Have you ever purchased a new car such as a Honda Accord and when you start driving around in your new car it’s seems like everyone is now driving a Honda Accord? I think we can all agree that our own personal circumstances filter or influence our view of the world. I am a two-time cancer survivor and by the grace of God I am still here. When I drive around Ohio “post cancer”, it now seems to me that cancer is literally everywhere. My personal circumstances have caused me to become very alert to when someone I know or know of becomes diagnosed with cancer. As the Ministry Coordinator for a Cancer Support Group at a large church here in Cleveland, the number of emails I get each week talking about a new cancer diagnosis would astound you. Cancer is everywhere and if it hasn’t touched your family yet, it likely will at some point. Just this week I heard that my neighbor (approximately 10 houses down) has been diagnosed with multiple myeloma.
Even though cancer is everywhere and the number of people I am praying for seems to be growing each and every day, I do occasionally come across a cancer story which tugs my heart a little more than the others which I’m exposed to on a daily basis. These “tug at my heart situations” are normally because of a personal connection or friendship I have with the cancer patient. Please let me tell you about my most recent example of such a personal cancer connection story.
In 2017, my Mom encouraged me to look at a Facebook page which documented the cancer trial of a woman named Ann (I have purposely left her last name out for privacy reasons) who lived in Tennessee. Ann grew up in my hometown of Muncie, Indiana and she was 9 years younger than me. When I researched her on FB in 2017, she was battling Inflammatory Breast Cancer (IBC) and her worldly medical prognosis was not good. After I connected with Ann, I began to follow her more closely on FB. When reading her FB posts, I recognized that Ann had a great sense of humor and was willing to be extremely open about her cancer trial. Like many of us, Ann had a personal Facebook page but she also had a second Cancer FB page where she shared updates on her cancer trial. When talking about her trials and tribulations on her cancer FB page, the level of detail she went into just amazed me. This cancer FB page was essentially a cancer blog for Ann to share her updates, thoughts, prayer requests, victories and challenges which are part and parcel to almost any cancer trial. If you wanted to read some medical or cancer trial details, Ann was more than willing to provide you with them. Most people would be too embarrassed to share the details which Ann shared but she did it in a way which made you both laugh and cry. She had a knack for drawing people in with her writing style and for developing a following of loyal friends and prayer warriors. The amount of detail she went into about her cancer trial had a way of making her experiences seem more real to those who read her posts. Here is an example from one of her posts:
I had a dentist appointment with the most awesome dentist in the world and then I had to get labs drawn at UT to send to Nashville. My stupid port is always acting up and of course wouldn't give blood so they had to stick my arm, again. It's already bruised from all the other sticks it has to get our when my port is being a pain, which seems to be most of the time lately. We were trying to decide where to eat on the way home and settled on a place and then I decided I was just too tired and want to go home and take a nap. My husband was going to take me home and then go back out. I had decided I really wanted an apple and knew we had them at home when my nurse called and said my platelets were 2 and to head back to the hospital for an infusion of platelets.🙄 We decided to hit the Wendy's drive through so I could get a kids meals with apple slices. It was such a good idea until at the window they tell me the apple truck didn't come today. Seriously?! 😣 Okay, I can deal because I'm a big girl, but then they forgot to give me the sauce with my nuggets😖😳. I mean, really. How hard is it? No apples, no sauce. What is this world coming to?
How can you not read the preceding paragraph and not be ready to laugh and cry? God gifted her with a compelling writing style because He knew this writing outlet would comfort her during her cancer trial but He also had a plan for how He would use these social media posts to work diligently in the hearts of others. You could not read Ann’s posts without thinking “Why is this happening to her?”. Only God knows the complete answer to that question. However, you could not read one of her posts without also thinking about the question “What would I do if this was happening to me?”. God had a plan to use Ann’s posts to convict all of us of our own mortality and our need for Him in order to draw people closer to Him. I’m not sure if Ann even realized this that her posts could cause those who read them to ask questions like “how would I respond if I was walking in Ann’s shoes”?
After battling the disease for years, I’m sorry to say Ann passed away this week. I will miss reading her updates and her quirky humor. When I read the news of her death on FB, tears started running down my face. I was in a room with over 800 people at a conference in Las Vegas when I read about her passing. I asked myself the question – “Why was I, a grown man, crying over someone I don’t recall ever meeting”? I’m not sure I know the complete answer to that question but part of the answer is her death causes me to again ponder my own mortality. She is younger than me and shouldn’t be dying was my initial reaction. As a two-time cancer survivor, “that could have been me I thought” and “why am I still living and she is not”? In all my years of ministering to people with cancer, I have come to realize these types of questions are all normal human reactions. However, the reality is God has a unique plan for each of us (Jerimiah 29:11). He is sovereign and in control so only He knows the answers to these questions which I’m sure are some of the same questions which Ann’s friends and family also asking. James 4:13-15 says: "What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that."
The grim reality is we are all going to die. Job 4:5 tells us: “You (God) have decided the length of our lives. You know how many months we will live, and we are not given a minute longer.” God knows the exact moment each of us is going to die and many of us are going to die from cancer. Since there is a 100% chance that each of us will die, why is it that it hurts so much and seems like such a surprise when someone like Ann finally succumbs to this horrible disease? Did we not realize she was terminal and was likely to die absent a gracious intervention from God? Only God knows the answer to these questions and others like them. However, in 11 years of ministering to people with cancer, I have observed that most people don’t spend much time preparing for the one thing (death) which is an absolute certainty in each of our lives. I have done a lot of public speaking over the years and have found the times I am the most nervous are the times that I’m the least prepared. The same “how prepared am I perspective” is true when talking about or dealing with death. People who haven’t thought through what will happen to their souls after they pass away from this world are the ones who don’t know how to respond appropriately when someone like Ann passes away from a cancer trial. They act surprised or shocked....it is almost as if they don’t believe death is a possibility…they haven’t prepared for the reality we will all face and so many (not all) of their responses are inappropriate at best.
A friend of mine who battled Lymphoma over the past year summarized the inappropriateness of many well-intentioned individuals as follows (Source: JayWhitmer.com):
My "thoughts and prayers" take is not to crush those who say this since after all, it's the American way. But I would ask those who repeatedly use this phrase to reflect further on what you specifically mean by it, whether you communicate it or not to the recipient. In other words, what are you praying, why are you praying, and most importantly WHO are you praying to? Some have just thrown "positive vibes" our way, which clearly skips the WHO question. I'll be brutally honest here - that doesn't help us much, and I don't think that helps the "thrower" much either. Still, I can appreciate people who openly wrestle with this and are honest about "I don't know what to say" or even who to say it to. That at least opens the door to a conversation that I think would encourage both of us.
Why is it that we spend so little time thinking about our own deaths even though we know for certain that death will happen to each and every one of us? Mathew 10:28 tells us: “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” I Thessalonians 4:13 says: “Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope.”
In my first cancersupportchrnoicles.com blog post, I talked about how blessings can come from a cancer trial. As I mentioned in that post, one of the blessings of cancer is the fact that it can cause you to come to grips with your own mortality. A cancer diagnosis forces many folks to realize that they will not live forever and they need to start thinking about what will happen to their own souls after they die. I’m sure my cancer trials have caused me to consider my own death more than most people my age. When you are young you think you will live forever but a cancer trial causes such unrealistic thinking to fly out the window.
When someone like Ann passes away at such a young age, it should remind each and every one of us that we need to have a plan for our own souls after we die. What is your plan? If you don’t have a plan, then I encourage you to please consider the promises of the Gospel and the hope that Jesus provides to all of us, including those like Ann who succumb to a cancer trial. Ann’s passing at such a young age is a wake-up call from God to each of us, so how will you respond? Will you answer God’s call? As for Ann, 1 Peter 5:10-11 tells us:
10 And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. 11 To Him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
The promises in 1 Peter 5:10-11 apply to only those who are “in Christ”. In other words, these promises apply only to those individuals who have a personal relationship with Jesus. Romans 10:11 says: “If you declare with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Having a personal relationship with Christ the King means He is more than just a good friend or someone you admire. When he becomes your personal Lord and savior, you start to seek Him in everything that you do all the time. He starts to consume your thinking as you start to actively seek Him by studying His word (Bible), by praying to him and by fellowshipping with other believers. You also start to realize that he is the King and He is sovereign over all things, including a cancer diagnosis and a cancer trial. You start to trust in his perfect plan for your life. Psalm 115:3 says “Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases.” Job 42:2 says “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.” Psalm 103: 19 says “The Lord has established his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all.” 1 Chronicles 29:11 says “Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, for all that is in the heavens and in the earth is yours.” Yes, as Psalm 115:3 suggests, God does all that he pleases. His Kingdom does rule over all. As hard as it is to lose someone like Ann (I cannot imagine the pain her Husband and family are going through right now), it is comforting to know that what happened to her is part of God’s perfect plan for her life. As the ones who are left here on earth, what can we learn from what happened to her and how can this impact our lives and the lives of others going forward? Since she has passed away from this world, Ann’s fate is sealed but your fate is not if you are reading this post so do you have a plan for the eternal destination of your soul?
I am happy to report that Ann was a believer in Christ. She grew up in a Christian home, she attended a Christian college, she was involved in a non-denominational church, she went on mission’s trips and she was vocal about her faith. One of her friends who knew her well posted the following this past week:
People often ask why Jesus allows bad things to happen in this world. The truth is that in this world there will be tragedy and death. Jesus only promised us that He would never leave us alone. He never promised that this life would be fair or free from pain and suffering. It may be sad to hear, but it's true. Just because you believe in Jesus doesn't mean your life will be free from sorrow and heartache. Christians lose their loved ones, they struggle to feed their family, they cry, they hurt, and sometimes are victims of horrible crimes. But Jesus is there with you...through all of it. God makes us another promise....If we believe in Jesus, we will one day have a home in heaven...and in heaven this is no suffering...no more death...no more pain. Life is not fair...but GOD is good.
Ann, I don’t recall ever meeting you back in Muncie. The reality is my memory is not very good and our paths likely did cross each other over the years back in this college town in Indiana where we both grew up. Regardless if we met or not, thank you for inspiring me to write this post and hopefully your story will inspire others to come to grips with their own mortality and to consider the good news of the Gospel and to hopefully put their faith in Christ. Ann, well done my good and faithful servant and welcome home. Thank you for intentionally and unintentionally pointing people to Christ, who the Bible says is the only one who can provide eternal rest for our souls.
John 11:25: Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die;
Jim Risk, a two-time cancer survivor, is the volunteer Ministry Coordinator for the Cancer Support Group (CSG) at a non-denominational church in NE Ohio. Jim and his wife, Kristina, have participated and served in CSG, a Christian ministry, since 2007.