Category Archives: Grieving

Real Fear

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When Mary, Tom, and I were children, Mom and 11 other ladies formed a women’s club that met monthly to sew/knit together, share lavish desserts, and become best of friends. These 12 women produced nearly 40 children between them, all of whom grew up thinking they were cousins. As this post-war generation became adults, many of us lost track of each other, though our mothers always seemed to know who went where and did what.

Interestingly, those strong childhood ties have found us reconnecting as we’re all “getting up in years.” Whether it’s gathering to honor one of us at a memorial service or “finding” each other via social media, we seem to pick up right where we left off, a satisfying tribute to youthful friendship.

???????????????????????????????Last week one of these long-term pals appeared in my email inbox in relation to my sister’s cancer. Albion Fellows Hargrave, generally known as Al, has always been Fellows to us. He turned out to be a successful pediatrician who I haven’t seen since we were both students at Wheaton College 50 years ago. (…when Fellows was a camp lifeguard, at right)

In his email, written from the viewpoint of a medical doctor, Fellows addressed possible fears Mary might be having as she faces surgery and chemotherapy, as well as an important principle about how God factors into all of this.

From his email:

Dear Margaret,

Do you remember when Betty Elliot spoke to us on Job in [Wheaton’s] Chapel in October, 1964? * The take-home message I remembered and that influenced a lot of my practice of medicine for 40 years was, “I am not responsible for God’s behavior.”

One of the things God says to Job is “I cannot answer your questions, but I will never desert you.”  The main reason is we do not have the capacity to understand his ways. A very distant approximation would be me explaining to a six month old all the important reasons why we were going to give her four immunization injections.

So many times a mother would tell her child and my patient, “Quit crying! He hasn’t done anything yet.” I would gently correct her and say I had done something very terrifying to the child. I had walked into the room. And then I would remind her that “Fear is one of the worst pains.” Rather tell your child that “Mother understands your fear and wishes she could take it away, but she can’t. However, I can promise you I will not leave you.” The mother did not understand the background, but that was an adaption of God’s promise to us out of Job, as explained by Betty Elliott.

I used it for 40 years [as a pediatrician] and it seemed to be effective. I am not responsible for God’s behavior, but he is, and that is more than enough.

Dr. HargraveBest regards,

Fellows

“My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine.” (Isaiah 55:8)

Mary’s prayer requests:

  1. Praise for continued prayer support
  2. Praise for peace that surpasses understanding
  3. To stay “healthy” before surgery
  4. For meaningful time with family, especially Bervin

*Elisabeth Elliot was a missionary married to Jim Elliot, who was massacred by the very people he was trying to reach for Christ. Betty was 30 years old at the time, with a 10 month old child.

True Humility

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HumilityGod espouses the character quality of humility. He looks for it in his children but no doubt finds it far less frequently than he’d like. That’s because in our world, me-first trumps humility, which makes God’s values the polar opposite of the world’s.

Humility is an attribute developed in secret, and though we can’t actually see it, we have a sense of when someone is humble. It doesn’t mean being shy, or favoring the back row, or being a doormat. Instead it’s having an unpretentious opinion of our own importance, the opposite of pride.

Humble people are hard to find, but I’m fortunate enough to know one personally: my sister Mary.

Mary has been debilitated emotionally and also physically in recent weeks with the discovery of cancer in her system. Alongside these negatives, however, has been the positive outpouring of well-wishers and in particular, promises of prayer. When she talks about it, her eyes mist and she says, “I just can’t get over it! It’s unbelievable how kind everyone’s been.”

Last week when she said this, shaking her head in disbelief, I said, “People are simply responding to the many things you’ve done for them over the years. They want to help you, because you’ve helped them so much.”

And here’s the humble part. Mary looked quizzically at me and said, “But how have I helped anyone? I haven’t done a thing.”

???????????????????????????????When she said that, the book title “One Thousand Gifts” came to mind, a written list of God’s gifts to the author. But if I wrote a book about Mary’s giving it would have to be titled “Ten Thousand Gifts.” Or maybe “A Hundred Thousand.” All of her life Mary’s been a giver. Quietly, behind the scenes, without keeping track, without expecting thanks. Humbly.

And that’s why she can’t think of anything she’s ever done for anyone else.

Even now, while facing significant surgery, time in an intensive care unit, and a recuperation that will be followed by chemotherapy, Mary’s thought is, how can I shine for Jesus through all this. She wants to know how she can impact nurses, doctors, tech people, anyone who crosses her path, with the love of Christ. And because God wants the same thing, he will see to the details.

None of this means Mary isn’t tempted to fear the unknown or give in to doubt. Just today she wrote in an email: “I’ve hidden Scripture verses in my heart, and by His grace, I’m reminded of them when I need them most. I just need to believe them… totally… and not doubt.”

It isn’t easy being at the center of a cancer drama, but Mary is living it humbly by God’s grace, which will always be, he says, sufficient to her need.

“God opposes the proud but favors the humble.So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come close to God, and God will come close to you.” (James 4:6-8)

Mary’s prayer requests:

  1. For God to increase her faith when she feels weak or fearful
  2. For his timely prompting of Bible verses she’s tucked away in her heart, whenever she’s discouraged
  3. For childlike belief in God’s promises without a trace of doubt

The Game of Life

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StoplightWhen we were children, one of the popular playground games was “Red Light Green Light.” A crowd of kids stood behind a starting line. Then one person (chosen to be the “stoplight”) stood a good distance from all the others to shout the color commands. With his back turned, he “directed traffic.”

If he yelled, “Green light!” the kids in the group could run toward him until he said “Red light!” Then they’d have to stop instantly, because he would turn around hoping to catch them moving. If he did, they’d have to return to the starting line. The object of the game was for one of the runners to tag the stoplight person before he could turn around.

Mary and Bervin, without wanting to, are playing medical “Red Light Green Light.” After a thorough work-up of Mary’s cancer case at Rush Hospital in Chicago, they traveled to Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, for a second opinion.

In the 2 weeks since Mary has been sick, the stop and go lights have been flashing with dizzying speed. One day they were running toward surgery and the next toward chemotherapy. Or they were being told, “We can operate and take it all out,” or, “We think there’s more cancer elsewhere in your body.” Green, red, green, red.

Mayo ClinicYesterday was a difficult red light day of meeting new doctors at a new hospital, taking new tests, and ending the day at new depths of exhaustion. Today the light turned green as blood tests looking for cancer elsewhere came back normal. Tomorrow a colonoscopy will reveal the health of Mary’s intestinal track. Whether it’ll be a red or green result, no one yet knows.

After playing this game for 2 weeks, they’ve been tempted to think they are the losers. Mary said tonight, “The minute we get a piece of bad news, our natural tendency is to give way to despair. But again and again we’ve watched God stop those thoughts (red light) and superimpose his scriptural promises over them (green light).”

She also said, “I’ve been reading in Hebrews that our suffering is meant to train us to be more like Christ. It’s not meant to torture us but to be a force toward spiritual gain.”

None of us are exempt from playing “Red Light Green Light.” But with God, it isn’t just a playground game. It’s a life-game that leads to the priceless win of holiness.

“God is educating you. This trouble you’re in isn’t punishment; it’s training, the normal experience of children…. We respect our own parents for training and not spoiling us, so why not embrace God’s training so we can truly live?” (Hebrews 12:9-11 The Message)

Mary’s prayer requests:

  1. Preparation for tomorrow’s meeting with the surgeon, for whatever they will hear
  2. For Mary and Bervin’s children as they each suffer in different ways over their mom’s illness
  3. That each will turn their eyes to Jesus first and to medical information after that