Standing before the door of her hospital room in the ICU, the familiar sounds of the machines and the hustle of scurrying feet faded to a whisper. I hesitated, took another breath, and stepped forward, surrendering to an adventure that would leave an eternal mark upon my already bleeding heart.
Eight months went by. Sent home with hospice care, she laid in her bedroom at home. For over a year, this beautiful 16 year old fought a rare, aggressive form of cancer. We prayed together and asked for healing. We pleaded for comfort. We cried out for peace in the midst of great suffering. After a 27-hour surgery, as chest tubes were placed into her sides, as doctors came in to give her difficult news, we prayed. I wept for her. I pleaded with God to heal her. But now she was dying.
Lord where is the victory in this? I took a breath, held her hands, and began to pray. Helpless and completely inept, I searched for words and found none. All I had to give was His love. Praise God there's an endless supply of that.
Our culture views death as defeat. When a person dies of cancer, we say they've "lost their battle." But I've witnessed the victory in death (1 Cor. 15:50-58). I have seen that, for those who bear the marks of great suffering, wounds become the greatest rewards. Through the prayers of a dying teenager, I saw what it looked like to walk courageously through the battles of life, persevering even in the depths of suffering.
Jesus healed people with all kinds of diseases and ailments. From the demon-possessed to dying children, the scriptures are clear that Jesus was a healer. These are great stories of wonder for those on the mountaintop, but to those in the valley of the shadow of death, these stories seem to chastise rather than calm their weary souls. What about me? You healed them, but now you watch me suffer, refusing to stop the pain.
These were the questions I wrestled with as I watched child after child fight against the horror of childhood cancer. I watched families pour their hearts out to Jesus like the man in John 4 whose son was dying. I could not understand why he would heal in the Bible, but not today. My questions threatened to embitter me until he opened my eyes to the truth revealed in His word:
The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and all who dwell in it. (Psalm 24:1)
Which is easier, to say, 'Your sins are forgiven you', or to say, 'Rise and walk'? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home. (Luke 5:17-26)
I began to see that physical healing, as we see in the gospels, was not an end in itself. Every person Jesus healed eventually faced the reality of death. He raised Lazarus from the dead, but eventually Lazarus' body went back to the grave. In our fallen world, our bodies break and wither. We are "subjected to futility" (Romans 8). And what is true of our earthly bodies is also true of our souls. Bound by sin, we cannot save ourselves from the penalty of death.
But Jesus entered into our broken world. He restored earthly bodies to show us that he can also restore sinful hearts. Our God did not merely come to heal our bodies. He came to set us free from the bondage of death forever!
Now in putting everything in subjection, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. But we see HIM, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone (Hebrews 2:8-9)
Things aren't always what they seem. My occupation as a pediatric oncology nurse wasn't merely about administering chemotherapy and changing out puke buckets (although there was plenty of that). It was a calling to step into a world of brokenness. And as Christians, that's what we do. We willingly enter into suffering with others, taking with us the truth that heals forever.
Are you suffering? Keep seeking. Keep asking. Keep knocking on the door. Our Savior suffered on our behalf to set us free from death so that we might find rest even in the greatest depths of pain and suffering. We hold to the truth that our God has given us promises to make us new and bring us out of darkness into light. May the Gospel be enough for us, and may the Lord give us ears to hear and eyes to see our world with an eternal perspective!
"So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal." (2 Cor. 4:17-18)
