For Bill & Traci

(note: I wrote this last Thursday, 2/4, with final edit & finishing touches today)

So, here I sit @ 12:15 a.m., well past my bedtime, pondering the depths of God's providence.

Our dear friends Bill & Traci Massey got the call NOBODY wants to get today. Hodgkin's Lymphoma, a.k.a., Hodgkin's Disease, is Traci's diagnosis. They go to the Dr. tomorrow. (update: and to the oncologist later this week)

Cancer sucks.

Not a word I use very often...but I use it here because it fits. How else to describe this wonderful, godly, servant-minded, Christ-centered, go-the-extra-mile couple with three young daughters getting the phone call today that changed the entire trajectory of their lives??

But cancer is most assuredly NOT ultimate!!

But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair...So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.
2 Corinthians 4:7-8, 16-18

*That* my friends, is what is ultimate. Re-read this phrase slowly: an eternal weight of glory...

My friends Bill & Traci already had one of those secured. Yet in His providence, our Lord has seen fit to somehow magnify their weight of glory.

I praise You in this storm, & I will lift my hands, for You are Who You are no matter where I am...and every tear I cry, You hold in Your hands...You never left my side...and though my heart is torn, I will praise You in this storm...
Casting Crowns, "Praise You in This Storm"

(press >>>THIS<<<>every Thursday night via ipod while driving back from night class)

Now I guarantee you that where they are right now, & where they will likely be in the days & months to come will NOT seem like a "light momentary affliction." But in light of an eternal weight of glory, it will be.

As Margaret Becker once sang, "when glory, ever more glorious, stands revealed" that eternal weight of glory will be seen. And in its light...in His light...Hodgkin's Lymphoma will seem like a blip on the radar screen.

But not yet.

Right now, it is an all-consuming thing that would consume Bill & Traci's every thought and devour every moment of time they have.

So would you please join me in praying that the sovereign Lord of the universe, who has called us by name & we are His, would sustain and encourage and empower and equip them?

And would you please join me in praying that my friend Traci would be totally & completely healed of this dreadful disease?

And would you please join me in praying that God would magnify Himself and His name and His character through Bill & Traci's time in the valley of the shadow?

Thanks so very much!

With a heavy heart,
Mike

p.s. - a passage my oncologist shared with Lisa and me on our first visit to his office in December '05:
But now thus says the Lord,
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
“Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by name, you are mine.
When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
and the flame shall not consume you.
For I am the Lord your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.
Isaiah 43:1-3