I might even take up golf again
...if I could play on a course like the one in Austin's huge and beautiful Butler Park. We drove past the Butler Park Pitch and Putt during a trip to Texas last week. It's a nine-hole, par three course, close to the city's downtown. The entire course is only 805 yards. It's ideal for families. It's real golf, literally a miniature golf course, with drives off the tees, short fairways, and no windmills.
Cancerous thoughts
According to recent research, the growth of some types of brain cancer are accelerated by thinking.
If you're relying on exercise to help you lose weight...
...maybe not. A report from a British medical team says that exercise is useful for fending off heart issues and dementia, but if you really want to lose weight, lay off the calories.
Showing posts with label cancer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cancer. Show all posts
Saturday, April 25, 2015
Sunday, October 26, 2014
Wednesday, January 02, 2013
3 Lessons My Health Issues Have Taught Me
[This was prepared to be shared with the people of the Logan Cancer Recovery Group this evening.]
Since my last visit with you several years ago, a few things have happened in my life.
In 2010, I suffered a heart attack that took out 40% of my heart. Since then, a stent was implanted in an artery that had been 100% blocked and in 2011, as a precautionary measure, I received a defibrillator/pacemaker.
Also in 2011, a small spot of melanoma was found on my left leg and I underwent an outpatient surgical procedure at the James Center at Ohio State. A biopsy showed that there was no cancer in the surrounding area.
In 2012, I developed a stubborn rash that ultimately proved to be a symptom of Celiac Disease, a genetic condition that may or may not show up in he course of a person’s life. The thinking is that all that whole wheat I was eating to keep my heart healthy triggered the activation of the Celiac Disease. Because I still had a rash and both my wife and I were getting acclimated to the new gluten-free, wheat-free diet that is the only treatment that exists for Celiac, we had to cancel a planned visit with friends who live in France.
Shortly after the Celiac diagnosis, I told an old high school classmate: “It’s no biggie. Heart, cancer, and Celiac were all on my bucket list.” We laughed and he said, “Man, you gotta get a different list.”
Now, I’m doing well. Most days I do several miles of brisk walking. My heart is steady at about 60 beats per minute. My blood pressure, which has never been an issue, is, my doctor says, “perfect.”
There’s been no hint of skin cancer on any other part of my body.
And I’m actually enjoying the gluten-free diet.
After my last physical, my doctor declared that I was in "great shape."
I can’t claim to have experienced anything like what many of you have gone through. But I have learned some things I either didn’t know or didn’t pay much attention to before my last visit with you. They’re probably things all of you know from your experiences. Nonetheless, they’re worth remembering.
So what are some of these lessons I’ve learned?
First: Any time we receive bad news about our health, we should remember that it isn’t always our faults. We know that smoking leaves us at heightened risk for heart attack and cancer. We know that not exercising and not getting immunized leaves us susceptible to all sorts of diseases. We know that it’s not wise to drive without securing our seat belts. There are common sense precautions we all can take to reduce our risk for diseases or accidents.
But sometimes bad things happen even to cautious people.
In Matthew 5:45, Jesus says that the Father “makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.”
In Romans, the apostle Paul says that the whole universe groans under the weight of the condition of sin, that condition of enmity between God and the creation that you and I have inherited from Adam and Eve.
For nearly two years after my heart attack, I beat myself up for it. Although I had been unaware of feeling stressed, I assumed since I had none of the other risk factors for a heart attack that I had stressed myself into it. I even said so publicly. And stress may have played some role in it.
But only recently, my doctor said that he didn’t think my heart attack was caused by stress. “What was it then?” I asked. He paused for a long time and then said, “Maybe just bad luck.”
Now, I don’t believe in luck. But I do believe that there are some things that happen to us over which we have no control. In fact, most of the things that happen to us are probably in that category.
My doctor told me, “Mark, you may have been born with a partially occluded artery that simply took fifty-seven years to become completely blocked.” He went on to say that given the numbers of collateral arteries that had developed near the blocked one, something that would have taken decades to develop, I probably was born with that blockage.
Again, common sense dictates that we control those negative behaviors or habits that may endanger our health and instead, engage in other habits, like exercise, that can help us. But not every illness we’re hit with has anything to do with our behaviors. Our genes, our environments, or just being at the wrong place at the wrong time can all work against us.
The last thing we need to do when we’re hit with a negative medical diagnosis is to send ourselves on a guilt trip. That will not help us feel better.
A second lesson is really one I have re-learned. It’s summarized in the words of Pastor Chuck Swindoll. “I am convinced,” Swindoll has said, “that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it.” Viktor Frankl, the psychotherapist who survived time in a Nazi concentration camp said much the same thing when he wrote that, “Everything can be taken from a [person] but one thing; the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances...”
Every one of you here this evening knows well that while we may not control what happens to us, we can control how we react to it.
I have known people who suffered minor health setbacks and allowed them to become death sentences. These people withdrew from life, proclaimed themselves to be suffering from the terminal disease of being human, shuttered their spirits, metaphorically wrapped themselves in cotton balls, and waited for the Grim Reaper.
Others recognize though that life, even in the midst of adversity, is a precious, undeserved gift from God worth living, worth cherishing.
Some of you know "B" from our congregation. B will turn 99 years old in a few days. A few years back, her sons and she decided that she could no longer fend for herself in her home. So, she moved to an assisted care facility.
B is legally blind and has to wear hearing aids. Last year, she had Shingles.
She could be bitter, wondering why she’s still around despite her afflictions. But that isn’t the choice she’s made. Always an avid reader, now largely unable to read, she listens to about five novels on CD every week. She works out every day, is a member of the garden club, participates in the crossword puzzle group, laughs, and keeps me on the straight and narrow.
B once told me that after the decision was made that she needed to leave her home, “I could have felt sorry for myself. But I decided to be happy.” We can control how we react to what happens to us.
A third lesson I’ve re-learned in a powerful way over the past few years is the most important one of all. It’s this. When Jesus tells those who believe in Him, “I am with you always, even to the close of the age,” you can bank on it.
I have never felt the closeness of Jesus, the One Who died and rose to set me free from bondage to sin and death, more than I have in the two-and-a-half years since my heart attack.
And belief in Jesus, Emmanuel--God with us--is good for our health and good for our recovery from health challenges.
This is borne out by research. In the book, The Faith Factor: Proof of the Healing Power of Prayer, Dr. Dale Matthews and co-author Connie Clark write: “Scientific studies show that religious involvement helps people prevent illness, recover from illness, and--most remarkably--live longer.” [The authors' italics.]
They go on to cite several studies that prove that point. For example, a 1972 study of 91,909 people in Washington County, Maryland “found that those who attended church once or more a week had significantly lower death rates from” coronary disease, emphysema, cirrhosis of the liver, and suicide. They also had less tuberculosis and other diseases.
In 1995, a Dartmouth University study of 232 elderly patients who underwent open-heart surgery showed that the “overall death rate among these patients was 9 percent the first six months after surgery. But for patients who said they attended church regularly, the death rate was 5 percent; the death rate for non-church attenders was nearly three times what it was for churchgoers.” Even more impressively, among the believers, the 37 patients who said they received “significant ‘strength and comfort’ from their beliefs all survived the six-month period.”
The authors go on to document study after study that show the positive effect that faith has on cancer patients, those suffering from depression and grief, and those who have addictions.
Now, we all know, as one of my seminary professors used to remind us, that, except for Jesus, God in the flesh, Who rose from the dead, and Enoch and Elijah, two Old Testament figures who never died, the ratio of births to deaths among the human race remains 1 to 1.
But I have learned that belonging to a Savior Who gives new and everlasting life to all who repent--disavowing the power of sin over their lives--and believe in Jesus--surrendering their whole lives to Him--have a power for living and dealing with life’s adversities that those who don’t have a relationship with Christ don't enjoy.
This shouldn’t surprise us. Jesus describes Himself as “the way, and the truth, and the life.” When we have a relationship with Jesus, we know that we belong to God now and for all eternity and that nothing can separate us from God or His love for us.
If that doesn’t give us strength to handle anything, nothing will!
So, these are the lessons I have learned or relearned these past few years, lessons I’m sure you all know well.
Number one, when we get a bad medical diagnosis, we need to change what behaviors and habits we can, but we shouldn’t beat ourselves up for things we can’t control.
Number two, we can’t always control what happens to us, but we can control how we react to what happens to us.
Number three, we need to embrace and maintain a strong personal relationship with Christ through prayer, reading God’s Word, regular worship attendance, service in Christ’s Name, and sharing our faith in Christ with others.
When we undertake these steps, we will ensure that however long we live, we will truly live, making full use of the gift of life with which God has blessed each of us. Thank you.
Since my last visit with you several years ago, a few things have happened in my life.
In 2010, I suffered a heart attack that took out 40% of my heart. Since then, a stent was implanted in an artery that had been 100% blocked and in 2011, as a precautionary measure, I received a defibrillator/pacemaker.
Also in 2011, a small spot of melanoma was found on my left leg and I underwent an outpatient surgical procedure at the James Center at Ohio State. A biopsy showed that there was no cancer in the surrounding area.
In 2012, I developed a stubborn rash that ultimately proved to be a symptom of Celiac Disease, a genetic condition that may or may not show up in he course of a person’s life. The thinking is that all that whole wheat I was eating to keep my heart healthy triggered the activation of the Celiac Disease. Because I still had a rash and both my wife and I were getting acclimated to the new gluten-free, wheat-free diet that is the only treatment that exists for Celiac, we had to cancel a planned visit with friends who live in France.
Shortly after the Celiac diagnosis, I told an old high school classmate: “It’s no biggie. Heart, cancer, and Celiac were all on my bucket list.” We laughed and he said, “Man, you gotta get a different list.”
Now, I’m doing well. Most days I do several miles of brisk walking. My heart is steady at about 60 beats per minute. My blood pressure, which has never been an issue, is, my doctor says, “perfect.”
There’s been no hint of skin cancer on any other part of my body.
And I’m actually enjoying the gluten-free diet.
After my last physical, my doctor declared that I was in "great shape."
I can’t claim to have experienced anything like what many of you have gone through. But I have learned some things I either didn’t know or didn’t pay much attention to before my last visit with you. They’re probably things all of you know from your experiences. Nonetheless, they’re worth remembering.
So what are some of these lessons I’ve learned?
First: Any time we receive bad news about our health, we should remember that it isn’t always our faults. We know that smoking leaves us at heightened risk for heart attack and cancer. We know that not exercising and not getting immunized leaves us susceptible to all sorts of diseases. We know that it’s not wise to drive without securing our seat belts. There are common sense precautions we all can take to reduce our risk for diseases or accidents.
But sometimes bad things happen even to cautious people.
In Matthew 5:45, Jesus says that the Father “makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.”
In Romans, the apostle Paul says that the whole universe groans under the weight of the condition of sin, that condition of enmity between God and the creation that you and I have inherited from Adam and Eve.
For nearly two years after my heart attack, I beat myself up for it. Although I had been unaware of feeling stressed, I assumed since I had none of the other risk factors for a heart attack that I had stressed myself into it. I even said so publicly. And stress may have played some role in it.
But only recently, my doctor said that he didn’t think my heart attack was caused by stress. “What was it then?” I asked. He paused for a long time and then said, “Maybe just bad luck.”
Now, I don’t believe in luck. But I do believe that there are some things that happen to us over which we have no control. In fact, most of the things that happen to us are probably in that category.
My doctor told me, “Mark, you may have been born with a partially occluded artery that simply took fifty-seven years to become completely blocked.” He went on to say that given the numbers of collateral arteries that had developed near the blocked one, something that would have taken decades to develop, I probably was born with that blockage.
Again, common sense dictates that we control those negative behaviors or habits that may endanger our health and instead, engage in other habits, like exercise, that can help us. But not every illness we’re hit with has anything to do with our behaviors. Our genes, our environments, or just being at the wrong place at the wrong time can all work against us.
The last thing we need to do when we’re hit with a negative medical diagnosis is to send ourselves on a guilt trip. That will not help us feel better.
A second lesson is really one I have re-learned. It’s summarized in the words of Pastor Chuck Swindoll. “I am convinced,” Swindoll has said, “that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it.” Viktor Frankl, the psychotherapist who survived time in a Nazi concentration camp said much the same thing when he wrote that, “Everything can be taken from a [person] but one thing; the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances...”
Every one of you here this evening knows well that while we may not control what happens to us, we can control how we react to it.
I have known people who suffered minor health setbacks and allowed them to become death sentences. These people withdrew from life, proclaimed themselves to be suffering from the terminal disease of being human, shuttered their spirits, metaphorically wrapped themselves in cotton balls, and waited for the Grim Reaper.
Others recognize though that life, even in the midst of adversity, is a precious, undeserved gift from God worth living, worth cherishing.
Some of you know "B" from our congregation. B will turn 99 years old in a few days. A few years back, her sons and she decided that she could no longer fend for herself in her home. So, she moved to an assisted care facility.
B is legally blind and has to wear hearing aids. Last year, she had Shingles.
She could be bitter, wondering why she’s still around despite her afflictions. But that isn’t the choice she’s made. Always an avid reader, now largely unable to read, she listens to about five novels on CD every week. She works out every day, is a member of the garden club, participates in the crossword puzzle group, laughs, and keeps me on the straight and narrow.
B once told me that after the decision was made that she needed to leave her home, “I could have felt sorry for myself. But I decided to be happy.” We can control how we react to what happens to us.
A third lesson I’ve re-learned in a powerful way over the past few years is the most important one of all. It’s this. When Jesus tells those who believe in Him, “I am with you always, even to the close of the age,” you can bank on it.
I have never felt the closeness of Jesus, the One Who died and rose to set me free from bondage to sin and death, more than I have in the two-and-a-half years since my heart attack.
And belief in Jesus, Emmanuel--God with us--is good for our health and good for our recovery from health challenges.
This is borne out by research. In the book, The Faith Factor: Proof of the Healing Power of Prayer, Dr. Dale Matthews and co-author Connie Clark write: “Scientific studies show that religious involvement helps people prevent illness, recover from illness, and--most remarkably--live longer.” [The authors' italics.]
They go on to cite several studies that prove that point. For example, a 1972 study of 91,909 people in Washington County, Maryland “found that those who attended church once or more a week had significantly lower death rates from” coronary disease, emphysema, cirrhosis of the liver, and suicide. They also had less tuberculosis and other diseases.
In 1995, a Dartmouth University study of 232 elderly patients who underwent open-heart surgery showed that the “overall death rate among these patients was 9 percent the first six months after surgery. But for patients who said they attended church regularly, the death rate was 5 percent; the death rate for non-church attenders was nearly three times what it was for churchgoers.” Even more impressively, among the believers, the 37 patients who said they received “significant ‘strength and comfort’ from their beliefs all survived the six-month period.”
The authors go on to document study after study that show the positive effect that faith has on cancer patients, those suffering from depression and grief, and those who have addictions.
Now, we all know, as one of my seminary professors used to remind us, that, except for Jesus, God in the flesh, Who rose from the dead, and Enoch and Elijah, two Old Testament figures who never died, the ratio of births to deaths among the human race remains 1 to 1.
But I have learned that belonging to a Savior Who gives new and everlasting life to all who repent--disavowing the power of sin over their lives--and believe in Jesus--surrendering their whole lives to Him--have a power for living and dealing with life’s adversities that those who don’t have a relationship with Christ don't enjoy.
This shouldn’t surprise us. Jesus describes Himself as “the way, and the truth, and the life.” When we have a relationship with Jesus, we know that we belong to God now and for all eternity and that nothing can separate us from God or His love for us.
If that doesn’t give us strength to handle anything, nothing will!
So, these are the lessons I have learned or relearned these past few years, lessons I’m sure you all know well.
Number one, when we get a bad medical diagnosis, we need to change what behaviors and habits we can, but we shouldn’t beat ourselves up for things we can’t control.
Number two, we can’t always control what happens to us, but we can control how we react to what happens to us.
Number three, we need to embrace and maintain a strong personal relationship with Christ through prayer, reading God’s Word, regular worship attendance, service in Christ’s Name, and sharing our faith in Christ with others.
When we undertake these steps, we will ensure that however long we live, we will truly live, making full use of the gift of life with which God has blessed each of us. Thank you.
Friday, December 02, 2011
'The Widow Maker' and Me
Earlier today, I went to the James Cancer Center at Ohio State for an evaluative appointment.
In October, a small melanoma was removed from my left leg. In about a week, I'll have an outpatient procedure to remove surrounding tissue.
I was impressed by the staff at the James and the ease with which I was registered.
In addition to the doctor, I also met with a nurse practitioner. She looked at the wallet cards I carry identifying me as someone with both a stent and a defibrillator and said, "Do you know that the heart attack you had is what we call 'the widow maker'? It's a miracle you're alive. God must have plans for you."
Miracles still happen. Why God chose to work this miracle on me, I don't know and no doubt won't know until I see Him face to face.
But I pray that I will make the most of this life God has given to me.
In any case, to God be all the glory!
In October, a small melanoma was removed from my left leg. In about a week, I'll have an outpatient procedure to remove surrounding tissue.
I was impressed by the staff at the James and the ease with which I was registered.
In addition to the doctor, I also met with a nurse practitioner. She looked at the wallet cards I carry identifying me as someone with both a stent and a defibrillator and said, "Do you know that the heart attack you had is what we call 'the widow maker'? It's a miracle you're alive. God must have plans for you."
Miracles still happen. Why God chose to work this miracle on me, I don't know and no doubt won't know until I see Him face to face.
But I pray that I will make the most of this life God has given to me.
In any case, to God be all the glory!
Saturday, November 05, 2011
It's Harder to Believe Than Not To (Reflections of a Former Atheist)
I've been an atheist. Since 1976, I've been a Christian.
I can tell you that living a life of faith in a God of total love and absolute power while continuing to live in a fallen world in which bad, senseless things happen to faithful people is far more difficult than going through this life as an atheist.
As an atheist, I had no expectations of God’s deliverance, ascribed no meaning to existence, and was not offended, except insofar as they created nuisances for me, when bad things came my way. In an uncreated world in which there is no good Creator or need for redemption, there is no reason to get riled up over what seems unfair or wrong. There are fewer things to explain and fewer unanswered questions when you're an atheist. It's a far simpler, even simplistic, way of life.
As musician, filmmaker, and satirist Steve Taylor once observed, "It's harder to believe than not to."
But whatever difficulties belief in the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ may present, I would rather live and die with Christ than live or die without Him.
Like the apostle Peter, after Jesus had asked him and his fellow disciples if, like others, they would like to abandon him, I have to say, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that You are the Holy One of God" (John 6:68).
My life has been interesting lately.
I had a heart attack that destroyed 40% of my heart in June, 2010. A stent was implanted shortly thereafter.
Just before I received a pacemaker and defibrillator on October 13, less than a month ago, a small mole was removed from my leg which turned out to contain melanoma cancer cells. The dermatologist is confident that he removed all of the cancer, but I'll undergo an outpatient procedure to remove tissue from the surrounding area in December.
These experiences are mere bumps in the road compared to what many people experience in life. I have no complaints.
But I can tell you that I have been sustained by Jesus Christ and by the prayers of other believers in the past year or so.
I have become even more convinced of the love and power--and the ultimate lordship over all things in heaven and on earth--of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
Christ is with me and I am promised that when I die, as a repentant believer in Jesus, I will be with Christ for all eternity.
How could I be anything but hopeful when I know those things to be true, even when life gets tough?
I pray that every day, God will help me to make the prayer of Saint Paul, who suffered so much not in spite of, but precisely because, he followed Jesus, my very own:
But those who believe in Jesus are blessed with a certainty about their futures that gives us the freedom to love our neighbors, to choose the path of joyful service, to shake off unkindness from others, to work for justice, and to walk humbly with our God. You really can't deter or bring ultimate discouragement to people who know they're going to live forever.
I have found that, in spite of everything, while it may be better, it's still better to believe than not to.
I can tell you that living a life of faith in a God of total love and absolute power while continuing to live in a fallen world in which bad, senseless things happen to faithful people is far more difficult than going through this life as an atheist.
As an atheist, I had no expectations of God’s deliverance, ascribed no meaning to existence, and was not offended, except insofar as they created nuisances for me, when bad things came my way. In an uncreated world in which there is no good Creator or need for redemption, there is no reason to get riled up over what seems unfair or wrong. There are fewer things to explain and fewer unanswered questions when you're an atheist. It's a far simpler, even simplistic, way of life.
As musician, filmmaker, and satirist Steve Taylor once observed, "It's harder to believe than not to."
But whatever difficulties belief in the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ may present, I would rather live and die with Christ than live or die without Him.
Like the apostle Peter, after Jesus had asked him and his fellow disciples if, like others, they would like to abandon him, I have to say, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that You are the Holy One of God" (John 6:68).
My life has been interesting lately.
I had a heart attack that destroyed 40% of my heart in June, 2010. A stent was implanted shortly thereafter.
Just before I received a pacemaker and defibrillator on October 13, less than a month ago, a small mole was removed from my leg which turned out to contain melanoma cancer cells. The dermatologist is confident that he removed all of the cancer, but I'll undergo an outpatient procedure to remove tissue from the surrounding area in December.
These experiences are mere bumps in the road compared to what many people experience in life. I have no complaints.
But I can tell you that I have been sustained by Jesus Christ and by the prayers of other believers in the past year or so.
I have become even more convinced of the love and power--and the ultimate lordship over all things in heaven and on earth--of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
Christ is with me and I am promised that when I die, as a repentant believer in Jesus, I will be with Christ for all eternity.
How could I be anything but hopeful when I know those things to be true, even when life gets tough?
I pray that every day, God will help me to make the prayer of Saint Paul, who suffered so much not in spite of, but precisely because, he followed Jesus, my very own:
I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. (Romans 8:18)It is harder to believe than not to.
But those who believe in Jesus are blessed with a certainty about their futures that gives us the freedom to love our neighbors, to choose the path of joyful service, to shake off unkindness from others, to work for justice, and to walk humbly with our God. You really can't deter or bring ultimate discouragement to people who know they're going to live forever.
I have found that, in spite of everything, while it may be better, it's still better to believe than not to.
Thursday, September 03, 2009
For some of my short takes...
Go to my Twitter site. You'll find a link to a great video on the motivations of the Pelotonia bicyclists from the Ohio State James Center, among other things.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
A Simple Prayer Request
I just received this message from my colleague and friend, Pastor Glen VanderKloot:
A small request. Pray this short prayer and pass it on to everyone you know.You could pray that simple prayer today and everyday, couldn't you?
Dear God, I pray for the cure of cancer. In Jesus name. Amen
Friday, July 03, 2009
Fight Pancreatic Cancer
I just saw President Carter's PSA on pancreatic cancer, which has taken so many of his family members. My uncle died from it two years ago. You can donate here to help with research for a cure of this horrible disease.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Please keep praying for David Wayne...
and read his latest blog post. He reflects on the emotional, physical, and spiritual roller coaster involved in fighting cancer.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Part Two of David Wayne's Cancer Story
Here. Please continue to keep this wonderful pastor and blogger in your prayers.
As you pray for David, don't forget to also pray that researchers will find cures for cancer.
As you pray for David, don't forget to also pray that researchers will find cures for cancer.
Thursday, January 08, 2009
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
How to Help a Grieving Friend
How do we help friends who are grieving?
Over the course of the years, I've learned some important basic lessons about this, both from personal experience and from my reading of the Bible.
If you have a friend who is grieving, whether over the death of a loved one, a divorce, a job loss, or a move that has taken them many miles from familiar faces and places, they can use your help. Fortunately, the principles I've discovered can be used in face-to-face conversations, over the telephone, and even, I have learned, in internet instant messaging. So, to help you help your grieving friend, here are seven of those lessons.
First and most importantly, listen to your friend. Frequently, whether it's because of our own discomfort or a penchant for wanting to "fix things," we can go to our grieving friends and shower them with torrents of consoling words. But what grieving people most need is to be listened to. Their pain and grief need to be acknowledged.
In the Old Testament book of Job, a man is aggrieved when he loses first, all his sources of wealth and then, all of his children in a natural disaster. Three friends come to visit Job (pronounced with a long "o"). One scholar has pointed out that the friends do something very wise at first. They let Job "vent," allowing him to give full expression to his agony, his questions, his anger. Then, they make a mistake: They open their mouths. My biggest mistakes in life and in trying to help hurting people, have never come from listening. They've always come from talking.
Second, don't try to talk people out of their grief. Grief is something which, over time, follows a more or less natural course. Sometimes more time and sometimes less is required. It depends on the person, their level of faith, and their particular grief. You can't truncate grief with words.
Some people think that they need to give the aggrieved person a "pep talk." But such talks are really designed more to make the talker feel they've done a good turn than to do any real good for anyone else. A woman's husband died. At the funeral home viewing, a man decided to "cheer her up." He said, "I know you feel bad now. But you'll get over it." That's a true story and it's truly awful.
Thirdly, don't try to explain what you don't understand. When people grieve over their losses, they wonder, as all of us do, why this has happened. The person who wants to help the friend who is asking this question must resist the temptation to answer it. In all honesty, your friend doesn't want to have a rational explanation anyway. They simply want to be able to say, "This isn't fair!"
And it isn't fair. Life often isn't fair. At the end of Job's forty-two chapters, we're left with this answer to the question of why grief befalls us: We live in a world where bad things happen. In the New Testament, Jesus tells us that bad things rain on the good and the evil alike. Why that is so, no one living on this planet is wise enough to say. Only God knows the answer to the question of why and you don't need to play God by pretending to have that answer.
Lesson four is this: Let your friend be angry with God. A deeply faithful Christian man whose granddaughter had recently died told me, "Sometimes I get angry with God. I know it's horrible; but it's true." I assured him that what he was feeling wasn't horrible. I reminded him of such people in the Bible as David and Job, who always believed in God, but also got angry with God when dealing with grief or the threat of death. And I told the grieving grandfather, "The fact that you're angry with God proves your faith in God. You would never be angry with someone you didn't think was there."
Most of the time, when we respond to people's anger, no matter its source, with condemnation, it only makes them dig in their heels. God says in Proverbs 15:1, "A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger." Letting your friend get angry with God will prevent their anger from becoming an ongoing feature in their life.
Lesson five: Don't avoid talking about your grieving friend's loss. Often, friends fear that if they do so, they'll only make their friends feel sadder. But a grieving friend already is sad and if it seems natural to mention a friend's dead loved one, for example, or if your friend mentions that person, you should be willing to talk about them as well.
A woman once told me, "My friends avoid speaking of my late husband like a plague. What they don't seem to understand is that when they do that, it makes me feel as though they think he was unimportant or that they want to pretend he was never there." Through the years, I have heard that grieving woman's words echoed by other grieving people. You honor your friend when you're willing to discuss with them the people or circumstances they grieve.
Lesson six: Pray for your friend. You should pray that God will bring them comfort, for sure. But you also should pray that God will use you as a conduit for the blessings you want your friend to receive. Whenever I visit people who are dealing with grief, I always ask God to fill me with His Holy Spirit, allowing God's love for my friend to flow through me. Jesus says that the world will know Him when His love is visible in us. Pray that God will love your friend through you.
Finally, if you're a follower of Jesus, your friend will probably eventually want to know what has allowed you to be so helpful to them. You can honestly say that it isn't you who have been helpful, that you have prayed over every step you took with them and that God has guided you. You can tell them that you belong to an eternal God Who has destroyed the power of death and that anyone who trustingly follows Jesus Christ has hope beyond the grave. At the right time, after you've lovingly taken the journey of grief with your friend, that will come as very good news.
[This piece distills two columns I wrote five years ago for The Community Journal, a suburban Cincinnati newspaper. I presented this earlier today at two gatherings, the women's group of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church and the Hocking County Cancer Support Group. This has appeared in various incarnations on the blog.]
Over the course of the years, I've learned some important basic lessons about this, both from personal experience and from my reading of the Bible.
If you have a friend who is grieving, whether over the death of a loved one, a divorce, a job loss, or a move that has taken them many miles from familiar faces and places, they can use your help. Fortunately, the principles I've discovered can be used in face-to-face conversations, over the telephone, and even, I have learned, in internet instant messaging. So, to help you help your grieving friend, here are seven of those lessons.
First and most importantly, listen to your friend. Frequently, whether it's because of our own discomfort or a penchant for wanting to "fix things," we can go to our grieving friends and shower them with torrents of consoling words. But what grieving people most need is to be listened to. Their pain and grief need to be acknowledged.
In the Old Testament book of Job, a man is aggrieved when he loses first, all his sources of wealth and then, all of his children in a natural disaster. Three friends come to visit Job (pronounced with a long "o"). One scholar has pointed out that the friends do something very wise at first. They let Job "vent," allowing him to give full expression to his agony, his questions, his anger. Then, they make a mistake: They open their mouths. My biggest mistakes in life and in trying to help hurting people, have never come from listening. They've always come from talking.
Second, don't try to talk people out of their grief. Grief is something which, over time, follows a more or less natural course. Sometimes more time and sometimes less is required. It depends on the person, their level of faith, and their particular grief. You can't truncate grief with words.
Some people think that they need to give the aggrieved person a "pep talk." But such talks are really designed more to make the talker feel they've done a good turn than to do any real good for anyone else. A woman's husband died. At the funeral home viewing, a man decided to "cheer her up." He said, "I know you feel bad now. But you'll get over it." That's a true story and it's truly awful.
Thirdly, don't try to explain what you don't understand. When people grieve over their losses, they wonder, as all of us do, why this has happened. The person who wants to help the friend who is asking this question must resist the temptation to answer it. In all honesty, your friend doesn't want to have a rational explanation anyway. They simply want to be able to say, "This isn't fair!"
And it isn't fair. Life often isn't fair. At the end of Job's forty-two chapters, we're left with this answer to the question of why grief befalls us: We live in a world where bad things happen. In the New Testament, Jesus tells us that bad things rain on the good and the evil alike. Why that is so, no one living on this planet is wise enough to say. Only God knows the answer to the question of why and you don't need to play God by pretending to have that answer.
Lesson four is this: Let your friend be angry with God. A deeply faithful Christian man whose granddaughter had recently died told me, "Sometimes I get angry with God. I know it's horrible; but it's true." I assured him that what he was feeling wasn't horrible. I reminded him of such people in the Bible as David and Job, who always believed in God, but also got angry with God when dealing with grief or the threat of death. And I told the grieving grandfather, "The fact that you're angry with God proves your faith in God. You would never be angry with someone you didn't think was there."
Most of the time, when we respond to people's anger, no matter its source, with condemnation, it only makes them dig in their heels. God says in Proverbs 15:1, "A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger." Letting your friend get angry with God will prevent their anger from becoming an ongoing feature in their life.
Lesson five: Don't avoid talking about your grieving friend's loss. Often, friends fear that if they do so, they'll only make their friends feel sadder. But a grieving friend already is sad and if it seems natural to mention a friend's dead loved one, for example, or if your friend mentions that person, you should be willing to talk about them as well.
A woman once told me, "My friends avoid speaking of my late husband like a plague. What they don't seem to understand is that when they do that, it makes me feel as though they think he was unimportant or that they want to pretend he was never there." Through the years, I have heard that grieving woman's words echoed by other grieving people. You honor your friend when you're willing to discuss with them the people or circumstances they grieve.
Lesson six: Pray for your friend. You should pray that God will bring them comfort, for sure. But you also should pray that God will use you as a conduit for the blessings you want your friend to receive. Whenever I visit people who are dealing with grief, I always ask God to fill me with His Holy Spirit, allowing God's love for my friend to flow through me. Jesus says that the world will know Him when His love is visible in us. Pray that God will love your friend through you.
Finally, if you're a follower of Jesus, your friend will probably eventually want to know what has allowed you to be so helpful to them. You can honestly say that it isn't you who have been helpful, that you have prayed over every step you took with them and that God has guided you. You can tell them that you belong to an eternal God Who has destroyed the power of death and that anyone who trustingly follows Jesus Christ has hope beyond the grave. At the right time, after you've lovingly taken the journey of grief with your friend, that will come as very good news.
[This piece distills two columns I wrote five years ago for The Community Journal, a suburban Cincinnati newspaper. I presented this earlier today at two gatherings, the women's group of Saint Matthew Lutheran Church and the Hocking County Cancer Support Group. This has appeared in various incarnations on the blog.]
Sunday, June 08, 2008
Real Hope
[This was a presentation I gave to cancer survivors and cancer care givers during the Hocking County American Cancer Society Relay for Life on June 7, 2008.]I’ve been asked to focus my thoughts today on hope. I’m happy to do that. Napoleon once said that a leader is “a dealer in hope.” That’s especially true for we leaders called pastors. If I’m not dealing in hope, I fail to do my job.
The need for hope for cancer patients, cancer survivors, and their families and friends is obvious. Both the need and the impact of hopefulness is well-documented. People with hope, countless studies have shown, live longer and better, stave off illness more readily, and weather life’s storms with greater facility than do those without hope.
But as a “dealer in hope,” I must tell you that I don’t believe that all hope is equal. In the commercial world, there are things that dealers sell that are useful and helpful, everything from toothbrushes to cars, from groceries to electric fans, a really useful commodity today. But there are other dealers whose products are hurtful, things like illegal drugs, loans with extortionist interest rates, or inferior products they know will break down almost as soon as customers get them home. Similarly, there are people who deal in and believe in false hope. False hope is more destructive than illegal drugs, high interest loans, or inferior products.
Admiral James Stockdale was the highest-ranking prisoner of war during the Vietnamese conflict. He was held, often in solitary confinement, for years. I read the report of an interview with him once. “How did he survive?” the interviewer wondered. “I decided to allow it to be the most important experience of my life, the lessons from which I wouldn’t trade for anything,” he said. The interviewer let that remarkable statement sink in for a second and then asked, “Who was it that didn’t survive their POW ordeal so readily?” “That’s easy,” Stockdale said, “the optimists.” That didn’t make sense to the interviewer. So, he asked Stockdale to explain. The optimists, the admiral said, were those who would say, “We’ll be out by the end of summer” and summer would come and go. Then they might say, “We’ll be out by Christmas” and Christmas wouldn’t bring their release. You see, the people Stockdale identified as “optimists” were those who bought into “false hopes,” hopes with no basis in fact, hopes they just talked themselves into.*
You all know that’s not the kind of hope you need to sustain you through the gravest challenges of life. I’m sure that most of the cancer survivors you and I know have been sustained by authentic hope, real hope.
In my former congregation in Cincinnati is a woman I’ll call Dottie. Dottie is the most fun-loving person you’ll ever meet. She also loves to do things for others. When a teenager from our congregation there suffered third degree burns and severed his thumb while using a microwave torch and had to be hospitalized for months, it was Dottie who organized the families of the congregation to take prepared food to the young man’s household so that his family could have good meals in spite of the hours spent away from the house and in waiting rooms. Only after people got to know her well would Dottie reveal that she was a cancer survivor, twice over, from two unrelated cancers. Whenever a member of our church or a member of their extended family was diagnosed with cancer, I immediately sent Dottie to be with them. Why? Because Dottie, this fun, tough, loving ball of fire, was the best “dealer in hope” I ever met. She helped people face the reality of their diagnoses and also helped them to see that those diagnoses were not death sentences, that their fights with cancer could, as was true for her, become tremendous growth experiences, even in the midst of the pain. Dottie showed them that there is hope, real hope for all of us, irrespective of the circumstances of our lives.
It won’t surprise you to know what the source of Dottie’s hope was. It was the God Who conquered death in Jesus Christ. You see, I believe that only a hope that holds out the authentic promise of life beyond this one can sustain us, encourage us, and embolden us in this life. That is real hope! Dottie had it.
In the New Testament, Paul, a man well-acquainted with sufferings of all kinds said that through Jesus Christ, he and his fellow believers could boast of the peace they had with God and of the resurrection they one day would experience. But they could boast of something else, he said. “And not only that, but we boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through [God’s] Holy Spirit…” given to all believers. (See here.)
I am humbled and honored to be with you. You know better than I about this hope I’m dealing today. I ask you, like Dottie, to be dealers and believers in authentic hope, hope that is ours here and for all eternity, hope that comes from a tough and tender God Who gave His life on a cross so that we might live with Him forever and Who loves and sustains us always. Let the God ultimately revealed in Jesus Christ give you a hope that never dies. Thank you for allowing me to be here today.
*Here I paraphrase Jim Collins' discussion of his interview with Stockdale as reported in his book, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap...and Others Don't.
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