Archive for the 'prostate' Category

It is hard to believe that a week ago I was having prostate cancer surgery.  Time flies when you are having fun!  The surgery went well but I did have some problems with my catheter which involved an extra day in the hospital.  I came home Thursday.

Today, Dec. 10, I just got back from having my staples removed.  The pathology report indicated only a small area of cancer with the same Gleason score of 6 that I had at my biposy.  No cancer was observed in the outside area of the prostate.  My PSA level should begin dropping and remain very low if indeed the cancer has been completely removed.

I praise the Lord for these good results and am very grateful for so many who prayed.

I wrote this post on December 2, before my surgery on Dec. 3.  Didn’t post it until after the surgery. 

The words “Christmas” and “cancer” don’t seem to go together.  The word “Christmas” generates mental images of family gatherings, Christmas trees, quaint snow-covered villages and churches, Sunday School pageants, wreaths, and, of course, presents.  Cancer generates images of hospitals, doctors, bald heads, and perhaps even death.  Cancer should not even be mentioned in the same sentence as Christmas!

Yet for me, with my prostate cancer surgery tomorrow at the start of the Christmas season, my thoughts naturally connect the two.  And I wouldn’t have it any other way!

At Christmas, we should be thinking most of all about why Jesus came.  The reasons for His coming directly relate to cancer, to suffering, to all that is most difficult about our lives.  I could refer to many passages of Scripture but the passage that means the most to me now, one day before surgery, is Hebrews 2:14-18.

He came to help me and all who share in flesh and blood.  And what a help it was!  Through His death He rendered Satan ineffective, for He conquered death.  If I die from surgery or from cancer, I go to be with Him.  He came to become a merciful and faithful high priest.  He satisfied the wrath of God for my sins, so I will enter the hospital room basking in the undeserved favor and grace of God.  He came so that He would experience all the temptations involved with suffering so that He could provide the best of help to me.  What great reminders Christmas brings!

During this season we will hear of the depression that occurs during holiday seasons.  Although actually it is a myth that more suicides occur around Christmas, still many feel stress, loneliness, and despair during the holidays.  How I wish they could understand the relationship between Christmas and cancer.  How I wish they could have the joy that underlies all the Christmas celebrations-the joy I have as I anticipate surgery during the Christmas season.

 As word of my cancer has spread, many people have come up to me and expressed their loving concern.  Several have told me that they are praying for me and asked me how I was doing and how I was feeling.  This has been especially true at Stonecroft Ministries where the staff takes very seriously the ministry of prayer.  I am extremely thankful for your concern and the tremendous missionary family I have the privilege of serving.

Physically, I am feeling better than I have felt in a long time because I have lost some weight.  My prostate cancer was not diagnosed because of the presence of symptoms.  Instead, my annual blood work indicated an increasing P.S.A. level that led to a biopsy.  Actually, it is very serious if you have symptoms with prostate cancer, as symptoms are an indication that it hasn’t been detected early enough.  Men, please have your annual blood work done!

As I write this, it is exactly one month until my surgery on Dec. 3.  I am doing well emotionally and spiritually now but it is conceivable that as surgery draws near I won’t be doing as well.  I can imagine that the closer the day is, the higher my anxiety will be.  Could it be that the day of the surgery, as I pull into a parking space at the hospital, my hands will freeze fast to the steering wheel?  Will they drag me kicking and screaming into surgery with me only becoming calm when they give me the “La-La” juice?

The possibility of my becoming a basket case brings me to another way that God is strengthening me.  God has strengthened me through the knowledge that no matter how weak I become God will not forsake me.  His staying with me through any trial has nothing to do with my strength but everything to do with His strength and the completeness of what He has done for me in Christ.  Are not the fantastic (virtually unbelievable, but completely believable because they are from God) promises of Romans 8:31-39 perfectly appropriate for minor trials such as mine as well as the severest trial?

I can be weak, fearful, full of anxiety about the surgery or its outcome without ever worrying that my weakness will separate me from God.  He has promised me it will not!

Of course, it would not be good public relations for the Executive Director of Village Missions to be screaming as he enters the hospital!  Neither is it good for a Village Missionary to scream in panic when encountering a trial!  Unfortunately, many of us maintain the appearance of strength on the outside while inwardly we are screaming.  After all, we have to maintain the image of the pastor or the director who is in control!  That is nothing but hypocrisy and such false spirituality does no one any good.  Yet total weakness in the face of adversity would undercut everything we have ever preached about the sufficiency of Christ!  It would certainly undercut everything I have written in this blog thus far about my cancer.

What is the answer?  In my weakness, knowing that God has not forsaken me, I must cling to God’s strength.  It is good to come to the end of our resources and it is even necessary to come to the end of our resources so that we turn to the strength of God.  We must turn to God in the midst of our anxiety and panic.

Paul identifies and illustrates what we must do in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10.  He came to God in his weakness caused by the “thorn in the flesh.”  God kept reminding Paul of the sufficiency of His grace.  He informed Paul of a spiritual growth process in which power was “perfected in weakness.”  I think the process was a weaning away in Paul his reliance on his own strength in favor of a developing reliance on God’s strength.  He came to the place where he even relished weakness because of the opportunity for the display of God’s power in him.

I have entered the school of weakness.  It has a curriculum that can be learned in no other way.  I am strengthened in this trial by knowing of an unending love that does its greatest work of grace in the times I am the weakest.  How am I doing?  I am actually doing better by having this opportunity for the display of God’s power than I was doing before I had cancer.

May we embrace every trial we encounter as part of the rich and thoughtful design of God to display His power in our life!