This journal entry skips in and out of topics, covering everything from his first glimpse of God to putting down roots in Rochester, Minnesota. Without the cancer, life would be exciting and good. But then there’s the cancer…

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August 29, 2022

When I feel good, I think about plans for the future here on earth, about our triplex, the paint and improvements I want to make with Annso, time with Will, about raising him here in Rochester, how much fun that will be.

But then I have searing pain in my neck for a straight month and doctors talk about spinal pain being linked to cancer. When I think it might actually be spreading, I think about verses where David says he will be pleased when he sees God’s likeness when he wakes.

I wonder what that would be like, to wake from this life and see the likeness of God for real. To go into the next life, of no choice of my own, just the way God let it go down for some reason and what that might be like. I try to embrace that as a possibility and make peace with it as an option.

Why God would want to cut my life short and bring a little person into our lives right at the end of mine is beyond me. I don’t see how that would be a good thing, and more, how hard that would be for Annso. And I pray against it and ask for more time.

Hezekiah asked for more time and he got it. Why not me? Why can’t I get another 25 years? Lord, you can do that. You can extend and give time to my life. You have done it before, and you can do it again.

You saved me from all those wrecks when I was younger, all that careless living. You brought me out in 1 piece. And here I sit at age 49, fighting cancer of all things. But it’s what’s happening.

We don’t want it, but no one asked us if we wanted it. One day a doctor told me “it looks like cancer,” and she couldn’t have been more right. It sure was. But Lord, you can heal me, you can make it go away or at least retard it so I get more time.

You are into bringing glory to your name, and this is the chance to do that in a unique way. Thank you for the chance to be the one to bring glory to you. Annso and I didn’t ask for this, but since you allowed it, we embrace it and want to fight our best and go through it the best way we can.

This Labor day we go to Michigan. We are bringing Ralph and Astrid, and I know they will love it. I’m stoked to be going, since we’ve tried to plan it a couple times and didn’t end up going because of my illness coming back and making it hard for me to travel.

It’s better to cancel than to be over there and dealing with the ER in one of those little towns. It could be the difference between life and death for me.

Today, I am meeting with a lawyer and the seller of our house here in Rochester, the flesh-colored triplex we’re in the process of buying. We don’t have it yet, but will try and bang out a purchase contract this morning.

Lord, we are settling down in Rochester for the long haul, if we have heard you right. Buying a house with a couple rental units in it, going to a church where we already know people, and even Ralph and Astrid have a place here, which is their own walk and significant for different reasons to them and their place in life.

Wisely, they are thinking about coming here permanently. I have told them I’d help get them green cards if they want, and they’re taking me up on it. So the process goes on, starting with Annso’s citizenship, which moves them to being sponsored by her and eventually getting their green cards.

That’s the way our lawyer told us to do this, so we are. This world is all about lawyers in a way. We have 2 of them so far—one for real estate and one for immigration. lol Who would have thought?

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“The eyes of the Lord watch over those who do right. His ears are open to their cries for help.” (Psalm 34:15)

Nelson expresses confidence in God’s willingness to hear his prayers, and he knows He has the ability to answer them. So he spends much of this post calling out to him about his cancer.

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August 29, 2022

5:15 am, waiting in the kitchen for Ralph’s arrival at 6:15 am, to take me to my MRI scan at Mayo. The neck pain has been getting worse, and they’re trying to find out if it’s cancer in the spine. If it is, they’ll treat it with radiation to relieve the pain. Otherwise, it’s something else.

To me, the “something else” would be better. Maybe the side effect to one of the drugs they’re giving me or just sore joints from something else like arthritis. We pray like crazy and hope for the best.

To the faithful you show yourself faithful, to the blameless you show yourself blameless, to the pure you show yourself pure, but to the devious you show yourself shrewd. You save the humble but bring low those whose eyes are haughty. You, Lord, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light. With your help I can advance against a troop; with my God I can scale a wall. (Psalm 18:25-29)

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We see God how we are. The faithful see him faithful. Pure see him pure, shrewd (having or showing sharp powers of judgment) to the devious (showing a skillful use of underhanded tactics to achieve goals).

Lord, I pray for good news from this scan and that you would deliver me from the enemies who want me dead, who brought this cancer to put me in the grave. I can relate with David and pray like he did:

I called to the Lord, who is worthy of praise, and I have been saved from my enemies. The cords of death entangled me; the torrents of destruction overwhelmed me. The cords of the grave coiled around me; the snares of death confronted me. In my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice; my cry came before him, into his ears. (Psalm 18:3-6)

I call to you, Lord, and you hear me. Many others call to you and you hear them, too. Bill, Mom, Linni, and Bob call to you and you hear these righteous people calling to you for me. They cry to you for my salvation. They call so I might be saved from death.

I pray for Annso too, that you would continue to give her strength to keep going with this. She is like no one I’ve ever met who helps me day and night. She is like an angel tending to my every need. I can hardly believe how good you are to me through her.

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”Call out to Me and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things…” (Jeremiah 33:3)

In this journal entry it seems like Nelson is taking a minute to reflect on all that’s happened in the 4 months leading up to this day in August. He’s encouraged to have witnessed God’s steady presence with them in ways that could only be his.

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August 27, 2022

The weather is starting to cool down here in the north, even though it’s still August. We like living in Minnesota compared with Hawaii after all the eternal Summer we had there for the past 6 years. It’s a change of season, and we sure didn’t see it coming.

From one day to the next, it just changed on a dime. We were out of there. Now we have nothing in Kona and a whole new life over here. We have a new church we’ll go to tomorrow, and it seems like it’s God directing us to this nice group of little families to do life with for this season, however long it is.

Following God is exciting in that way, not knowing but trusting him, that he knows what we don’t. He prepares the way for us and gives us what we need to handle it.

He has been with us this whole time, going to the hospital and visiting all these specialists and doctors trying to figure out what I have and how to treat it.

We are learning and growing just by trusting him and doing “the next right thing,” as they used to tell us in AA. Just for today. That’s all you have and all you can do. Thank you, Lord, for walking ahead of us and leading us through the valley of the shadow of death here. And what a death valley it has been, for sure.

From one day to the next, everything changed, and you came to our rescue, even though we didn’t ask for this and would never have wanted it. You stood with us through it all.

Thank you for the people who have prayed, the money you have sent, the doctors who have worked on me, and the apartment we have to live in during this time. Thank you for Ralph and Astrid and their help, for Mom and her help at the beginning. Thank you for the insurance, as we have many times. It’s been one of the biggest miracles here yet–nothing we could have done for ourselves.

Thank you that the symptoms have lessened, and that health has slowly been returning to me.

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“O Lord for what do I wait? My hope is in you.” (Psalm 39:4)