Cancer...

"Where is God in all this?" "Oh, He's up there. Somewhere... shouting down that He loves us, wondering why we can't hear him. You think?" -What Dreams May Come

"But I tell you, in this you are not right, for God is greater than man. Why do you complain to him that he answers none of man's words? For God does speak--now one way, now another--though man may not perceive it." -Job 33:12-14

2,000 years ago, a man with leprosy approached Jesus and falling on his knees cried out, "If you are willing, you can make me clean!" Keep this story in mind...

Merriam-Webster offers many definitions for the word "cancer," but one has begun to really stick with me: "n. something evil or malignant that spreads destructively." I think that covers the totality of what cancer is. It's more than just a clump of deadly cells. So much more. A little over a month ago, my Uncle John got some bad news: during surgery the doctors noticed something out of place. A week later the news was confirmed: an advanced tumor on his pancreas. All of a sudden, all of my family was shaken, left asking how this could happen to such an amazing man.

I love my uncle! He can sing and play a piano like nobody I know. He is one of the most brilliant minds I've ever met, which is probably why he is an engineer. And then this happened. Something evil and malignant is spreading destructively in his life.

One of the questions we ask so often sounds something like, "Why do bad things happen to good people?" I don't have the answer to this question. I don't know why God allows sadness and evil to exist in this world. I don't know if God put this cancer in my uncle. I don't know if God created Hurricane Katrina. I don't know! But there is something I do know. I know that God is bigger than my mind can possibly fathom, and thank God for the fact that he has a bigger plan in store than just making me happy. I know that somewhere in the midst of all of this God is working for good.

Years ago there lived a man named Job. Job was upright and righteous, and God allowed Satan to tear his life apart. Every sorrow and suffering imaginable, Job suffered. And at the end of the story, God finally speaks. As Job is at the end of his rope and ANGRY, God responds, "Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? Tell me, if you understand. Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it?" In one moment, God changes the whole conversation. He takes Job's, "How could you do this God?" and tells him, "Where were you when I made the world? Don't you think if I can set the universe in motion I have a plan for this?"

Let's return to the man who begged Jesus to heal him (Mark 1:40.) He didn't run to Jesus and say, "Heal me!" No, he says, "If you are willing, you can make me clean." It's so much deeper! This man KNOWS Jesus can heal him. That's not what he's concerned with. He sees that God is painting a bigger picture than just his life. It's as if he says, "Jesus, if healing me is in your bigger plans, you can do it. But if it's not going to bring you glory, don't."

I believe that we were created by a God who still performs miracles and heals. But it's hard for me when I hear people say, "By the grace of God my child was healed." For every premature baby that survives to live a healthy life that isn't supposed to make it through the first night, there are others who never see their second day. We don't say, "By the grace of God he allowed this child to pass." But I have to believe that there are no mistakes. I have to believe that in everything God is faithful to his promise, "I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future." I just think his plans are bigger than mine. I think his point of view is way more beautiful than mine. After all this is the God, who placed each star in the sky and yet has numbered the hairs of my head.

A dear friend of mine has a sister who is going through a terrible ordeal. It has hurt this friend of mine. Hurt, in fact, is perhaps the most incomplete and insufficient word I can use. Not being able to do anything has torn her up. But in the midst of all this, I got a message from her the other day. "I just wish there was more I could do. But I'm just trusting right now. We all are. We have nothing else. But Jesus is using them in ways that I will never understand. And I'm trusting in that." That is the faith of the man who cried out to Jesus, for "we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." (Rom. 8:28)

I don't know why bad things happen. I don't know why people suffer. But I do know that God is at work in the midst of all things. He DOES NOT fail! So my prayer for my Uncle John has changed. Now, I pray like the man who met Jesus. "God, you CAN heal John. And if that will bring you glory, then you know I desire to see him healed. But I pray you give me the faith to know you story is bigger than mine and that your plans are more perfect than ANYTHING I can fathom." I believe in a god who is bigger than any tumor or any storm. But I also believe in a god who is bigger than just satisfying me.

forever unfinished...