daily java: gripe

Daily Java: 

My heart is in anguish within me;
    the terrors of death have fallen on me.
Fear and trembling have beset me;
    horror has overwhelmed me.
I said, “Oh, that I had the wings of a dove!
    I would fly away and be at rest.
I would flee far away
    and stay in the desert;
I would hurry to my place of shelter,
    far from the tempest and storm.” (Psalm 55:5-8)

This post is a gripe and has no answer. Yet I feel I have to write something. And this blog is my release.

Yesterday marks the fifth or sixth time to fall. I am now in the situation that my right arm is seriously hurt and I find I have a broken collarbone. I have hit my head three times seriously, twice on the back and once of the front (yesterday). I have fallen in public three times making it rather humiliating. and I am at the point that I can barely move. I am faced with Easter services as the only musician in our church and the peripheral neuropathy in my hands is so bad I do not know if I am going to be able to play. My church is scared for me and have gotten to harping on me to carry around a walker and all kinds of other stuff.

I am in constant pain from all this and the side-effects of the chemo. I fear they will get tired of all this and begin to move away from me. I am totally discouraged. I am in a good work that I could do something with but can do nothing. I have approached this whole thing with as positive an attitude as I can but am coming to a point of being tired and wanting nothing but to sleep.

Today I would welcome death. I know where I am going and there is no pain. But of course Ella needs me. However, today, she almost fell at her doctor's office and I could do nothing but watch while everybody else helped her. i walk slowly and carefully and have found myself, for the first time in my life, afraid. I am afraid of falling. At my height, it is a long way to the ground and I just do not know how to fall. So I walk carefully and slowly and Ella says I have added 15 years to my apparent age just looking at me walking.

God does not send bad things, but he does allow them. And is the strong man watching the bully beat up a smaller man without interfering any different that the bully himself? I know You and I have discussed this in the past, but it is a very real thing in my life right now. There is no week that goes by without at least four or five things bad happening to me. And these are not small things. I have hit both shoulders numerous times with painful results. I have hit my head causing painful contusions three times. I have damaged my right knee and my right hip pretty badly.

Add to this the cancer and the drastic weight loss and inability to eat and the chemo-therapy, the peripheral neuropathy - all the other junk.

I don't know, but I feel I am at the end. I know that God is not always fair. But he is supposed to be always good. I saw good things coming from this when I came and was full of buoyant hope in the knowledge that I was supposed to do something great here so the devil was going to do his best to stop me. But now? I cannot stop, but I feel I have trouble going on. My life is a shambles.

I know there is no answer. But something has to give. It hurts my fingers even to type this letter.

I will have to admit, if it were not for the relationship I have with my wife, I do not know what I would do. However, even tat is showing strain. She is afraid and was from the beginning. She doesn't know what to do and many of her encouragements turn out to be the wrong direction or the like. She does what she can yet she is so limited too. So we are stuck. Every trip to the VA is 100 miles round trip. I just hope my resources hold up. and that Ella and I hold up.

daily java: back from the dead

Daily Java:

Soon afterward, Jesus went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went along with him. As he approached the town gate, a dead person was being carried out — the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a large crowd from the town was with her. When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, “Don’t cry.” Then he went up and touched the bier they were carrying him on, and the bearers stood still. He said, “Young man, I say to you, get up!” The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother. They were all filled with awe and praised God. “A great prophet has appeared among us,” they said. “God has come to help his people.” This news about Jesus spread throughout Judea and the surrounding country. (Luke 7:11-35)

The young man seemed like he could never make it over into death. There had been the funeral and all of the accompanying things that went with the funeral, yet he could never make it over.

Then he heard a voice coming from all over and nowhere at the same time: Young man, I say to you, get up! And – BAM! – his eyes were open and he was looking around. There was this man that everybody seemed to be looking at, along with him, of course. The townspeople were kind of looking at both of them in a mixture of shock, horror, amazement – there were several things, several looks they had in their eyes.

He realized that he was on a moving platform that some people were carrying, like he was sick or – or dead or something.

Wait. He was dead. He remembered dying. He fell off the scaffolding and hit his head on the rocks and died.

No, how could he have died? He was sitting up, wasn’t he? But his mother was looking at him with a look he had never seen the like of: shock, amazement, some – no, a lot of relief. He had died, hadn’t he?

He started talking and it soon became clear that it was going to be hard for him to stop talking. “Where am I? What am I doing here? Why am I on this big bench thing? Who are you? Tell me something, somebody.”

But it was almost as if it was too much to even hardly look at him, much less talk to him. The people around him – were all in black, so it must be a funeral. “Tell me something,” he screamed. “What is happening?”

The man looked at him and said, “It’s okay. Here is your mother.” And he handed the young man over to his mother. His mother grabbed him and hugged harder than he had felt her hug him ever. “Oh, Ezra, oh, Ezra” she said over and over again.

Then, to top it all off, everybody started hollering. They were praising God and in general making a lot of noise. This was not the funeral noise he had usually heard growing up. This was different. This was praise from a group of people who obviously had seen a miracle.

And the miracle was – him. Him. He had been dead and now he wasn’t anymore.

This man (and he found out real quick) was named Jesus. He had heard of him. He went around doing amazing things. Well, for sure, this was an amazing thing. If he raised him from the dead, that was an amazing thing, and that is the truth.

But you know, everybody had another feature obvious on their faces. Fear. Just plain fear. They had seen someone reach over and pull someone else over the edge of death back into life.

And you have to admit that doing something like that is scary. It isn’t something you can look at and just pass off as interesting or entertaining. It mean that this man, this Jesus, had power over life and death.

He wanted to know more. He could take care of his mother and still find out about Jesus. He figured one of the reasons Jesus brought him back from the dead was to take care of his widowed mother. And he would. But he also wanted to find out more about this seemingly ordinary-looking fountain of life.

When Jesus left town, Ezra was with him, as was his mother, Miriam. That young man wanted to know something good. And he would find out if he could.

daily java: falling down

Daily Java:

If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble. (Ecclesiastes 4:10)

I fell again today. It seems that I am going along fine then boom! I fall.

This time I almost took out the little bookcase where we store our natural grain cereals and such, along with sugar and flour. I didn’t break it, but did a good job anyway.

I felt myself going and went over kind of sideways backwards and landed with my head on two plastic storage containers, both of which I broke.

It didn’t hurt me, but it certainly hurts my pride. It is one of those things that makes you feel stupid. And as tall as I am, my fall is slow and majestic and I hit hard. Again, it was fortunate that I hit the strorage containers because they gave easily under the imacvt of my head.

Pain is limited to my left lower back. I wrenched my back, so I just am probably going to have trouble moving tomorrow morning.

The worst part is the weakness I have right now. I guess it is the rapid weight loss combined with the inabililty to get any real nourishment from food (I have trouble eating), but whatever it is, I could not get my arms and legs under me. It was almost impossible to get up. I finally butt-walked over to the bed that is on carpet and with Ella’s help, got everything together and got up.

All told, it was probably five minutes before I could get up off the floor.

And I hated every minute of it. I hated the fact that Ella saw me in such a tremendous state of weakness, I hate the fact that I am that weak. I have always been the strong one. But not now.

I have thought about it all evening. If it happened when I was by myselff, I am not sure what I would do. I certainly am not going to call someone to pick me up. I am not that big anymore, but still. And to say that I have my pride sounds shallow, but it is true, I guess.

However, now that the pride is going, I am going to have to replace it with something else, something that will get me off the floor.

daily java: each of us has a demon

Daily Java:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith. Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne. Think of all the hostility he endured from sinful people; then you won’t become weary and give up. (Hebrews 12:1-3)

Each of us has a demon of some kind. It may be a small, nagging one that constantly hits on us. It may be massive and major and is visible to all who see us, even in the middle of the day.

But whatever it is, each of us has one. The writer of Hebrews calls it a sin that so easily trips us up. He may have been talking about sin in general and how it is always so ready to get us. Or  and I think this is it – he may have been talking about some particular sin that is always ready to rear its ugly head.

It may be pornography, something no one but you would know. Computers have made that sin so prevalent that it is in danger of destroying our young men.

It may be pride, getting carried away with praise and adulation. This is common among preachers if they are good at what they do. Any time someone compliments them in any way, no matter how small, BOOM!, there sits the demon ready to chew on you.

It may be greed, it may be power, it may be overeating, it may be drugs or alcohol – any of these things.

But whatever it is, if left unchecked, it may very well send you to hell, overwhelming your positive God-given power and chewing the insides out of you until you become nothing more than a external shadow of what you used to be.

And it will kill you. We have to recognize it, we have to see it and know what it is. Someone once said that recognizing your problem is half the battle. That can be true, although it isn’t all the time. But one thing for sure, you have to know your demon.

I know mine and I hate them because they stand between God and me, between the spirituality and holiness I want to achieve and what I am left with.

However, there is one difference between what we know and what is real. The difference is that the power of God will help you, even when you are too weak to do much yourself. You are caught up in that sin, you hate it and find yourself engaging in it more and more. But you have that power, that grace of God, that strength that is only available from the Lord Almighty himself.

He will help you deal with it and he will help you overcome it, if you want. It may require major surgery to get it done. Jesus himself said that sometimes dealing with this is like plucking out an eye or lopping off a hand.

But sometimes it has to be done. He will give you that strength and he will overcome. The apostle Paul said:

No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. (Romans 8:37-38).

He said that Jesus was greater than any of these things. There is no demon that is able to destroy us as long as we have our eyes on Jesus, our hands fixed firmly on him, our hearts centered on his, our affections set on things above. We will overcome.

The next time the demon comes up, and it will probably be tomorrow or even tonight (they are tireless little creeps), remember that Jesus will carry you through. He overcomes and he saves.

And he delivers us from the powers of sin if we but let him.

daily java

Daily Java:

Some Greeks who had come to Jerusalem for the Passover celebration paid a visit to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee. They said, “Sir, we want to meet Jesus.” Philip told Andrew about it, and they went together to ask Jesus. (John 12:20-22)

Next week is Palm Sunday, the Sunday Jesus makes his Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem. People just do not know what to do with him. He is phenomenally popular, so the religious leaders can’t figure him out. The others, the regular people, want to see him and meet with him and to talk with him. His popularity is growing.

But there is a problem. He is a volatile figure. Those who consider themselves to be in charge are always having confrontations with him. And those confrontations are getting worse the more popular he gets.

Jesus calls them dishonest, unethical, murderers – since they stand in the line of the people who killed all the prophets who came before him. He is out of control in their eyes and they have to do something. They just do not know what.

Even people who are not supposed to care about what the Jews are doing are coming to talk with him. Everybody (but them) likes him and his firebrand style of preaching and theology. He brings a fresh new way of looking at things and it scares them.

They have to do something. But what? They cannot quite outright kill him. The crowds love him and that would turn them away from them. And they have no real charges against him. So what do they do?

They bide their time. They wait. Waiting is the best thing anyone can do anyway.

And it works. In their minds, Jesus goes just a bit too far. In Mark 14, Jesus said that they could destroy this temple and he would raise it up in three days. Even though he was talking about his body and that he would rise again, they took it another way, and they had what they wanted.

They set the stage for his arrest (quietly with Judas) and for his subsequent trial and execution. In just a week, he comes into Jerusalem in a publicly popular procession and then adds to their anger by clearing out the temple of all the money changers.

Of course, the waiting worked two ways. They got what they wanted, but it turned out to be exactly what God wanted too. It was time for Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. That was the part they didn’t mean, but it was perfect.

Next week, Palm Sunday, and the plan of God begins to be revealed.

daily java

Daily Java:

The Lord helps the fallen and lifts those bent beneath their loads. (Psalm 145:14)

Today was a bummer of a day. I fell a total of three times. Each time I fell, I hurt myself further. One of the falls, I came to on the floor and didn’t remember being there and I think I hurt my ribs, maybe even breaking one.

Each of the falls was strange. It was as if I had no legs or coordination. The third fall I broke open the scab at the back of my head where I fell at Target in Wichita last Friday.

And I hurt from them.

The day started off badly, too. I slept entirely too late, and after I got up, I slept in my chair until around four o’clock. I could not wake up. Then the falling began. I alternated between the falling and the sleeping the rest of the day.

I don’t know what caused it. I hope that it wasn’t the extra oxycodone I took last night and this morning. Ella thinks it was the added Morphine the doctor gave me the other day. I plan to cut down the morning Morphine and just take the smaller ones he gave me before.

Whatever the case is, I am tired of this. I have never really fallen before in my life and I do not like it. I am tall enough that falling takes me a long ways down and I always hurt myself.

Tomorrow I have to take Ella to the dentist and I cannot imagine driving. I hope I am better then.

Lord, take this plague of falling away from me. It hurts too much. I praise you. Amen

daily java - beginner faith

Then Peter called to him, “Lord, if it’s really you, tell me to come to you, walking on the water.” Yes, come,” Jesus said. (Matthew 14:27-28)

It had been years now since that night he walked on water. And now he sat in prison wondering if he were about to die.

He had such a beginner faith then. It was amazing how the Lord built that faith almost from the ground up. He was irritated that Andrew was gone when he needed him on the boat when Andrew first met Jesus. But then he met Jesus and Jesus astonished him, he overwhelmed him. He had never met anyone like him before and never had since.

It was almost as if Jesus were a faith fountain, just pumping it into Peter to get Peter to the point where he would step out of his boat in a storm – something no sailor in his right mind would ever do. His boat was his protection. To step out of it and – here was the weird thing, to expect to walk on top of the water – was madness.

But he did. And he walked. At least for a while.

But one thing for sure: He was the only one of the twelve who did. He was it, the lone faith walker. The rest were trying their best to get him to come back into the boat. They were logical. They were normal. He was not.

What he was filled with was the faith of God, faith enough to walk on the water. Even if only for a few moments, he could do it. And he did. As long as he kept his eyes on Jesus, he could do it.

He dreamed about that at night now. Many more miraculous things he had seen since, and even done but it was that night that was the beginning of his real journey in faith and trusting Jesus.

Yes, it was short, but it was real. And he did it.

He knew that every step in the faith journey to God begins with the first one, the fist step. The throwing his net down where Jesus said fish would be was part resignation, part kind of a “what else am I going to do?” thing. The other things he did because it seemed the right thing to do at the time.

But stepping out of the boat. That was faith, real Faith with a capital F. When he did that, he
threw his life open to Jesus and gave him control.

He only lost that control once, when he denied Jesus. And oh the tears he has shed over that in his lifetime. He could do nothing about that. But he could do something about the walking and he did the right thing. He stepped out of the boat and he walked on the water.

And he remembered that act of faith almost every day of his long life since.

Now he had this last test of faith. Would he go willingly to his death? Or would he deny again the love he had for Jesus?

He knew what he had to do. It was a lot more fun and satisfying and just plain God-pleasing to walk on the water. He would keep his eyes on Jesus and do it again.

daily java

Daily Java:

I wish he would crush me.
    I wish he would reach out his hand and kill me.
At least I can take comfort in this:
    Despite the pain,
    I have not denied the words of the Holy One.
But I don’t have the strength to endure.
    I have nothing to live for. (Job 6:9-11)

Part of the purpose for this blog is to air my thoughts. And consequently, some of my thoughts are complaints. Since not a whole lot of people read this journal, it won’t matter a lot if I put them on here.

I am tired of being tired. Several things have characterized this journey through cancer.

One is the lack of eating. I want to eat but cannot seem to be able to do anything about it. My body is turning away the food it needs to live. I am hoping some of the medication the doctor gave me today will help this and I can begin to gain some good weight.

Another is peripheral neuropathy, the constant tingling and pain in the outer extremities. Today it is particularly bad because it has moved into my left fingertips, my guitar hand. I am afraid that I am not going to play the guitar Sunday morning. I even played the guitar when I had surgery for carpal tunnel syndrome on my right hand. I kind of propped the pick in the cast and played. But I cannot do it with pain in my fingertips.

A third thing is dizziness and falling. I have even started using a cane. I fell for the fourth time today. I fell less than a month ago in the tub and almost couldn’t get out until Ella came and helped me haul myself out. I fell again last week at the chemo room in Mercy hospital where Ella was getting her Rituxun injection. In that one I hurt my shoulder really badly and skinned myself up.

The third fall was at church when I fell in the foyer, hurting the other side and the other shoulder, although not as badly. The fourth was today in the Target parking lot in Wichita. This one had a very bad hit on the back of my head. Why I was not hurt more I do not know, but one odd thing was that it kind of freed up my shoulder injury from last week. Strange.

A fourth thing is that I have lost my voice. What once was a magnificent voice is not a hoarse tenor that can barely sing.

And then there is the overwhelming tiredness and inability to do much.

I will just have to live with these. I do not like them but there they are. However, I will not deny my God and I will not turn from him. He is my God and I will ever serve him. Praise be to his Name.

Lord, I ask that you take these away and make my cancer go away. Make it so that I am an effective minister here. But above all, keep me close to you and to your grace. I praise you. Amen.

daily java - being able to eat

Daily Java:

Whatever they did in their lifetime—loving, hating, envying—is all long gone. They no longer play a part in anything here on earth. So go ahead. Eat your food with joy, and drink your wine with a happy heart, for God approves of this! Wear fine clothes, with a splash of cologne! (Ecclesiastes 9:6-8)

I am really having trouble. I cannot seem to be able to eat. It is not that I do not want to. I love eating and love to eat. And people are banging on me to do so. But for reason my eating mechanism has been short-circuited somewhere.

It comes from the cancer. I lost so much weight so rapidly that I guess I got used to not eating. That was during the time that I had trouble swallowing. But the doctor helped that somewhat by the installation of the stent in my esophagus so food and liquid would go through.

But it seems not to be enough. There is a gag mechanism that has come in that keeps me from eating certain foods. And the list seems to be getting longer every day. Whenever I eat something that fits whatever criteria my body sets up, I begin to try to thrown up. I can usually keep it from happening, but it is decidedly uncomfortable. And it changes sometimes from day to day.

Ella and I tried to figure out what it was that my body would want to reject and we cannot pin it down. Just about the time we think we have it figured out, something changes or moves into the list without our knowing.

For instance, today we tried to pinpoint the things I had the most trouble on and it seemed to be starchy things. I did fine on meats and stuff, but bread, potatoes, other things that were bulky food seemed to be out.

Then tonight I had some roast and cheese. That fit the criteria well, but it didn’t. On the third piece, I was through.

I hate it. People at church are ragging on me to eat and talking about how I should eat little meals and stuff like that. Basically all things I am doing. They think they are doing me a favor but all they are doing is irritating me. I am doing all those things. What else can I do? Nothing.

I am hungry and I want to eat. What am I going to do. I fear becoming anorexic. Those people lose the ability to eat after a while and cannot do so. They starve to death. I do not want to starve to death. All I want to do is eat your food with joy and be happy. The main way we socialize is by my cooking dinner for people. But who wants to come eat dinner with this guy who has two bites and then makes throwing up motions and has to leave the table for a minute, then comes back and pushes his plate back,

Who? No one, that’s who.

I am tired of it.

Father God, give me the ability to eat. Give me the ability to sit with a group of people and cook dinner and sit and eat with them and be happy. Please, Lord. Please. Amen.

daily java - falling down

Daily Java:

If you think you are standing strong, be careful not to fall. (1 Corinthians 10:13).

I fell this past week. It wasn’t just a minor fall: a bang! Ouch! I’m sorry, let me give it a kiss kind of fall. It was a mega fall, a majestic fall

And anybody that is tall will tell you that falling is one of the worst things you can do. When are tall and you fall (Huh! Rhymes) you go down a long ways. Two people fall and one is shirt, that is not to say that he won’t fall. He or she doesn’t just do it easily.

I was walking through the chemo room at Mercy Hospital in Independence, KS, Friday. Ella gets her ITP treatments there because it is. There are recliners to sit in for the patients, pictures on the wall, etc. I had on  pair of Crocs, which have just about become my favorite shoes, their problem, though, is that they grab the floor, causing me to stumble.

Usually, it is not so bad. I just look back at the floor to see if there is something that needs to be picked up. Everybody does that, like it is the floor’s fault,

But this time was different. With all this cancer and the heart attack and all. It is difficult to keep my balance. I have never before outright fallen, but I have come close.

This time, I fell. I hurt my ankle, my right knee, landed on the tip of my shoulder and whacked me on the back of my right shoulder, wrenching my left shoulder and finally, whacking myself on the back of the head. It both hurt me physically hurt and embarrassed. It made feel like a fool at a time in life when I need to feel capable.

And of course, there were 75,000 people standing around in the infusion room at the t1me . None of this quietly messing up. Everybody was there and they all watched me fall. And today, I feel horrible.

But it does go to show you: everybody falls. 63 year old men, year old toddlers, young children, teen aged jocks. Some do it for fun, some for a living, some because they are big and clumsy. I do it because my balance is not that great. But I also hate it.

In 1 John 1:7-9, the apostle Paul wrote about walking in the light:

If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth.

He said that as long as we are in Jesus and trying our best, we have a place in the grace of God. The immature Christian who can barely do anything right and the mature Christian who seems to have the godly life down pat are both in his grace and both have his righteousness

Nobody is perfect. Nobody lives a sinless life. Nobody. In others words, nobody does everything right. We all fall, we all sin,  Some do it big, in front of missions of people., some do it little and you barely noticed.

But they did. And they had done it before and would do it again. Remember that next time you do something stupid. It doesn’t excuse your mistake, but it sure tends to make you feel better.

daily java

Daily Java:

On the way, Jesus told them, “Tonight all of you will desert me. For the Scriptures say,
   ‘God will strike the Shepherd,
        and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.’
But after I have been raised from the dead, I will go ahead of you to Galilee and meet you there.” Peter declared, “Even if everyone else deserts you, I will never desert you.” Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, Peter—this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny three times that you even know me.” “No!” Peter insisted. “Even if I have to die with you, I will never deny you!” And all the other disciples vowed the same. (Matthew 26:32-35)

Peter was telling the truth. He was ready to die for Jesus. And would do so at that very moment or later or whenever Jesus asked him to.

The problem was, Jesus didn’t ask him to die for him. He asked him to live for him. There is a pile of difference between the two. Dying for Jesus requires a moment’s massive sacrifice, a one-time thing. Living requires a long-term commitment. And that is hard.

It also hurt Peter that Jesus would question his manhood, his commitment, his courage, his very loyalty by saying that he would run away. And Jesus knew this. It surely didn’t take divine knowledge to know it. Peter loved Jesus and would do anything he asked. He viewed himself as strong and courageous, firm to the end, he and Jesus standing side by side fighting for the Kingdom of God.

But these moments, or the ones coming soon, were why Jesus had come in the first place. He had come to sacrifice himself, to die, to be nailed to that cross. And he knew why Peter was so upset.

He didn’t even try to convince Peter any further. He knew that it would do no good and would just precipitate an argument. He just turned and led his disciples to the Mount of Olives for the final earthly act of his life. Peter would find out soon enough, and it would shake him to his very core. It would destroy all the bravado, all the self-image the strong man had built up through the years. He would find out that when it came down to it, he would run. And it was not because he was so stupid, or goofy, or yellow. He ran because he didn’t know what else to do. He was baffled.

The fight came just like he thought. He drew his sword and lopped off the ear of one of the attackers. Jesus looked at him and said, “Stop it. Those who live by the sword shall die by the sword.” Then he picked up the ear and put it back on the man.

It took all the wind out of Peter’s sails. He stood, stupefied, and looked around. Then he dropped his sword and ran, just like everyone else. Chances are they all were ready to fight. But Jesus didn’t want them to die. He wanted them to live to bring his gospel to the world.

Peter was the one who gave the first recorded gospel sermon in Acts 2. Peter was the one who opened the door for non-Jews to come into the Kingdom when he went and saw Cornelius in Acts 10. Peter was the one who had such a prominent position in the early church. He did not need to die, and Jesus knew it. He needed to live.

When it came time to die, he did it boldly and without visible fear. We don’t know how he died, but church tradition says that he was crucified upside down in Rome. Maybe, maybe not. The Bible does not speak to it.

But I would imagine he always felt he was living on borrowed time all the rest of his life. He should have died on that hill with Jesus. Instead, it was several decades later before he finally did.

We do not know what we will do until it happens. We may be brave, we may not. The only way we know is when we wake up on the other side of eternity and then it will be a little hard to brag about.

We try our best to do what God wants and we live our lives in as much courage as we can. And we let God take care of the rest. That is all we can do and that is what we trust him to do.

Peter was a great man, no one better, and Jesus knew it. All he needed was a taste of his own mortality. When he got that, he was much the better as an apostle and as an emissary to God.

The same goes for us. Trust and do what you can and let God take care of the end.

daily java

Daily Java:

I have been reduced to skin and bones and have escaped death by the skin of my teeth. (Job 19:20)

I have lost almost 110 pounds in the past four months, and my wife is scared.

It has been from the cancer and related issues, but at the same time, I am having trouble eating. And the more trouble I have eating, the worse the problem seems to get.

Ella says that she sees me dying before my eyes and is frightened.

I understand her problem. But, of course, she does what she has always done when faced with a situation like this: she begins to hector me, to almost nag at me. It is a voice and tone of voice that I dislike intensely. She knows that I do, bu tin situations like this, she almost becomes helpless in the face of how she feels.

She also knowns that it does absolutely no good, yet she cannot seem to leave that approach behind. She really does not know what to do.

She is scared for me, because she says she sees me, her husband, her lover, her friend, her caretaker – dying before her eyes.

And it is true to an extent. I cannot afford to lose much more weight before it begins to harm me. I even wonder if the heart attack last Tuesday was brought on by the stress of all that weight loss. I have read that anorexia brings on heart problems because of the stress, and I am beginning to approach anorexia territory.

It is a bad thing and I do not know what to do. I need to eat and I want to eat. On one hand. On the other, I am absolutely not hungry and have no desire to eat.

I mean, I look at the food, even sometimes lust after it, but after a bite or two, I am absolutely without any desire to eat.

I always admired those people who could do that. You know, just eat a little and then stop. I always wanted to just have a small amount of food and then push their plates away. I always admired that and wished I was like that, too.

It is a real conundrum. I know that the only answer is that I have to start eating or I will die of starvation. But I do not want to eat. And on top of it all, the Ensure drinks that I have had recommended to me by the medical people I talk to are all sweet. They taste either vanilla or chocolate variations and I really do not like them. I get really tired of sweet things and especially here lately. I suppose the lack of eating intensifies stuff and anytime I drink or eat a sewet thing it is like a sugar bomb. I do not like it.

I did discover beef broth today and it was good. But it is mostly meat and salt so I am not sure what its value really is. I do take vitamins in a fairly high quantity so I am not really concerned about that.

But I am concerned, for the first time in my entire life, over getting enough to eat. I am starving to death in a house with enough food to feed several hundred people. And it is all stuff I like: cheese, meat, sauces, lost of bacon. I could eat (and I did six months ago) like a king. But I starve like a pauper.

And I am tired of it. After looking at the pictures at the WinterFest 2013 last Saturday night, I look like a refugee from a middle eastern POW camp, gaunt, thin, haggard. And, of course, my brilliant idea of cutting my hair into a burr was not a ogod one.

I am going to ask the nurses Wednesday about this when I go for my weekly chemo check-up.  I may even ask the pharmacist tomorrow when I go to WalMart. They will probably mention the Ensure and the like and I already know that.

I have to get to the root of the problem.

I suppose that no eating shares a common root with eating too much, but it is the weird side of the equation. I have never had this problem.

I have to figure out how to begin to eat again, how to gain my appetite back, how to gain some weight. It is a very real problem and I have to get a handle on it.

It is not so easy to just sit down and say, “Now, self, we need to eat. So eat this and this and this.”

No. Start that gag reflex (and I never know what’s going to key it off) and I am through immediately. No further desire to eat and I will throw up on the table if I do.

Father God, bless me somehow with the ability to eat. Help me find an appetite. Ella and I are scared and need to find an answer so that I will not die. For myself, I do not mind. I am ready to go be with you and am quite tired. But Ella needs me. Help me, please, Lord. Give me the appetite to gain some of my weight back. Give me your presence and your power and touch me with healing. Help me eat. In Jesus name, the Bread of Life, amen.

daily java

Daily Java:

But Jesus spoke to them at once. “Don’t be afraid,” he said. “Take courage! I am here!” Then he climbed into the boat, and the wind stopped. They were totally amazed, for they still didn’t understand the significance of the miracle of the loaves. Their hearts were too hard to take it in. (Mark 6:50-52)

It was rough being an apostle. Of course, you had the great points of daily contact with the Master, getting to talk to him and ask him questions one on one, something most of his disciples didn’t have. You got to be there and participate in the miracles he performed. It was a great job on one hand.

On the other hand, it was a hard job. They were constantly having to stretch themselves into what Jesus wanted them to be. and they were conflicted.

They saw him feed 5000 men with just a handful of food, yet they were afraid they would have to do without. They had watched him heal people, yet they were afraid they would be hurt.

And it wasn’t meanness or stupidity on their parts. Mark said that their hearts were too hard to take it in. That didn’t mean that they didn’t want to believe. It meant they just had not been around long enough with this radical preacher and his radical message to truly be able to assimilate it. Their hearts were not flexible enough would be a better translation.

In this passage, they are in a storm on the Sea of Galilee. They feel like they are about to die. Jesus will be without his apostles, their families will be without the husbands and fathers, they will die. What will they do? Help!!

But Jesus came along walking on the water and stopped the storm. Sounds simple when put like that, but it is what happened. The apostles were amazed, and it says they still didn’t understand the significance of the miracle of the loaves. It had been too short a time. They could not understand yet that Jesus said he would take care of them and provide whatever they needed, even shelter from a storm. He had a job for them and was not anywhere near ready to let them go it alone.

It was just too hard for them to take all this phenomena in. Their hearts were not flexible enough to wrap around this. It was just too great for them to understand.

So they flapped along day by day, baffled much of the time, worried that Jesus might be mad at them for not understanding, trying their level best to do so. And really, for the most part, succeeding.

But it didn’t really dawn on them. They could not yet grasp all of these lessons gleaned over three and a half years or so. It took the presence of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost to sort it out for them.

Imagine if you were in this same situation. We look at them through the prism of 2000 years of theological study and meditation. They saw it for the first time. What if your failures like this were written up in the Bible for billions of people to read about for thousands of years? It is like that in other areas too.

I remember talking to people who saw their first car when they were teenagers. I also talked to people who marveled at electricity. Most of us can remember when computers came out and they were scary little dudes to most people. They still are and I am pretty good at them, but I do not understand them.

They accepted these things, but just could not understand them.

But they tried. And there was the key. Only one – Judas – didn’t make it through. Which goes to show you that you can sit at the feet of Jesus for three and a half years and still be lost. It never penetrated from acceptance to belief in Judas’ mind and heart. He had his mind other places.

Sooner or later, they understood and then began to take these personal experiences and were able to build others’ faith, too.

But, as I said, it took the Holy Spirit to do it. They could not do it themselves. And neither can you. There is no real understanding of the word of God, written, spoken, indwelling or anything else, without the Holy Spirit to guide you and make your heart soft enough to wrap around his miracles and his power.

That is the only way you will ever learn.

daily java

Daily Java:

Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. (1 John 4:18)

I am back! I almost died Tuesday. If I didn’t, then I was awfully close.

We were going for one of our interminable doctor’s visits to Wichita. Not far from home, my chest began to hurt badly. I figured that since I was going to the VA anyway, I would just go ahead and drive there. It was only two hours and if I could keep going, I would be fine.

It got worse, so I stopped in a convenience store in Howard, our county seat, 25 miles from home. I had already popped three nitroglycerines, so I bought 2 aspirins and crunched them. The other day this worked to stave off the pain.

It still got worse. By now Ella was worried and I decided to go into Howard and find the EMT’s and let them take me.

The VA turned me down, even though I have VA access. It seemed they do not have a heart specialist, so they sent me to St Francis, another hospital in Wichita (and probably a better one).

They had done a few things to calm the situation down and I was probably out of immediate danger so that they could operate on Wednesday afternoon.

As it turned out, I had a 90% block and a 70% block in my heart. They installed a stent through a heart cath in the femoral artery into the 90% artery. The operation was a success, except for the fact that all during the surgery it felt like an elephant was sitting on my chest. And I remember hollering. I usually do not holler, but I suppose the drugs weakened my holler resistance.

After sixteen horrible hours where I had to lie on my back (I am not a back lier (lyer? liar? –I was not lying, although I was lying – interesting) so it went long and slow.  I finally got to get up and came home Thursday.

It made it worse by the fact that Wichita got the most snow it had ever gotten at this time of year, but some great and wonderful new friends came in their four wheel drive Titan and took me home.

I have never been so happy as to see my home, my chair, my bed, Facebook with 8,326 messages telling me to get well. The latter was overwhelming, I don’t mind telling you.

And I am back.

My time here in Longton has been a hard tenure, even though it has only been about four months. It feel like a year or five. I was diagnosed with esophageal cancer, lost over 100 pounds in those four months, I have just about lost my booming voice. Ella got ITP, a blood platelet disease. This was in addition to the fact that she never quite got over the move physically.

Quite a lot to give a church with her new minister. Not really a bargain. But they have rallied around us and loved us and helped us and done so much for us. I really do not understand it. And as I told them at one point, I know churches that would have cut a minister loose because it was really an unfair thing to happen to them. But they loved us and helped.

And I love them more than they could possibly know. I would do anything for them and do not mind telling them.

But another thing that came from this weekend. My own response to impending death.

I praised God and was not afraid. That alone amazes me. I always wondered how I would do.

As the apostle Paul mentioned I am not afraid to die. And now I know it. But as he also said, it is better for me to stay here.

But if I live, I can do more fruitful work for Christ. So I really don’t know which is better. I’m torn between two desires: I long to go and be with Christ, which would be far better for me. But for your sakes, it is better that I continue to live. (Philippians 1:22-24)

I was ready and I and God knew it. But, on the other hand – and there is always an other hand – Ella needed me. I am her common draft animal and caretaker. She could get along without me, but it would be very difficult. Not to mention the grief that I know I would feel in the same situation of losing a life-long lover.

So I am back. And this I promise. I will be a better minister, a better father, a better son and I will be a better husband to my love (not necessarily in that order). And I will be a better follower of Jesus, my Lord and Savior.

And the point of it all, the scripture and my epiphany and all? It’s easy.

When you love God and you know God loves you, there is no need to be afraid. Even though you face death, there is no need to be afraid. Life is not all there is when you are in Jesus and when you have hold of his marvelous grace.

Even though you face death, you can still thank God and praise him. And when you are in him, and you die, it is not punishment you go toward, but reward, standing in the presence of your God, the Lord Almighty.

What a shame to live life so full of fear of death, full of fear of punishment, just full of fear. He is your God and he is greater than any fear you might have.

I will not be afraid. And I will love life and God and Ella and my church and the Church Universal and anybody else I can stick in front of me to acknowledge and love.

Praise his blessed name.

daily java: listening to Jesus

Daily Java:

Then he [Jesus] added, “Pay close attention to what you hear. The closer you listen, the more understanding you will be given—and you will receive even more. To those who listen to my teaching, more understanding will be given. But for those who are not listening, even what little understanding they have will be taken away from them.” (Mark 4:24-25)

I am really bad at not listening sometimes. We are in the store and I am looking at something. Ella says she is going and will be in the blahblahblah department. I say fine and continue to look. Then I start to go where she is, but where is it? The blahblahblah department is – what? So in pre-cell phone times, I had to go looking for her. Now I have to call her and she will be three aisles over. It is kind of silly.

I didn’t listen.

You tell the kids what you want them to do and they say yes, all if fine. Then it is not done and sometimes that is a very bad thing.

They didn’t listen.

Someone tells you how to get to their house but you don’t really listen. Someone gives you instructions on how to put something together, but – you get the picture.

We are not able to do many times because we didn’t listen. It is not that we are stupid or bad people. It is just that there are a lot of things going on in our minds. We are thinking about other stuff and sometimes it just gets shuffled around and lost.

However, if it is something vital and we know it, we listen intently and follow the instructions to a T. We want to do it right.

Jesus said the same thing: if you listen, you will learn. And the closer you listen, the attention you pay to it all, the more you will learn. If you listen with half an ear, you will be rewarded with minimal information and will not get the job done.

He said that those who listen will have more understanding. And the closer you listen, the more even then that you will understand.

But how do you listen. Jesus is not talking aloud to us as such today. But he does have all his teaching available to us in his word. When we read it and when we think about it and when we dwell on it, it will penetrate into our hearts and we will have more understanding.

And it is more than just reading. It is the meditation, the prayer for understanding, the dwelling upon it. It is not the memorization of the scriptures. That memorization without meditation is worthless. All you have is raw materials. It would be like buying an entire houseful of furniture and not putting it together. All you have is raw materials. You cannot live in it or sit in it or anything. It is nothing but potential.

Listen to him. As Jesus said in another passage:

Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. But anyone who hears my teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash. (Matthew 7:24-27).

If you listen to him, he will give you understanding.

daily java

Daily Java: 

For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven. (Ecclesiastes 3:1)

Several things have happened this past week. Some are things of relief, some are things that I am just glad to get over with.

One thing I was glad to get over with was that my wife finally bought a purse. To a husband, the subject of your wife’s purse is one that is kind of double-sided. She searches and searches, and can never find the right one.

Looking for a purse for your wife, or rather standing around while she looks for a purse is horrible. If you try to help, you are reminded that you are not carrying the purse. She is. Which is true. It would be a cold day in South Texas in July that I would carry a purse.

But we looked everywhere. The malls, WalMart, Target, all the discount department stores, street corner vendors, everywhere. And I found out some terrible things.

One was that most purses are ugly, multi-colored things and can be the size of a automobile trunk. Another is that purses are expensive. Some people pay up to four and five hundred dollars for a purse! I was aghast.

Ella looked and looked and finally found what she wanted, but in another couple of years, she will have to do it again. After all, the purse will wear out. And I will again traipse around after her scooter like some big, stupid looking lummox, offering whatever suggestion is demanded of me.

The other was better, if you could say that curing cancer is better than looking for a purse. Next Tuesday I begin my chemo-therapy in Wichita at the VA. It will be a four hour process, but the best thing about it is that it will have begun. Waiting is a terrible thing.

And it is interesting at the number of people in this church who have gone through chemo-therapy. They are eager to help and give me aid and just minister to the minister. For that I am grateful. Longton church has made room in their lives for a physically damaged minister and I am thankful for the gift God has given me.

Some churches would have terminated the relationship because of the time involved. But it seems that Longton has embraced it. Thank you, Lord.

My van had a problem this week but fortunately it is not as bad as I initially thought. And of course, I have lost tons of weight. 60 pounds to be exact. Since I now eat tiny little portions of food, I suppose I will continue, but that is an upside to the downside of the cancer.

And the cancer will not get us down. To paraphrase the three Hebrew men in Daniel 3, God will deliver me. And even if he does not deliver me, I still will not turn from him. He is my God and I will ever serve him.

God continues to bless and watch over us here and we thank him.

God bless you and keep you in his glorious name.

daily java

Daily Java:

I am suffering and in pain. Rescue me, O God, by your saving power. (Psalm 69:29).

I have been in pain for rte past several days. It doesn’t seem to matter how much of my drug supply I take, I am still in pain. Today, I even went so far as to take double my morphine. It dulled it somewhat, but it has not gone away.

The cancer I have is in a place that is hard to control. It is in the esophagus where it meets the stomach. You can feel it in front of your stomach and touch it with your hand.

Sundays when I play my guitar, the guitar lies on it and it hurts.  It just seems to hurt all the time. And it takes my mind from what I want to be thinking about and puts its on the cancer.

It makes me tired in general, and when I finally get enough medicine to take it away a little, it makes me feel drugged and sleepy.

But the pain has surprised me. I read about people in pain and never knew what it would be like in a lifestyle situation. It is hard to overcome. It is constant and always present. You find yourself holding that part of your body with you hand, even though it does no good.

I determined at the beginning that I have the cancer, the cancer does not have me, but it has been harder than I thought.

I pray to God for strength and power, but I do not seem to have any right now. I have been asleep all morning from the morphine and I do not like that.

The hyper weight loss has bothered me a lot. I cannot seem to be able to eat. And the result of the weight loss is strong. When I lie on my side in the bed, I can feel the strong and sharp points  of my ribs and the hard bone of my pelvis. My skin hangs from my bones. I look truly wasted when undressed.

Dressed, of course, I look all right. But clothes do hide a multitude of sins.

And there is the nagging hunger. I thought for a while that it was all my cancer that was hurting. But I have figured that it may be hunger pangs. I am starving and cannot seem to eat. I fear that I will be come anorexic and not be able to eat again as a normal person.

The hair falling out I can deal with. It is, after all, only hair and I will grow back. I have had a burr before and can again with no real problem.

I just do not like being helpless in the face of all this. But I am. And whether I like it or not, it really does not matter, God has allowed me to go through this, and so I do. I just hope I make a better witness at the end than now.

daily java

Daily Java:

And the very hairs on your head are all numbered. (Matthew 10:30)

Well, it is official. After this second chemo-therapy I am losing my hair.

I took my shower Wednesday night and after drying my hair, the towel was full of free-range follicles. In fact, not only the towel, but also the tub and later, my hair brush.

About a year ago, I began to grow my hair out longer. I have had a burr for a long time, but I thought I would try longer hair. Maybe relive my hippy days when I had a lot of hair. In the interim, I have had two small haircuts to make it grow in the direction I wanted, but it is still basically getting longer and longer. I liked it.

I have always been kind of vain about my hair, I guess. My hair was always thick and full and wavy and dark brown with auburn tints. It would even go into an afro if I really wanted it to. In fact it would do most anything but the beach boy look that I was desperate for back in the 1960’s. It was unique hair and it was always big.

It started thinning a couple of years ago, but never has gone away like my father or my maternal grandfather. I figured it would, but it didn’t. So I sat back in my ease and said “Grow, wave and be long.”

Then the cancer and the chemo-therapy. I have been told that the second one is the one that will kill your hair. And sure enough. Bang. Not a big BANG! mind you, but just a whimper. One minute luxurious tresses, the next a handful of hair.

It is no real problem for me though, much as I may whine. I can get a burr and look like half the guys on the street (more handsome, of course). So in the next week I shall.

And the hair falls. Since my mustache will probably drop hairs too, I am going to end up hairless. A long, thin, skeleton. (BTW, I have lost 85 official pounds since I came here in November).

With the hair gone, and the extreme weight loss, I would imagine my own mother would not recognize me, I look that different.

And every time I look in the mirror, I see a different person than I have ever known, thinner, with cheekbones (I have never had visible cheekbones). My eyes look bigger. It is a bit startling.

I thought of people I have known who have come into contact with the grace of God with such a dynamic power that it changed them completely. They were almost physically unrecognizable afterwards. It was that strong a change. You could see his power on them like you can see the tiredness of the cancer on me. And you could see them grow like you see me lose weight and hair.

But no matter how much weight I lose, or how much hair I lose, or how many wrinkles I have or anything else: God always recognizes me. And he does so to such an extent that he can look at me and say, Hey, Johnny! I think he probably calls me Johnny like all the people I knew before 1974. That was when I came into contact with him.

But at least, I make it easier. He doesn’t have to work nearly as hard to count my hair now.

daily java

Daily Java:

My heart is sick, withered like grass, and I have lost my appetite. (Psalm 102:4)

Which makes for a lousy Valentine’s Day. It is the second day after my second chemo-therapy and I feel as if I could sit down in a corner, pull a cover over myself and weep silently.

That, of course, makes it hard to get into the spirit of Valentine’s Day with love and romance and really neat dinners of heart shaped ribeyes you make your wife. I do not feel like eating and in fact, feel that I will throw anything I eat up.

Ella made me my favorite cookies yesterday. White chocolate and macadamia oatmeal cookies. I love them. But I have eaten a half of one. And it went down hard.

In addition to all this, I completely forgot to get her a Valentine card of any kind. She had a beautiful one waiting for me this morning as well as a hand-written love note. From me: zilch.

My mind just isn’t working that well. All I want to do is sleep. In fact, yesterday, I slept probably 20 hours of the day maybe. I have already gotten in two or three hours today.

I always prided myself on being a romantic fellow, but this year I am a bomb.

I mean, she understands it and she understands me. She knows that I am having trouble. She sees it in me, and she hears about it from a lot of other people who have gone through it too.

But still, the reality of it is harder than the account from other people. And I hate it.

I mean, it is not something that will affect the course of our lives together. We have already gone through almost fifty Valentine’s Days anyway. So one bomb is not going to cause us to derail from the train tracks of life. But the problem is that it is this year, and I would like to have it better this year since everything is going so tentatively.

And when it comes down to it, it is conceivable that it could be my last. The whole thing could go wrong and the treatment could fail. As the doctor tells you, you could die from this.

And you could. Cancer is, after all, a terminal disease if not treated. And if it had not been found, I probably would have been gone within a couple of months just from the starvation and inability to get any fluids, even water, down my esophagus. Maybe they could have done intravenous feeding but still.

That sets a totally different picture of Valentine’s Day to me. I do not mind dying. Not really. If I do, I go to be with my God in a place where there is absolutely no pain nor suffering. But if I do that, I leave Ella and she needs me.

Yes, others could do for her what I do, but others could not love her like I do. So she would have the physical love, but she would not have the emotional and caring love that only I could give her.

Ah, well. We leave our lives to God and let him work out what is best for us. He did not send the sickness, the cancer, but he can use it in both our lives to his glory. I would like to see how he will.

For now, I depend on her to know how I feel and count on the fact that she loves me and will continue even though I flop an occasional Valentine’s Day. And I know she will. She loves me, as I love her.

daily java

Daily Java:

You must pay close attention to what they wrote, for their words are like a lamp shining in a dark place — until the Day dawns, and Christ the Morning Star shines in your hearts. (2 Peter 1:19)

There is a dark place inside me and it called cancer.

It is kind of interesting (in a sense that I would like to be a psychologist studying someone in these circumstances) the way I feel about it.

I decided when I was diagnosed with this esophageal cancer that I refused to let the cancer own me. I told my church and I have told others, especially over Facebook, that I had a peace and a  calm about it that surprised me. I always felt that would happen, but this is the first time that I got the chance to put it to into actual practice.

Yes, I have the cancer. Yes, if the treatment goes wrong I will die. Yes, it is extremely painful. Yes – other stuff. You know what I mean.

So I go on living, ministering, helping, doing all the things I need to do as a gospel preacher and minister of the word. So I kind of bury it underneath all the other emotions and feelings, and I just don’t pay any real attention to it.

Except that I do. Underneath all the regular living stuff, all the ministering and things, there is that dark place. And you can hear the dark place thrum, a soft, low, almost inaudible sound that says: “You have cancer and you are dying.” Soft, yet enormously authoritative.

It is like a constant, low, soft, but very real thrumming noise. It is like when you live near something that runs a machine all the time. After a while you do not really hear it, but every once in a while, it is made apparent. And if you pay attention to it, it will drive you crazy.

And it would not be hard at all for that voice to begin getting louder and more demanding. All of the things I usually think about will be there but the dark place will no longer be on bottom. It will begin to creep closer and closer to the surface. Sooner or later, it becomes one of the dominant themes of my life.

So I cannot let it. And if all I had was my life, I couldn’t deny it. It would be impossible. My life would be my number one priority.

But my life is not my number one priority. That lamp is. God is, and his kingdom and the things of the work he gives me are. And I do his will to the best of my ability. However, I cannot if that dark place becomes dominant.

So what do I do? I decided to let God have control and to remember his grace, not my own death, his number one priority. His presence, his grace, his love is that lamp shining in a dark place. That lamp, when turned on and given free rein in my life will kill that dark place. After all, the darkness of satan cannot live in the light of the wonderful grace of Jesus.

You have one, too, a dark place that threatens to overwhelm you. The key is to allow him to live in you, to shine out that unwelcome darkness.

Try it and see what happens when the light of God destroys the darkness.