September 25, 2005
My Journey with Cancer

Trials can cause us to be bitter or better

My big calendar inside my room tells me that it has been eight months since I was diagnosed with invasive breast cancer. My nails still bear the dark marks of the chemicals from various combinations of drugs they used for my chemotherapy. The modified radical mastectomy left an indelible mark in my body, but the scar is only a reminder that everything has changed. My hair is now more than an inch long, sometimes I bare them to people close to me, but to avoid unwanted glares, I still wear my wig inside the classroom, when I go shopping or eat in public places. But some of my eyelashes and eyebrows have failed to grow back again. They deserted me during and after the successive chemotherapy treatment. I look at the mirror, and breathe the word Patience. Sometimes, Cancer is an instrument to change a person, outwardly and inwardly. Depending on how we take it.

Dr. Harold Sala, in one of his many inspirational books said that trial is like a whirlwind that picks up an object, that when you finally hit the ground, you are not in the same person. Trials can cause us to grow bitter or better.
Bitterness leaves a bitter taste. It is worse than cancer. It eats up the mind, the heart, the body and the spirit. It is persistent and never allows you to breathe. It lurks in the dark alleys of the mind, looking for company. It makes your heart grow weary, tired, critical and unforgiving. If you allow bitterness to live a single moment inside your system, it begins to invade all the good things inside you. Then as days pass by, it becomes a monster that controls your whole being. And eventually we die inside.
We become enslaved by bitterness that we look at the ugly side of life most of the time. We become bystanders and watchers instead of doers. To become a critical person one does not require a degree. All you have to do is find all the faults in this whole wide imperfect world and feel miserable. It does not take some qualification to nurture all the negative feelings of self-pity, anger, resentment, envy and many more.
Many times in this journey, I am tempted to feel that way. Self pity, depression and anger could easily find their way to those who are sick and suffering, to those who are physically healthy but hurting inside and to those who feel like they were abandoned by the Creator and left to die in misery and pain.
But looking back on how I have been sustained by God, there is no room for bitterness.
When one is told that she has a malignant tumor and that is cancer, and she may not live longer than she thought she feels like everything is about to end. She will miss the big game. There will be no more place for dreams. Tomorrow is filled of uncertainties. Everyone is passing away, but to know that your turn is imminent, it makes a lot of difference.
Cancer can be cruel and devastating, but it has allowed me to get a closer look at pain and God. I realized that in the most trying and painful times, no one, except God could accompany us into that certain threshold known only to the one who experiences it. That moment becomes so private between the mortal and His creator.. In those moments, I understood why He had to become flesh. Why he had to be crucified. Why he had to undergo such a horrible death. He had to be in the flesh to identify with my pain, with all our pains… It wasn’t enough for Him to die for our sins. But the way He chose to die shook me. Yes I am in pain too, a lowly mortal and sinner, but with all the amenities of modern medicine, painkillers, doctors and nurses, family, friends and relatives who are willing to give all the comfort I needed. While He, who is supposed to be the King of kings, took my place. Jesus knew that empathy could not be learned in expensive universities. One had to undergo pain, to identify with those who are in the same boat. Only then, does real compassion come. My situation is nothing compared to what He had been through. How then could I feel abandoned? Who would die for a friend?
If we desire His presence so acutely, He never fails us. I have learned that He yearns for that intimacy of personal relationship. But we could only attain that if we believe that He died for us, regardless of who we are. In John 3:16 Jesus says, “For God so loved the world that he gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
These assurances keep me alive and joyful inspite of cancer. I know that we are special in His sight. That we have a God who loves us so much that He died for us. He works in the nightshift. He doesn’t sleep. His line is not busy. He loves to be disturbed. He wants to be present wherever we are. He loves to be in our conversations, in our healthy times and sickness, in poverty and in abundance. Lets thank Him in washing dirty dishes, because that means He gave us food to eat, doing our laundry reminds us that He clothes us.
In the story of the Prince and the Pauper, they look alike that one day they decided to trade places. So the prince ha the first hand experience to become a pauper and the pauper tasted how it is to live like a prince. We are more or less like that. Jesus traded places with us because of His love.
Cancer can kill the body, but it cannot diminish eternal life.