That's What Faith Can Do

"You have cancer."

The three words nobody wants to hear, and I sure did not want to hear them.  But I did.  And I have leukemia.

But let me back up a moment.  I have an overly active mind sometimes and before I knew I had a problem I used to ponder how I would react if I learned I had some sort of deadly decease like cancer.  Would I sob uncontrollably?  Would I get angry and refuse to except it?  Would I cry out to the Creator of the world "Why?!!"  Would I retreat into a shell and refuse to talk to people?  One thing was for sure, fear would dictate my every move.

Was it posible to except one's fate with grace?  I did not think so.  At least, I was sure I could not.

Fast forward to a cold January night.  I was taken to the hospital for the first time in my life because I fainted while at work.  I was always very healthy growing up, no allergies, no broken bones, not even a cavity.  So when my 18 year old body suddenly failed me, I was confused and scared.  The people at the hospital were kind, but they kept poking me to draw blood.  Then the doctor came in and said it was best if I stayed the night, so they could run some more tests.  The next day was filled with tests and that night I was told that I had some sort of blood cancer.

It was nothing like I thought it would be.  I remember feeling tears fall down my cheeks but it was hardest to watch my mom cry.  She left that night and I was alone, staring at the blank hospital walls.  For the first time I could collect my thoughts and this is what I found:

1. I had Cancer
2. I could die from this Cancer
3. I wasn't afraid

For a long time I could not make sense of the last one.  Was I ignorant?  No, I knew the full weight of the situation.  Did I just not care?  No, I always wished to live long enough to have children and then grandchildren.  So there I was, lying in a hospital bed, just being told I could die very soon, and I was not afraid.

Should I have been afraid?  I thought I should.  Wasn't everybody who was told they had cancer?  But every time I even so much as thought about being afraid it felt like something just pushed it out of my mind faster than I could let the emotion settle.  Maybe it was all too new to me so I could not grasp it properly.  Yet the next morning I felt the same.  I remember thinking that the sun rise was beautiful.  That my nurse seemed especially kind and cheerful.

A family friend came to see me on her way to work that morning.  After talking for a while she asked me "How do you feel about all this?"  I replied that I felt that, while it was bad, I knew that somehow everything would work out fine.  She smiled a bit and said she felt the same way.  She told me that every time she went to pray for me it was like God was telling her I was going to be okay.

It was not until that night that I saw the Doctor again.  He told me that I had Leukemia.  He told me that I had a very common form of childhood Leukemia.  Then he looked me in the eye and said, "You are young and strong, Rachael.  With the treatments we have now, I expect you to be fully recovered and cancer free with in a few years."

I blinked.

"I am going to get better?" I whispered.

He smiled and went on to explain some of the treatments to my mother.  I watched her cry again as she called to tell my father the good news.

When everybody had left and I was alone again, I thought about my day.  I remembered how God had not let me feel alone or afraid, even when faced with death.  I never thought He could calm a heart such as mine, one that flipped over such little things, and give me peace.  But He did.  I could not understand how, but He did.

I always wished for a strong faith, but everything I did never felt like enough.  That day I learned that it is not about what I can do, it is about what God can do.  To truly grow my faith, I was gonna have to let Him take over every part of my life.

I have cancer, but thanks to God, cancer does not have me.

From the Stars to Me

My latest Google search found that there are 300 sextillion stars in the universe.  That is the number 3 followed by 23 zeros if you wish to write it out.  To say that is a lot would be the understatement of the year.  I could spend my entire life counting them and not even come close to numbering them all.  But what does the stars have to do with me?  Well, recently I have become fascinated with numbers of things that are too big to count.

For example, did you know that the average person has 90,000 to 150,000 hairs just on their head?  True, it is not 300 sextillion, but it is still impressive.  And nobody I know has enough time to count them all, let alone number them.  But take a look at this verse from Matthew:

"But even the hairs of your head are all numbered." (10:30 ESV)

Really?  God took the time not only to count the hairs on my head, but to number them all too?  I was impressed the first time I read that verse, but it took a sad event in my life to come to grips with a number as big as 150,000.

It was a cold January night in 2013 when I learned what was wrong with me.  I had Leukemia.  Years of Chemotherapy treatment lay before me.  I had to quite my job, drop my college classes, and spend weeks feeling so sick I could hardly get out of bed.  And then came the hair loss.  At first I thought it was no big deal: when I brushed my hair a few extra strands came out, when I woke up in the morning I found some on my pillow.  But then it got worse, where ever I sat piles of hair fell out around me.  Every time I touched my head many strands would fall to my shoulders.  The doctor had told me my hair loss could take months, but how could that be when it was falling out so very fast?  After a month of intense hair loss I looked in the mirror and was shocked to see that my head looked fine.  It only looked a little thiner at the top but besides that completely normal.

What?!?

When my mind stopped spinning I tried to wrap my head around the fact that I had lost so much hair, and still had so much more left.  Surly by now I would be bald as an egg!  My next thought was the verse in Matthew.  Suddenly I came to grips with just how big 150,000 was.  It was like God had to smack me in the face for me to realize just how much he cared about me.

So the God of the universe (with 300 sextillion stars in it) made some one like me and loves me so much that he numbered the hairs on my head.  Now that I really understand how big 150,000 is, I can not even begin to fathom what 300 sextillion looks like.  All those stars, made seemingly for no other reason than for us to see them and enjoy them.

My wish is that the next time you see a star filled sky, you will thank and praise the Creator who took the time to make them.