Small Gifts and the Main Gift

You can find an update of my physical and psychological status at our website, www.choosing2live.com, by clicking on "Choosing to Live Physically" and "Choosing to Live Psychologically" at the top of the page. Basically, the news from the oncologist this morning was at least tentatively encouraging. Of course, he's such a pro at dealing all day every day with the false hopes and false fears of cancer patients that he never shows a big reaction. I'm sure he wouldn't act visibly shocked or excited if a patient walked into his office with a full-grown, fully functional third arm growing out of their forehead. But I think it was good news. Anyway, you can read about it on the website.

My other blog thought for the day is basically a copy-and-paste from an e-mail I wrote to my sister-in-law today, after she commented on the website:

The idea behind the website is precisely to use my terrible situation to say that the things we believe about God are not just trite platitudes or airy-fairy clichés or cruel hypocrisies. He is real and loving and powerful even in your situation, right here and now. We are told that all things work together for good to those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. I think that includes me -- and this. So we're giving my cancer to God to use it for our good and for the advancement of the purpose to which he has called us. We believe he's healing me, but we want to bring people not to the idea that if you're a Christian bad things will never happen to you, or that every crisis will always be resolved in your favour, that no real loss or grief or hardship will ever happen to the saints; rather, we want to bring them to the idea that the God who is able to give me healing or daily bread or deliverance from the lions den or the fiery furnace is able still to be God in my life, and to draw me into deep intimacy with him, even in the lions den or the furnace, even to the grave; that physical health or prosperity is not the main gift He wants to give us, or the main gift our hearts really desire. HE is the main gift he wants to give us, and the main gift that we'll discover that our hearts really desire. It's not mainly the ability to run a 4-minute mile or buy a big fancy house that our hearts were created for. Our supreme destiny and desire, the reason for our being and our ultimate joy is a deep, fervent, mutual love relationship with him, that spills over into a love for the people around us and an ability to see their incredible worth as He sees ours and theirs. And we can have that right here and now in the middle of the fiery furnace. That's what made it possible for the three Hebrew men in the Bible story, when faced with that furnace, to say: "but if not, be it known unto thee Oh king that we will not bow down to the idol you have set up". He is able to deliver us and he will deliver us, but even if he doesn't, we can trust him when he says "my grace is sufficient for you"; we don't and we won't bow down to the idol of fear and control. That makes every moment, even the bad ones, worth living.