Because I firmly believe that God uses all my circumstances for my good and His glory, I am on the lookout for what He is teaching me through this cancer journey. Believe me, I don’t want to have to repeat this class!
So, with Easter approaching, I’ve been thinking about what the gospel has to say in the face of cancer. We know that Jesus has conquered the grave, that we who know Him will one day reign with Him, and that we no longer need to fear physical death. But is there more? What about the reality of living with cancer, its treatments and side effects, and the fear of the future?
My son Henry loves The Jesus Storybook Bible, and especially the videos that go with it. Who am I kidding – I love them just as much as he does! He’s been asking to watch the story “where Jesus dies on the cross” a lot this year, and a particular phrase in this story stuck out to me:
Jesus is making all sad things come untrue.
Let that sink in for a few minutes. Because we live in a sinful, fallen world, we are surrounded by sadness. We live with the reality of death, cancer, broken families, hatred, racism, and so many more terrible things.
But because of God’s wonderful “rescue plan” found in the person of Jesus, ALL of these “sad things” will someday be a thing of the past! Because of the events of the first Easter weekend, we have hope for the future, but we also have hope for today! God is working in my present reality – the cancer itself, and the side effects from the chemo.
Illnesses like cancer can cause us to lose hope. It’s a disease that is difficult to beat, eventually taking over every part of the human body if left untreated. We have no natural defenses against it. Chemo can often be worse than the actual diagnosis, killing healthy cells as it tries to kill the cancer cells. Living in that ever-present reality is more than hard.
But God had a plan from the beginning of the world. He knew about cancer when he first formed the earth and placed Adam and Eve in the garden. He knew about all of the other diseases we would fight, about all the evil that would fill the earth. And from that very beginning, Jesus was His perfect plan to give us hope.
So, this Easter, let’s be encouraged with this: God knows all the hurts in the world. He knows about my cancer, and He knows about whatever evil you are facing. And He is weaving the Story together and making all the sad things come untrue.
All of them.
And the King says, ‘Look! God and his children are together again. No more running away. Or hiding. No more crying or being lonely or afraid. No more being sick or dying. Because all those things are gone. Yes, they’re gone forever. Everything sad has come untrue.’ ~ Paraphrase from Revelation 21, Sally Lloyd-Jones in The Jesus Storybook Bible
What sad thing is God making untrue in your life?
Published April 3, 2015
