on His willingness to let me live.

At first I resisted the short leash. Like some canine rebel at obedience school, I pulled at the end of the leash and whined every time my Master jerked at the collar. I hated the idea that I couldn’t plan my life like others could. “If it’s God’s will” became so much more than impress-others-with-my-spirituality-evango-talk. For the first time in my life I realized that if God didn’t keep me alive, if it wasn’t His will, my plans were futile and foolish.

Now, ten years later, the short leash doesn’t bother me nearly as much. Don’t get me wrong; I’d love to be healed and to be living without the threat of hearing my doctor say, “Sorry, Ed, the disease has escaped to a vital organ.” And yet, if He does heal me, I hope I wouldn’t go back to life as usual. I would truly miss the exciting “faith-edge” of a short-leashed life: the abandoned trust, the deep dependence, the desperate prayers, and the constant personal dialogue with God.

I don’t want to go back to my “long-leash” life.

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After I finished my book, When God Breaks Your Heart, detailing my journey of faith living with a deadly disease, I thought I had said it all.

I’m discovering that there are days I just have to tell you one more thing. Today is one of those days.

It was April in 2000 when I wrote this desperate prayer and accompanying plea from Scripture in my journal:

Father, please give me ministry in my grandchildren’s lives. “Let Your work appear to Your servants, and Your glory to their children” (Psalm 90:16).

If you knew me back then or you’ve read the book, you know how bold that request was. I had nearly died in March and had not improved much since. The doctors were suspecting lymphoma, and following test after test, what they called my “numbers” refused to turn around.

I remember the day I wrote those sentences in my blood-stained journal vividly. Tears flowed as I begged God to let me have some influence in my grandchildren’s lives. Back then I was only thinking of two–Jackson and Megan.

I’m writing these words from my son’s home in Atlanta, where we just greeted Amelia Joy,who joins Jackson, Megan, Camryn, Mary, and Wyatt. Grandchild number 7–Zachary James–is now 10 months old.

I’m thinking of Saturday, the 10th of January 2009, when I spent the day with Amelia’s older sister and brother, Mary and Wyatt. I watched Mary’s skating lessons and Wyatt’s hockey practice. I was vaguely aware of some other children on the ice, but my heart glued my attention to one little twirling princess and one little bruiser in pads.

On the way home, Wyatt put his little arms around my neck and shouted, “We’re best pals!”

The Spirit reminded me one more time of the power of prayer and the comfort of being loved by a God who is perfectly reliable and strong.

I don’t know what’s breaking your heart today, but I suspect something is.

God knows, and He loves it when you ask Him for big things. You never know, He might just say yes.

Just like He did for me.

Thank you, Father, for hearing my desperate prayer. And for that almost-nine-years-later reminder from a blue-eyed little hockey star that You, not my doctors, number my days.

Four days before Christmas, 2001. I should be talking with my son and his wife about their life, their dreams, and the joy of the holidays. That’s what we usually do when they fly home from their military duty station from somewhere in the world. Any other year our conversation this morning would revolve around the soon arrival of his sister’s family from Oregon and how great it’s going to be to spend Christmas just being together with the extended family

But not this year.

THE SHACK

The first review of my book is in, but it’s pretty humbling. It comes from two very special girls in my life–granddaughters Megan and Cam. Their mom,and my daughter, Aimee, writes:

Since this is my first book, first blog, and first time having a chronic disease, I want to make sure that no one navigating to this site would think I don’t care.