How Then shall We Live?

Many of you have posted comments assuring us that Val will be healed. And you are right. But the truth, beloved, is that we just don't know if this will manifest itself by the hand of God reaching down to tear this disease out of Val's body. This is the daily prayer of our heart and we honor God by laying it at His throne. He never tires of repetition.

But we who are close know that this enemy, cholangiocarcinoma, is a deadly adversary. The medical world consider it a terminal cancer. Treatable, but not curable. I wish I could find just one five-year survivor on the planet.

There are no shortage of voices screaming at us from Germany, Mexico, or Thailand that they alone have the magic bullet cure. Some even suggest a conspiracy theory, claiming that the medical community is trying to hide these "cures".

At the risk of being harsh, the words of Jude 1:12 apply to those who push miracle cures; These men are shepherds who feed only themselves. Clouds without rain, blown along by the wind; autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted—twice dead.

As Yoda would say, discouraged are you? Don't be. We lift up our eyes unto the hills and ask, From whence comest our help? Our help cometh from the Lord, Creator of Heaven and Earth.

On this second day of 2007, consider the question posed by Francis Schaeffer, "How Then Shall We Live." The answer is simple. Live with purpose. Live life to fulfill your destiny. Live life as a journey. Every day, every hour. Look for the hand of God at work. King David spoke truth when he said, "better is one day in your house than thousands elsewhere."

The Apostle Paul understood this. He left us a trail of cookie crumbs to follow.

In the city of Troas, close to modern Istanbul, the Apostle, knowing that he would leave these Macedonians the next day and never see them again in this life, spoke until midnight in a heated upper room. A young man named Eutychus, sitting in the window, fell asleep and plunged to his death. Paul went down, threw himself on the young man and said, "don't be alarmed. He is alive!"

Had we been there that night, I am sure we would have seen the friends and relatives of Eutychus run down to the street ahead of Paul, only to find the broken body of a young man who, moments ago, was alive and vibrant. The Apostle, on the other hand, would certainly have stayed behind to petition the source of all power for guidance. I am sure that God Most High spoke audibly to Paul with detailed instructions on how to bring this man back to life.

Then they went upstairs again and broke bread and ate. After talking until daylight, he left. The people took the young man home alive and were greatly comforted.

Paul lived his life as a man of destiny. These would prove to be his last days of freedom. God had made it clear that he was to go to Rome by way of Jerusalem. He faced lynch mobs, a treacherous sea journey and imprisonment in Nero's Rome. And from his cell in The Mammartine Prison, he wrote what should be every christian's confession:

For me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

This is no death wish, only a statement of fact. Paul's life, my life, your life, Val's life is in the hands of God Most High, the Ancient of Days. Those who confess that Jesus is Lord are children of destiny. Every day. Every hour. Until Jesus returns or we go to be with Him.

And so we are back to the beginning beloved. Pray continuously that God would wrench this enemy from Val's body to His praise and glory. He never tires or grows weary of repetition.

Godspeed