It has been a little while since I wrote something last, I'm still trying to think of what I want to write about. In the mean time I received an email this morning that I have included here.
For over five years now a friend of mine, who has taught middle school science for twenty-two years at my old school, has been struggling with cancer. I have had many emails forwarded to me over the years in which he gives updates on his medical status and his walk with God. So much of his emails is riddled with sadness, enough to break the heart, but along side of it he writes of his ever changing and ultimately growing walk with Christ. Never in my life have I seen such a strong, beautiful Christian story that is constantly contrasted with the pains of this world - constantly reminding me of the Peace that Passes Understanding.
"Dear Friends,
Please forgive me for not writing you for so long. After each doctor visit over the past year or so, I fully intended on giving you an update, but I just could not pen the words. I wanted to fade back into obscurity, become a normal person again. I was tired of being “that guy with cancer,” weary of hearing “you look good” knowing the phrase “for a guy with cancer” was implied. But “that guy with cancer” has new cancer news that I must tell you about, and so I’m writing to you.
Before I give you the bad news, I must put it into context. I must tell you a bit of God’s story for my life. I share my story with you to encourage you, but selfishly, I write these words to calm my own fears. I need to see Jesus walking on top of the tumultuous sea of my emotions and hear him call out, “It’s alright! I’m here. Don’t be afraid.” From a doctrinal point of view, I believe in God’s providential care in every detail of my life, but in my day to day faith, I don’t trust him. Writing down the details of His care for me strengthens my faith. I hope it bolsters your faith as well.
In the summer of 2005, I discovered a lump on my throat. Surgery revealed it to be the rarest form of thyroid cancer, literally a one in a million type of cancer. Outside of surgery, this cancer was terminal with a three year life expectancy. If it escaped my neck area, all treatment options vanished. An anxiety ridden two and half years followed this diagnosis along with two more surgeries. Slicing tumors from my throat, my surgeon tried to stay ahead of the cancer, but it had saturated my throat tissue.
Miracles followed me on this journey. Waiting for a crucial scan, I met an African man named Emmanuel (God with us), and seconds after meeting we clasped arms as brothers and prayed for each other’s healing. At one point, doctors were certain the cancer had migrated to my bones. While sitting in a hospital cafeteria waiting to complete my scans, God suddenly reassured me that my bones were cancer free. My anxiety left immediately replaced with an inexplicable calm. During these years, God gave me many small signs of his presence. Celtic history and lore is significant to me, and while running through the forest one day, I heard bagpipes. Following the music, I found the piper and asked him to play Amazing Grace. He filled the woods with that precious song just for me. We vacation each year in New England near nesting ospreys. After receiving some very bad news, I stood by my classroom window looking out over our school’s pond and spotted an osprey soaring over the water. In my twenty two years at the school, I never saw an osprey before or since. I wore the number eleven while playing college soccer, and my sons always choose eleven for their jerseys. We call it our family number, and it became a symbol to me of God’s care for my sons. I saw elevens everywhere during these years. During a radiation treatment, I had to live with my mother for a week because I could not be near children. On the first night, I slipped into a deep depression. I called my wife but could not even speak. She prayed for me. Her prayer opened my soul to God’s spirit, and the deepest imaginable peace came over me. I drifted to sleep and dreamed of heaven, of flying over a city of gold and sparkling waters and lofty towers. The moment I awoke, a friend called and offered further encouragement to me completing my spiritual healing. On January 1, 2008, while reading John 14-17 for my devotions, three verses seemed to light up on the pages like fire. A clear voice in my head commanded, “Call Judy.” Immediately, I called my wife’s friend, but getting her voice mail and not having a clue about what to say, I simply recited the three verses on her mail. She called hours later in tears. While enduring her own personal tragedy, her pastor had counseled her to read John 14-17 the night before, and she strongly felt God asking her to claim two verses as her own. They were two of the verses I left on her voice mail. While running through the forest another time, I felt God speaking to me, insisting that I speak in high school chapel. I resisted the message. I was a middle school teacher; I never spoke to high school. God persisted and I finally spoke in the last chapel of the year. I preached out of Romans 12 about God’s transforming power, and at the end, I invited students to come up on stage to pray with me. Fearing I would be suddenly very lonely, the entire chapel of students came to the stage, and for 40 minutes, 150 students gathered around me and prayed. Many times God’s Spirit moved with stunning power during my sermons at church and chapels at school. After one service, a Jewish lawyer sobbed uncontrollably as God’s Spirit washed over him and he received Christ as savior. These are the miracles I can bear witness to.
Then God’s providence manifested itself. On January 7, 2008, I received the news that two tumors were spotted in my lungs. There was nothing the doctors could do. Five months later, I had another throat surgery to remove more tumors, and the tumors in my lungs multiplied to five. Then I received an email from a friend who had embraced the charismatic movement. He told me to go to Florida to participate in a great healing phenomenon. Not being charismatic, I did not consider going, but God planted an irresistible command in my mind to call one of Gayle’s friends. I called, confessing my ignorance about why I was calling, and she replied, “I know why you are calling, Tim. God wants you to go to a healing service in Florida.” I discovered that this pastor was to be in North Carolina the week after school, and I drove down. During the service, I experienced nothing and was deeply disappointed, but a group of Christians adopted me for that evening and gathering around me to pray for my healing. When I returned home, we discovered a possible treatment option, a new experimental drug only found at my hospital. Had I been diagnosed just a couple years earlier or lived anywhere else in the world, the cancer would have taken me. But before starting the drug, I had to heal from my surgery, go through eight weeks of radiation treatment on my neck, and then heal from the radiation. Fearful of rampant tumor growth in my lungs, we were told five months later that there was no change in the lung tumors. God answered many prayers. I enrolled in an experimental drug program, and for two years, the tumors have remained dormant. As you may remember, the drug hammered me with horrible side effects, but in recent months, I have worked out hard to regain my weight and strength, and I am 98% symptom free.
Now for the bad news. Yesterday, I learned a new cancer, unresponsive to my drug, is growing in my lungs. Again God’s providential care steps into my life. A year ago, my doctor had no treatment options for this new cancer. Now, she has another drug that believes can work. Along with 15 other patients, I will start this new drug in two weeks. It has the same side effects as the old drug, which could make the end of my school year difficult. My boys (ages 8 and 10) have been so happy in recent months because dad is healthy and strong again. We now must tell them this news.
Many old fears crept out of the cellar of my soul last night, whispering lies to me. There is no God, they say. He is just a fairy tale. Or, there is a God but he has not chosen you. Your sin is too great, your soul unrepentant. Or, your God is a cruel God. He has set you and your family up these past months to be happy again, but now comes the ax. I covet your prayers. My soul knows that I am a cherished son of the King, the bearer of an invaluable spiritual inheritance, a man whose family is cared for by the almighty God, but my mind rebels against these truths clouding my emotions with fear and doubt. Like the disciples in the storm tossed boat, my faithlessness believes God will sink my soul with my savior aboard.
So that is my story and my news. I think I see God’s plan in all this. I have come to realize that I am a better man, a better Christian, with cancer than without it. I think this is why God spares me from death but does not heal me from this disease. Perhaps He wants me to share my utter helplessness with you because you feel the same way, or perhaps you don’t and should feel that way. I don’t know these answers, but I do know that He is speaking to me today, and He wants me to tell you this next chapter of my story. He also wants me to tell my students though this is the last thing I want to do today. In an hour, I will speak to grades 6-12 in chapel though I am not prepared to do so. Please pray.
Be strong and courageous.
Blessings"
