She read the words. "My brethren, count it all JOY when you fall into various trials." James 1:2
She shook her head in wonderment. All the trials she had faced in the past three years had not been filled with smiles, laughter and dancing! Hardly. Instead, many tears and times of questioning, doubting, frustration, depression, anxiety...certainly not joy!
The memory of July, 2010 was still sharp in her mind. The three weeks of strange symptoms and then hearing the news CANCER! How could a healthy, active woman with no genetic predisposition to cancer tolerate such dreadful news? What was joyful about that?
She remembered back in the early spring of 2010, driving past the Cancer and Hematology Center in Holland, MI and thinking, "Thank goodness I don't have to go there because I don't have cancer." Yet by late fall of 2010, that's where she met Dr. A. following her discharge from spending four months at Syracuse, NY Hospital. What was joyful about that?
Yes, unbelievable trials. Was there any joy? She began to examine the past three years.
She remembered that evening when she sat in her bed at Upstate Hospital in Syracuse following the brain biopsy. The oncologist, Dr. C., came into her room and began describing her diagnosis. The brain biopsy was required so that a correct diagnosis could be made. Up to that point the doctors were not certain what was wrong. She had been in the hospital ten days, had then been discharged to Glenn's house in Manlius, NY the first week of July as they waited for the brain surgeon to return from his vacation. The doctors held three possibilities: either she had a stroke, Lyme disease or cancer. The biopsy of the brain's left thalamus and the excising of a nickel sized tissue sample would provide the answer.
On that evening of July 8, Dr. C. spoke a few minutes to her and Glenn (Dick had already returned to Glenn's for much needed rest). She recalled how fuzzy her thinking was that evening but she heard the next comment loud and clear. "You have a lethal, aggressive lymphoma in the brain. You probably have only seven weeks to live!"
Her first thought was "Seven weeks is not very long." But then a spirit of calm assurance enveloped her and she stated, with positive declaration, "Praise God!"
At that moment she heard Dr. C.'s assistant give a cry of wonder, "Oh!"
And then she added, "God is good!"
The response of Dr. C. and his assistant was shock! Probably they had never heard a patient respond in that way to a pronouncement of a death sentence!
Ah, yes, she now thought. She had to admit. That was an unexplainable joyful moment. She was absolutely certain the Holy Spirit had overtaken her and in spite of the hopeless news from the oncologist she had responded positively. She knew...she knew the Lord would be with her, whether she joined Him in Heaven or whether she stayed on this earth. She was not afraid of dying or of living.
She recalled just this past summer when the news about Dick was so devastating. At that time the doctors thought Dick's prostate cancer had returned and he only had a short time to live. That news had rocked her. She was so distraught she cried every day. Feelings of helplessness and uncertainty had crowded her days. She prayed constantly. And then the glorious news when the CAT scan and lymph node biopsy proved there was no cancer. Yes, they experienced indescribable joy!
What a period of testing and trial! And yet she realized because of her experiences, she had come to depend on Jesus more than she ever had in her lifetime. He is real, she told herself over and over again. She knew He was real because she had experienced His presence again and again. She had leaned on Him, trusted Him, believed in Him more deeply than ever. The intimacy which she gained with her Lord had indeed brought her joy...unspeakable joy!
She began to compare her pre- cancer days with her present days. Yes, she had believed strongly in God all her life, and had surrendered her heart willingly to Jesus back in 1972 at a Lay Witness Mission. She had grown in her faith over the years with the help of Christ centered pastors, Bible studies and deep relationships with Christian friends. But she realized now what she had gained....the incredible deep intimate relationship with her Lord as she struggled through her trials with brain cancer.
Truly this had been her testing, her trial and she had survived. She had endured, not by any self serving strength but only by depending, surrendering and trusting totally on God.
"By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, 'In Isaac your seed be called,' concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead." Hebrews 11: 17-19
