It’s weird to think of having cancer because I’ve never been really sick. Until 3 weeks ago, I took no medicine. Until 3 weeks ago, I had really not experienced pain. I had a chat with my niece this week. She called to see how I was doing. We had been talking about what we had learned from the Mayo doctors and what they were recommending. After about 10 minutes, she asked me how I could be calm about having cancer and getting chemo. I told her about Job. Then I told her a little bit about Jesus.
Job. He was a man who was tested by God. He was righteous. He walked with the Lord and was faithful. So one day, Satan kind of taunted God. He accused Job of being righteous and faithful only because God had blessed him so abundantly. You see, Job was healthy, he had a beautiful family, he was successful, and he was wealthy. In response to Satan’s challenge, God allowed Satan to cause all kinds of bad things to happen to Job. He lost his family and all his possessions and money. Then Job developed a super-painful skin condition so now, that one thing he still had—his health—was gone. What a terrible situation! Everything he had—it was all gone. Satan fully expected Job to turn on God. He thought Job would totally give up on God, turn away from Him, and ditch all faith in God. So how did Job respond? He said, “The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21). Incredible, right? Instead of losing his faith, Job blessed God! Job trusted God fully and completely, no matter what the circumstances.
Jesus. I don’t think I need to tell you that Jesus suffered. He was rejected by family, He was hated by a whole bunch of people especially the Jewish leaders who were constantly after Him trying to kill Him. In the hours before Jesus was crucified, He suffered indescribable pain—He was beaten. He was whipped with a kind of whip that had sharp little bits of bone and glass embedded in the leather so that it caused deep wounds, then He had iron nails like railroad spikes pounded through His wrists and feet. More than that, Jesus suffered the wrath of God because He took the punishment for all the sins of believers for all time on Himself. He suffered total separation from God the Father, a pain beyond our comprehension. Did you know this: before any of this took place, Jesus knew exactly what would happen. He knew all this pain was coming His way. And He still didn’t run away. He accepted the pain and took the wrath of God to pay the penalty for believers’ sin, delivering all who put their faith in Jesus from this pain and spiritual death. He was completely calm in the face of all this. He never fought back. He didn’t try to argue His way out. He didn’t claim that it was unfair even though it was. He calmly accepted what God the Father had willed for Him. Jesus trusted God fully and completely.
I explained about Job and Jesus to my niece. Job’s faith in God did not waver. His faith was calm and sure. Jesus’s faith never wavered. He trusted God no matter what. I do cry sometimes about my cancer. Sometimes they are tears of sadness, sometimes tears of tiredness over dealing with all this medical stuff and all the pain. But they are never tears of fear. I trust God. No matter what happens, I know my Savior and He knows me. And I do pray… I pray to remain faithful, and I pray for strength. I also remind myself of the many trials, the pain that so many people in the Bible experienced. If you need a Bible, or if you’d like to talk about this kind of calm and peace of Job and Jesus, give me a call.
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