Do or die
Typically, I like to start with a story, an illustration, or a funny real-life scenario that we can all relate to and that draws you, the reader, into the story. I don’t have one this time.
I think this might be the hardest thing I’ve written.
I had to go back and read the last blog to see where I left you. Ty and I were headed to Houston to have scans, and I appreciated the gift of forced rest, even if it came from circumstances I didn’t like. I posted on January 11th, just three weeks ago, as I write this, which is unbelievable to me.These last three weeks have felt like three months. I guess that’s what happens when your world turns upside down in an instant. Time stands still.
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It was a short trip: just one night. The news was not good.
My oncologist pulled up my scans, showing us a few glowing spots lit up like a light bright toy on my lungs and a few in lymph nodes thrown in as well.
As she scrolled down, I saw a light-bulb-sized orb of glowing brightness just below my lungs.
“Your cancer is back and has metastasized to your lungs, nodes, and liver.”
We stared at the scans. That orb took up half my liver. We stared at her. The room was quiet.
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Three months ago—at the end of September—I had my last scan where the verdict was “Clear and Beautiful.”
I celebrated my one-year NED (No Evidence of Disease) in mid-October. I gathered with friends and raised a glass; we toasted, cheered, and celebrated. We honored the story. We praised the Lord for what He has done. Sweet words like honey—of hope, encouragement, tenderness, and love—filled the room as I received them, wept, and felt the embrace of so many that have traveled alongside my family on this rocky path.
Now I have a tumor taking up half my liver?
Welcome to Inflammatory Breast Cancer, that cunning, two-faced b*tch. She’ll set you at ease and then stab you in the back every time.
Pardon my French, but sometimes you need to call a Spade a Spade.
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Ty spoke first. So, what’s next?
She explained that a new chemo infusion drug is proving to have great success with Stage 4 Metastatic patients. I can receive it right here in Knoxville every three weeks, and they’d like to get me started on it immediately.
Ty spoke again. How long for the chemo?
She looked at us with tender eyes. This drug isn’t curative. It’s good at extending life. You’ll take it until you can’t anymore.
Again, silence.
I see. I’ll take it every three weeks until I die.
I’m a straight shooter, and I don’t like anything sugar-coated. What do you mean by extending life? How long are we talking about?
My oncologist at MD Anderson is sometimes dodgy about eye contact. It just doesn’t seem to be her strong suit. But she looked me right in the eyes and kept that contact as she said:
For some people, we see five or even six more years. But I don’t want to give you false hope, Sarah. This will be the fourth chemo drug you’re on. None of them have worked. You—she stopped, correcting herself—your cancer’s two genetic mutations historically work against the drug to override it quickly.
She paused. In your case, two years would be very good.
Then she added, But, if you choose not to do this, and that’s a conversation you can have and let me know, then your liver will start to fail in a few months. There’s no going back after that.
We thanked her, gathered our things, and ran to catch our plane home.
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The story of Jairus has been in my mind’s eye these last weeks.
Jairus, a loving father, seeks Jesus out in a crowd, desperate for his help. His 12-year-old daughter is on death’s door. He falls at Jesus’s feet, pleading fervently with him. My little daughter is dying, he said. Please come and lay your hands on her; heal her so she can live.
Jesus agrees and goes with Jairus. But then, he gets distracted on the way to this critically urgent, life-or-death meeting. In the middle of this unplanned delay, messengers arrive with the news that the girl has died. He didn’t make it in time.
The messengers tell Jairus: Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the Teacher any further?
Jesus turns to Jairus and says the strangest thing: Don’t be afraid. Just believe.
Ummm, she’s dead. Believe what, exactly?
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What do I believe in? What do you believe in?
Things don’t turn out the way we expected.
This week alone, I sat with three friends and wept over their private griefs. Real trials. Tender, raw wounds with grown children making horrible choices, with teenage children rife with confusion, with generations of family baggage finally imploding on their doorstep, with the death of people they love dearly.
You can’t write a blog about those things. But I think that’s why so many of you faithfully read this one: my story is a public version of your deepest wounds, fears, and hopes.
And that’s part of what I grapple with now. It has been my joy and privilege to pull back the curtain and invite you to be my companions as I’ve walked the ups and downs of this tenuous path. And I hope I’ve been faithful to point you to Him. Now it looks like I will share with you perhaps the hardest thing of all over these next months:
What about when He can change things, but He doesn’t?
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I think of another friend of ours who struggled when things didn’t turn out the way he expected. You may already know him. Let me introduce you to my buddy, Judas. We are more alike than you may think.
We’ve been watching The Chosen together as a family (I highly recommend!), and there’s a scene that keeps replaying in my mind, over and over again, like a pebble tossed about on the ocean’s shore.
Judas is young, enthusiastic, and zealous for this new Rabbi Jesus and his radical message. He is a believer. He’s all in, leaving everything behind to join Jesus’s life and ministry.
In this scene, he goes to say goodbye to his sister. He doesn’t know when he’ll be back or what’s next. The two of them sit across the table from one another as he expresses his enthusiasm about this new Rabbi. She voices concern: popular teachers who gain crowds are usually killed, along with their followers. Rome squashes things like this quickly.
Judas responds eagerly: Don’t you see, Sister? If he is the Messiah, he won’t be killed! He will overthrow Rome, and Israel will finally be set free again.
Ah. There it is. This is what we do.
Obviously, if God is X, then He will do X.
If He is the Messiah, then He will overthrow Rome.
If He is the Provider, then He will give me financial security.
If He is Good, then He will protect me from Bad.
If He is Healer, then He will heal me.
And when things don’t go according to my plan? When the God of the Universe doesn’t bend to my will or expectation? Well, I reject Him. Or perhaps the better word (since we’re talking about Judas here) is—I betray him. I betray him because I don’t want to endure the sting of what feels like a cosmic betrayal of me.
It’s classic self-protection. I withdraw when I’m supposed to lean in.
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We left Jairus standing in the middle of the street, with Jesus beside him, hearing that his daughter had just died.
They arrive at the home of Jairus, and there is a crowd outside. Jesus tells the people that she’s not dead; she’s just asleep. They laugh at him.
I think that’s understandable, don’t you? It sounds ridiculous. Can’t we tell the difference between a sleeping girl and a dead body?
Then Jesus sends everyone out of the house—all the doubters are cast out, and just the girl’s mother, father, and a few of the disciples are in the room with Jesus and the girl. He says to her: Little girl, I say to you, get up!
With only his word, the girl sits up, gets out of bed, and starts walking around.
With just his word, she is healed.
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Sometimes, God does what we want the way we want it.
Sometimes, God does what we want but not how we want it.
And sometimes, God doesn’t seem to do anything at all.
So many friends are praying for me. We are asking you to pray for a miracle. We are told to ask, so why wouldn’t we? Please do. Please continue. I believe that prayer is no small thing—no small thing at all.
But right now, I feel like the biggest doubter in the room. I’m like a person from the crowd, laughing at Jesus.
The facts are clear as day. I saw the scans. What’s the point?
I’m already dead.
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I have come to the end of my rope with Hope. A light has shone into my deeper heart, and I don’t like what I see: Ambivalence. Giving up. Withdrawing. Retreating.
I look at Jesus with a shrug and say, You will heal me, or you won’t. It’s up to you; there’s nothing I can do about this, and to be honest, I’m kind of sick of asking.
Perhaps this is not a terrible place to be. As I feel myself sinking, I am buoyed back to the surface by the faithful, believing prayers of those around me. I’m reminded that Jairus’s daughter didn’t pray for herself. She didn’t even go to Jesus. Someone brought him to her. And that’s what you all are doing for me.
Like Jairus, you come to Jesus on my behalf and say, My friend is dying. Please come and lay your hands on her; heal her so she can live.
And for this, I will be eternally grateful.
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I won’t be in this season forever. This is a part of grief; it’s a stage of my lament. And as the following months unfold, I suppose we will walk through these questions together, either one or the other, maybe even both at the same time:
Can we believe that God does miracles today?
Can we trust Him when He chooses not to?
You have your own heartbreak today. You are at the end of your Hope rope with a beloved person or a heavy relationship. You are awaiting your own test results. You are weary, tired to the bone with asking God for the same thing over and over.
Can you hold Hope in one hand and Trust in the other?
How do we live, grow, and even thrive in this tension?
Thank you for walking with me here; for allowing me transparency of my inner heart. I know that we are on sacred ground together.
