Lord of the Dance

I am:

• Blessed  
• Humbled  
• Grateful 
• Thankful   
• Praising God   
• Unworthy
• A Miracle
• Broken  
  
• Awed

Why?  Because Tuesday evening my oncologist from Wake Cancer Center called to tell me that the final pathology of my two tumors was "polyclonal" NOT "monoclonal" (as originally suspected), which means NO lymphoma.  She continued and said that the recent CT scans of my chest, abdomen and pelvis showed nothing in my lymph nodes.  And the blood work taken last week came back "low normal" on the screening specifically for cancer.  If she said it once, she said it twice, "This is very reassuring."  Indeed!  Praise God!

For weeks we have gone back and forth with test results, surgery recovery, and the doctors' belief that I had lymphoma based on the initial pathology.  We have waited and waited for calls, labs, scans and pathology reports.  Each call left us hanging on another test or result.  No resolution, until now.  Thanks be to God.  And to her credit, my partner in life's dance, whose prayer life puts mine to shame, repeatedly stated that she did not believe I had cancer.  She never gave up hope even when word came back to the contrary.  I was not so optimistic and had resigned myself to the doctors' initial assessment and reports.  She heard them but did not accept them.  No, she wasn't in denial.  She was IN prayer.  

Teri is the strongest woman I know. Her quiet strength is a testimony to her deep and abiding faith in Christ.  Amazingly, just before my tumors were discovered and surgery imminent, she was diagnosed with her own serious health issue.  She never wavered.  She just prayed harder and became even more committed to doing whatever it took to face the next day, whatever it held.  I only hope I can be as strong, supportive and comforting as she has been for me.  As Jack Nicholson's character said of Helen Hunt's in one of his movies, "She makes me want to be a better man."  You do honey, you do!

In his posthumously published book, "Turn My Mourning Into Dancing," Henri Nouwen stated: Gratitude in its deepest sense means to live life as a gift to be received thankfully.  And true gratitude embraces all of life: the good and the bad, the joyful and the painful, the holy and the not-so-holy.  We do this because we become aware of God's life, God's presence in the middle of all that happens."  Henri is right.  Life is indeed a precious gift.  This journey has made me more aware of that gift than ever before.  

Nouwen again, For in our suffering, not apart from it, Jesus enters our sadness, takes us by the hand, pulls up gently up to stand and invites us to dance.  We find the way to pray, as the psalmist did, "You have turned my mourning into dancing" (Ps. 30:11), because at the center of our grief we find the grace of God.

I don't know what you're facing right now, but let me encourage you to join the dance.  It's not complicated.  Theology and religion seem to make it more difficult.  Simply put, the Lord of this dance died so we could know Him fully and live life more abundantly.  He's just waiting for you to join the dance.  He's no stranger to pain, heartache, pain, suffering and mourning.  The dance doesn't make trouble or heartache disappear, but it's loaded with grace-filled moments that remind us we are not alone.  It enables us to invite others to dance where we meet them in their pain.  And in those moments pain is shared and joy is doubled.  C'mon, let's dance!  

Praise be to the God of all comfort!

P.S. Happy 18th birthday to our baby, Sarah, the prettiest girl at the dance on Mother's Day weekend!