Batting 500...so far!

Today is the anniversary of the eradication of my cancer. No, unfortunately, my leukemia has not been declared to have been eradicated. I'm referring here to my colo-rectal cancer, which was treated surgically 26 years ago today. Some days after the surgery, I was seen by an oncologist who told me that the surgery was apparently successful, since no sign of the cancer was found in the many lymph nodes that were removed during surgery. When I asked him whether I would need radiation therapy or chemotherapy, he said, "Well, I could do either or both, if you like, but I have no reason to believe that would be of any benefit." That was good enough for me. I told him I would just as soon not have either, if there was no benefit. 

So, here I am 26 years and countless colonoscopies later, free of colo-rectal cancer. Now if I were a big league baseball player, I would say that batting .500 would be good enough, but in real life, my goal is to be batting a thousand, where it comes to cancer. That is to say, I want to beat the leukemia, too. To date, God has been so faithful in this pursuit. As I have mentioned in other posts, my chemotherapy went so smoothly that the oncology team has been amazed. There have been no fevers, no vomiting, nor even any nausea; no hospitalizations between my chemotherapy rounds. I was told that the chemotherapy I had and tolerated so well is what is generally gone through by AML patients half my age. 

I can't help believing that these results are because 3) I have complied with the recommendations of the oncology team and tried to follow them to the letter; 2) my oncology team is amazingly well prepared for dealing with this kind of cancer, by training and experience and expertise gained from what God has revealed to mankind about cancer in general and Acute Myeloid Leukemia in particular; and 1) because God is not ready to take me home just yet; He apparently has more for me to do. 

Perhaps, you are familiar with the story of Jonah, one of the prophets in the Bible. God had a job for Jonah to do, but Jonah didn't want to do it, so he ran away and booked passage on a ship for distant shores. While the ship was at sea, God caused a raging storm to arise. The ship was on the verge of foundering. The crew jettisoned the cargo, and each man prayed to his god for deliverance. But still the ship was on the verge of breaking up.  The captain went below and found Jonah asleep. He woke him up and said the ship was about to founder He told Jonah, "Pray to your god that we may be saved."

Then they said to him, “What shall we do to you, that the sea may quiet down for us?” For the sea grew more and more tempestuous. ¹² He said to them, “Pick me up and hurl me into the sea; then the sea will quiet down for you, for I know it is because of me that this great tempest has come upon you...they called out to the Lord, 'O Lord, let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not on us innocent blood, for you, O Lord, have done as it pleased you.' ¹⁵ So they picked up Jonah and hurled him into the sea, and the sea ceased from its raging...And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.” (Jonah 1:11-12, 14-15, 17)

Now, this is a fantastic story, and many people reject it as not only fantastic, but also as fantasy. But having spent a fair amount of time reading and researching the Bible and its claims, I choose to believe the story of Jonah, because other equally fantastic stories have been found to be true by archaeologists. For example, archaeological findings in the ancient city of Jericho fully support the story of how its wall fell, not inward as would be the normal case when a walled city is taken by an enemy, but outward just as Scripture tells us. Not only that, but a small section of the wall, containing a dwelling place, stood fast during the destruction. Could that have been the home of Rahab, the prostitute who dwelt in the wall and helped the Hebrew spies who were "casing the joint" to escape? They promised her that, because she had helped them, she would be spared. You can read that story in The Book of Joshua, chapter 6. For me, however, the bottom line is that I believe that God, Creator of the entire universe, is powerful enough to do any of these things without even breaking a sweat. 

Jonah's story doesn't end with his being swallowed by a great fish (no, it really wasn't a whale). After three days,"... the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon the dry land." (Jonah 2:10) Then God told Jonah again that he was to go to the city of Nineveh, a pagan city known for its violence and immorality and tell them that if they didn't repent, God would destroy them. This time, Jonah went to Nineveh, and the city surrendered to God. "When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it." (Jonah 3:10)

God saved a defiant Jonah from a really weird, disgusting death (I think I got off easy with chemotherapy by comparison with being in the belly of a fish for several days, yech!), because He had a job for Jonah to do, and He wasn't taking "No" for an answer. 

Just as God allowed Jonah to experience a horrific episode that caused him to stare death in the face and then saved him "...for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that [he] should walk in them," (Ephesians 2:10) so I believe God has allowed me to stare death in the face and saved me. He saved me from colon cancer because He wanted me back on His team, after I had turned my back on Him for 30+ years, and now I believe He is saving me from leukemia because He has a job for me to do. I don't know what it is, yet, but I do know from past experience that He will prepare me for the task...and then He will walk by my side while I do it. (I just hope I am a better sport about it than Jonah was. For that part of the story, you'll just have to read the rest of the book of Jonah!! P.S. It's in the Old Testament between the books of Obadiah and Micah.)

P.P.S.  Jonah's story foreshadows the story of Christ, who, though not in a fish, was in a grave for three days before God raised Him up to new life. In fact, Jesus draws this very comparison in  Matthew 12:40 - "For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth."