You know it's been a heartbreaking week for people in our community. I pray for everyone, everywhere, who's suffering at the cruel hands of cancer. Tonight, there are anxious minds, financial worries, pain and weakness, devastated hearts, and pronounced absences brought on by that terrible word.

I ask that you'd quiet the mind that is filled with ominous and racing thoughts. Give strength for the family member who sits in a hospital room, day after day. Give comfort to the parent faced with an unnatural order of death. I pray for the bodies that are weak and the frustration that comes with the inability to do the things that once were easy. I pray for encouragement for the never-ending cycle of treatment, sickness, and fatigue. I ask for provision for those who can't stretch the money to cover everything that's needed. I pray for the mother who wants only to live to see her children grow to an age of independence. I ask for mercy for the pain and relief from the nausea. I pray for the father, who would do anything to take the sickness on himself. Be with those who still haven't caught their breath from the gut-punching news. Give protection for the sacrificial mother who chooses her baby's life over treating her own infirmity. I pray that the darkness of nighttime will bring rest and not fear. I ask for the gift of a really good day when spirits are running especially low. I beg that you take away the waves of anxiety that wax and wane. I pray for inexplicable peace during the long waits for test results. I ask for comfort for the husbands, the wives, the parents, the children, the friends who are going to bed, tonight, with grief wetting their pillows. I pray that families will adjust to their new normal, whatever it may be. Please let your presence be felt when the news of recurrence is given. Give rest to the parents who haven't slept. Strength for the husband who is trying to hold it all together. A sense of security for the children who don't understand. Comfort the wife who cries in the shower where only you can see. Give endurance for the patients whose days revolve around appointments, scans, and bloodwork and just long for their old lives back.

I confess that it's a word that ranks high on our fear list, God. We believe in you and have faith in your power, but our human frailty trembles at the possibility of the nasty word being used alongside our names or the name of someone we love. I've been there before with family members.
I've seen it too many times with friends and acquaintances. The research, the breakthroughs, the new treatments, the good reports, and, sometimes, I confess, even the prayers. I can become cynical as far as it's all concerned. Forgive me when I doubt your goodness. I know I've allowed the heartbreaking earthly defeats to drown out the victories of your countless miracles. Open my eyes to those and never let me forget to thank you.

I know that we will never understand certain things from where we stand down here in this fallen world. I know that the mountaintops and delights of this life are the only measurements our mortal minds have to appraise the joy and glory of our coming heavenly home. It's like trying to measure the depths of the ocean or the span of the sky with a child's ruler. We can't begin to grasp its greatness, so we hold onto our lives and our people with a ferocious grip. This is all we know and it's pretty amazing most of the time. But, there are days when we don't see how all the pieces fit. We don't always understand how any good can come from all the bad. Sometimes, what's happening right in front of us blocks our view of what's eternal and what is to come. We can't see things as you do. Remind us we're not operating with all the information you have. "Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely." 1 Corinthians 13:12

"For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." 2 Corinthians 4:18

"He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there by mourning, nor crying, nor PAIN anymore, for the former things have passed away."
Revelation 21:4  

God, I am guilty of living in the moment and believing this life is a permanent setup. I get busy with my pressing concerns and lists and live in an illusion that I have a stockpile of days stored up someplace. I end up wasting an embarrassing amount of the gift of time that's dispensed from your hand. As I've gotten older, though, I'm realizing that your word really is true. "You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes." James 4:14  Please, give me a sense of urgency to live and love intentionally. To live for YOUR glory and fulfill YOUR purpose for me. Help me to be bold in sharing love and your offer of salvation. "For God so loved the world, that He gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16

"Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." Romans 10:13

Lord, in our human capacity, we're struggling to process all the devastation of cancer. Every one of us knows someone. Every one of us has lost someone. Every one of us is praying for someone. Every one of us is hurting for someone who's lost someone. Someone who has cancer. Please, cover all of our someones with your mercy. Wrap them in a blanket of your peace. Protect them with your mighty power. Provide for them with your kind hand. Be present in ways that are so overwhelming and unmistakable that they know, without a doubt, they are being held in the arms of God. We know that where the waters of trouble are deep, your power and mercy run even deeper.

My favorite promise- "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior" Isaiah 43:2-3 


Joni