Wayne Jacobsen

This is part ten of our continuing story of Alan and Lynn that began as In the Shadow of Death. Now Lynn has passed away from metastasized breast cancer in the face of a promise they both held in their hearts for her healing. Alan is left to deal not only with his grief, but his view of a God he was certain would heal her.

You can read from the beginning starting here.

From Alan July 22, 2019 (87 days after first email):

I’ve been trying to understand what you’re saying, and I guess I so want there to be a benefit to having a God as opposed to not having one. I find myself clinging to Scripture that seems to impart black and white promises, but at the same time totally befuddled that the promise does not seem to actually work. “If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, you shall ask what you will, and it will be done for you.” No qualifiers. No, “Yeah, but…” Just the King of Kings making a statement. But it did not work for Lynn and me. I am convinced that we both abided in Him and that His word abided in us. So, either that is not black and white, or I don’t understand what Jesus meant, or something is amiss in what Christianity is offering. I’m not ready to deduce that Christianity is not true—I hope I am going to Heaven when I die—although I think I told you I have a fear of having committed the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit when I was a kid.

But we really have no assurance of anything else. Scripture says that the promises of God are yes and amen in Christ Jesus. What does that mean for someone whose wife is dying and believing that those promises are yes and amen—including the healing ones—only to have her die in front of him?

Our (I’m still using us and our) pastor’s wife is a cancer survivor. He prayed for Lynn and ministered to us in extraordinary ways. Suddenly we got the news in church that his wife had to have emergency surgery to remove a tumor from her head and that there is cancer in her lungs. He was serving communion and reminding the church that “by His stripes, we are healed,” and I did not mean to be cynical, but I said under my breath, “Lord, I hope it works for him.” My heart is breaking for him and what his family has to go through again after having beaten it once years ago.

I’m not sure how to pray anymore for people when I used to be a prayer warrior, fervently storming heaven with a strong faith in Scriptures’ promises. Now, I just can’t because I know that there is not the weight that I used to believe was in those verses. God may or may not answer my prayers regardless of what the Bible says, so why bother? I know that is not an attitude I need to have, especially as one trying to live the call of God out in ministering to others.

I miss Lynn terribly. I have had three occasions this past week wherein I had fallen asleep on the couch after work, and I woke up suddenly with the strong impression that I had to get things ready because Lynn was going to be home from work soon. Then, of course, the brutal reality set in once I was fully awake. I guess this is normal when grieving.

Reading your answer to my why-pray question makes me see the faith as kind of a downer—sort of a “better get what he wants right” mentality. I have discovered the grace and love of God and do not see him that way. I see him as coming to give life and life more abundantly. And I know that Satan comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I guess he killed Lynn, stole Lynn from me and destroyed our marriage. You would say, “No! No! No!” But I sure do not see much life and life more abundantly in my precious bride dying of cancer and going through the suffering she did. I do not see how the grace and love of God fit into this.

Can I be blunt? People say, “God will get you through.” “Turn to Him.” Yet, Wayne, he is the one who allowed Lynn to die, who did not grant our requests for healing. How can I find solace there?

I’m sorry. I guess I should be getting it by now. Eight and a half weeks and I’m still asking and saying cynical things. I’m sorry.

My Response:

Please don’t be sorry. I appreciate what you are going through, and honesty is the only way to grow through all of this.

This is all part of the grieving process, for sure. Eight and a half weeks is nothing. I’ve woken up overseas, not remembering where I was and turned toward Sara only to be reminded, she was a few thousand miles away. Waking up is being reminded of reality again. I’m so sorry you’re going through it. Death of a beloved spouse or child is as painful as it gets in this world, which means we only need him even more. I’m so sorry your past theology is not serving you well here. It’s not the best time to look beyond it, with all the grief you’re facing, but there is a way to view all this that will make your sorrow less dominating.

The benefit to having God at times like this is so that we can draw on his strength, wisdom, and presence to help us navigate through the brokenness of this world. If he just gave us everything we wanted, then we would be our own god and he our servant, and the world would make no sense at all. He does have your best interests at heart, and though that’s hard to believe when our most noble expectations have been disappointed, it is nonetheless true.

He is at work in this horrific situation to work good out of what the enemy intended for evil. I sat with the widow of my best friend, who passed away over ten years ago. She said that as hard as losing her husband has been, she is grateful for all God has done in her heart through it. “I am a different person now,” she said, “and I’m so grateful not that he died, but what he has changed in me.” Lynn’s passing is not the end for you, either. God has life and joy ahead.

As to your question, we do look at these Scriptures very differently. There’s not much in our reasoning that is so clearly black and white, when it comes to how God works. We have tried to teach people “certainty” from Scripture for the last couple of centuries and have lost the mystery of a transcendent God. “If you abide in me and my words abide in you…” is the most significant qualifier ever. I know you think you have that down. I used to think I did, too, but there may be a great lesson in these words. Instead of asking for whatever we want and thinking Scripture is false if we don’t get it, perhaps we could see that as an encouragement to lean into him more deeply. It’s not a lack of love on his part, but a lack of perspective on ours. And I don’t mean by that that we weren’t close enough to get the miracle we wanted but to see a larger purpose unfolding in his reality, even in our pain and disappointment. I have nowhere else to go when my hopes are disappointed. His love is the only sure thing in the universe, and when I start there, I can see how he works good out of everything, even the things I find abhorrent.

I don’t see his “word abiding in us” as referring to my understanding of the Scriptures. He’s referring to us living inside his purpose as he reveals it inside our growing relationship. That’s the wider context of Scripture. God is not here to give us everything we want, but to draw us into his reality so we can be shaped by his purpose. That’s where the fullness of joy comes in a broken world. And yes, I know those words sound hollow now. Can there be any joy without Lynn? Yes, there can, and there will be. She was a part of your life for a long season; she has a legacy in your heart that will last your whole life long. But there is life abundant beyond her presence. Yes, impossible to see now, but I’ve seen him do it in tragedies like this with so many people. All our dreams were never going to be fulfilled here. The cry in our hearts is for eternity. Life here is a brief snippet of all God wants for both of you.

I don’t think Jesus meant to promise all of us that as long as we were good Christians and knew the Scriptures well, we could claim whatever we want and he would get it, even if we think it is something clearly promised in Scripture. That has never worked for anyone I’ve ever known. I don’t think it worked in the New Testament, either. Remember, Jesus only did the things he saw the Father doing. His power came from the work of the Spirit inside of him. He wasn’t claiming promises; he was being carried by the wind of the Spirit. The larger context of Scripture is always how we learn to trust our Creator and live inside of his unfolding purpose on a fallen planet. God hasn’t promised to give us everything we’d ever want. If that were true, Christians would be wealthy, never be sick, and none of them would have ever died.

“By his stripes, we are healed,” is not a guarantee of physical healing whenever we can work the keys right. Of course, it includes healing here, which I believe in and have witnessed, but it also includes the ultimate healing of freedom from these broken bodies, and from the war of flesh and spirit. Lynn is completely healed today in a way that your spirit still yearns to experience. She didn’t get second best. Can you even imagine what she saw the moment she opened her eyes in eternity? I doubt she’d want to come back here even if she could. And, she also knows how all this pain in your heart is transforming something in you that will bear great fruit for the kingdom in which she now dwells. I’m sure, too, she’s looking forward to the day you show up there, but there’s no impatience now in her.

And honestly, how often did people get the miracle they wanted when you were “a prayer warrior, fervently storming heaven with a strong faith in the Scriptures.” I used to live there too until I saw what happened to those I prayed for who didn’t get the miracle they hoped for? I know many went away doubting God, or themselves, or the truth of Scripture. Things really come into focus when you have a stake in the outcome. This can all be an amazing place of growth for you. God doesn’t become less real when we don’t get all we want, but even more real and we become part of his purpose in the world as partners in the process. This world isn’t about our comfort or even external happiness, but the deeper joy of being connected to him regardless of what this broken world hurls our way.

I never assume I know what God wants with any degree of certainty. I’ve been wrong too many times. I listen and follow as best I can each day and learn what I can of the ways in which God works so that I can flow with him. Prayer is that process of discerning, and the outcome of our circumstances is part of that as well. It’s not about God “may or may not answer” the way Scripture seems to say. He always answers true to his nature and purpose. All his promises are real but in ways far grander than we can see as limited as we are in space, time, and wisdom.

This world is a war zone. Not everything happens the way God would want it to. Free will, evil, the enemy are also all in play, and though God eventually wins over them all, those enemies are still being subdued under his feet. You know I don’t believe that God “allowed” Lynn to die. I don’t think God makes choices like that the way we see it from our limited perspective. If we could see it through his eyes, the landscape would be entirely different. I know what it looks like to you, I just don’t think it’s true. I can’t draw all the logical lines here; I simply trust the one who has captured my heart, who loves me more than anyone else ever has, and will bring everything together under the authority of his Son.

Hang in there, my friend. All of this is doing good work in you, but like the seed shooting roots into the soil, not much of it is visible right now. Don’t assume you know the outcome and try to protect yourself with conclusions you’re not ready to reach yet. He is having his work in you, and though it is through great pain, it will set you free in ways you can’t imagine yet.

When people ask me, “How did you get where you are today in your walk with Christ?” my answer is always, “Kicking and screaming!” In my younger days, I wanted God to be different than he turned out to be, but I discovered that he is way better than the one I wanted him to be. I think Paul described it as “far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think.” That’s what you’re discovering now. The side you’re on now is painful because it’s not what you were taught or what you want. But the other side of it will become truly wondrous. Things will begin to make more sense as God transits your life through the brokenness of this world and into the glorious freedom he always wanted for you.

Then you’ll see all those promises you quote in a very different light. They are not untrue; they are more accurate than you can imagine at this point.

To be continued…

Read on to Part Eleven here.

[If you’d like to receive this series in your email inbox when they are posted, simply fill in your email address in the box at the upper right of this page: “Receive Blog Posts via Email.”]

This is part nine of our continuing story of Alan and Lynn that began as In the Shadow of Death. Now Lynn has passed away from metastasized breast cancer in the face of a promise they both held in their hearts for her healing. Alan is left to deal not only with his grief, but his view of a God he was certain would heal her.

You can read from the beginning starting here.

From Alan July 8, 2019 (73 days after first email):

To be continued…

Read on to Part Ten here.

[If you’d like to receive this series in your email inbox when they are posted, simply fill in your email address in the box at the upper right of this page: “Receive Blog Posts via Email.”]

This is part eight of our continuing story of Alan and Lynn that began as In the Shadow of Death. Now Lynn has passed away from metastasized breast cancer in the face of a promise they both held in their hearts for her healing. Alan is left to deal not only with his grief, but his view of a God he was certain would heal her.

You can read from the beginning starting here.

From Alan June 22, 2019 (57 days after first email):

I am hoping we will stay in relationship even if there comes a time when I am “ok.” God has used you more than anyone else to help me, and I appreciate it more than I can say.

Today is one month since Lynn died. I have been weeping again and crying out to God. My eyes seem to be opening more and more to how wonderful Lynn was and how much she loved God. I knew what I had as far back as when I first fell for her in the mid-1980s. I knew she loved God deeply, but I am learning as I read some of her devotionals just how much she adored Him. And I am seeing how much she loved me. So I am still in whatever the grief experts would call the weeping and wailing stage. The reality of how permanent this is, is like a well-placed punch in the face, landing squarely over and over.

Wayne, I do not know if I can do this. I need her so desperately, yet I cannot feel her hand in mine, cannot hear loving words of encouragement, and cannot look into her big brown eyes, lit up with her smile that captivated my heart so many years ago.

I’m not ignoring your encouragement. I read it over and over. Today I’m having a horrible time as I realize that this is my reality now – single, widowed, alone.

Yeah boy!

My response: 

Yes, you’re only a month into this process. In grief time, that is barely a blip, unfortunately. Let the tears flow. Hold your grief on the lap of a loving Father. Celebrate her life as best you can. Look back at the joys of having known her, not at the unknown future without her. One will help you heal, the other will drive you to despair.

Have you noticed that imagining what our futures will be like, is never helpful? For one, we’re mostly wrong. The future is always unknown. Certainly, Lynn won’t be there, but you have no idea yet what will be—how God will make himself known to you and what gifts he will yet pour into your life. I heard one man say that the reason we are so stressed and in pain about our future is because humans cannot imagine grace. So, when you contemplate the future, do you notice how alone you are in it—not just without Lynn, but also without any real understanding of how God will be with you in whatever circumstances come.

Grace can only be assimilated one day at a time. Do you have enough for this day? Tomorrow will be another challenge, and there will be grace for that one. And the next, and the next. Take it in one-day bites, not trying to find all you need for all the potential outcomes of life from here on out. You can’t try to live the feared challenges of tomorrow on today’s grace. We’re not built that way. Again, nothing about this took God by surprise. He has whatever it will take to heal the wounds of her passing and still give you a hope and a future.

Alan, I’m so sorry for what you’re going through and don’t know that I would negotiate it any better if my wife had passed a month ago. However, I am concerned that you talk about her as if you’ve lost your God, the only source of love and support, and are hopeless without her. Is it possible that somehow her memory is supplanting God’s presence with you, or at least the hope that there are joy and life to be lived beyond her? If I were talking to a married couple that expressed this kind of dependency, I would consider the relationship unhealthy. If we want our spouse to be all the things that God said he would be to us, then we’re missing out on the greatest gift in the universe. Lynn was a great gift, but she is not the greatest gift. Are you thinking much about that? Have you elevated Lynn to a place in your heart that only God can fill? It may just be your grief talking, but that’s what I’ve heard in the last couple of emails.

Your reality might be “single, widowed, and alone” in a human sense, but you are far from alone. If you define your life by those three words, they will own you. Though the first two are real enough, the last one is not, and if you focus there, it will drown you. You are not alone. You are the beloved son of a gracious Father, who is also Maker of heaven and earth, and who has adventures still to share with you in this life.

You’re a father, whose kids desperately need a dad to love them, and you’re a follower of Christ with hope to speak to others who are in pain they don’t think they will survive. My prayer is that in the grief, you see the light at the end of the tunnel. Your life is not over here; it’s just changed. You had 25 years or so of a great gift, and hopefully, that gift made you a better person and will benefit you in days to come.

More of your treasure is in heaven now, that is for sure. But the greatest treasure—Christ in you—still lives on. Methinks there’s more to discover there that will help you through this season.

From Alan June 24, 2019 (59 days after first email):

I appreciate your pointing out that I may be focusing too much on Lynn. Thank you for feeling comfortable enough, for being honest. I’ve thought about this all day and what I believe is coming out is what I first started with – a severe feeling of disappointment and of being let down by God. I have started trying to receive His love again and have been praising Him when I think to, but as I wrote before, I feel like I have suffered a huge punch to my spiritual face. Still, I am asking that He reveal His great love to me again.

You helped me begin to give my theology a re-think, but I am still wondering things like, “What is the use of praying if God is not going to answer?” I’m still not past the nagging thought that He could have intervened but chose not to…how can I look to Him for comfort in something He allowed to happen? Not to be irreverent, but it’s like saying, “Wayne, I didn’t deposit your paycheck as you asked. Now, tell me how bouncing checks, as a result, messes up your finances.”

You wrote that somehow he could not give me the answered prayer I desired. But, what of “If you abide in me and my words abide in you, you shall ask what you will, and it shall be done for you?” What of, “By His stripes, we are healed?” Like I said previously, there are so many affirmative verses, Scriptures that lead to a climactic, “The promises of God are yes and amen in Christ Jesus.” That sounds like “If God is supposed to be for us, who can be against us?” In other words, there should be something we can count on in the Word without having to default to, “Well, His ways are higher.” Or, “We live in a fallen world.”

I have been chewing on what you wrote about creation and this broken world. It is unlike anything I have ever read. I think you are right. But there are also things like this paragraph in a daily devotion I received this morning from Joseph Prince: “My friend, don’t fix your eyes on how much or how little faith you have. Fix your eyes on the One who loves you, who has already given you what you need. When you come to Him, simply believe that He is waiting to meet your expectation. He will say to you, “Go your way; and as you have believed, so let it be done for you.”

Wayne, there has to be room for faith and expectation and answered prayer. I know God is not our genie. But he has promised an awful lot to “him who believes.”

Please don’t get weary of my struggle. I really do study and meditate on what you write to me because I believe God put you in my life to help me get through this nightmare. I thank God for you.

And a day later, before I could respond, Alan wrote this brief email:

I have felt terrible since sending you that cynical, doubt-filled response. I apologize. I want to sense God’s love and grace again and even in greater measure than ever before. I will try not to let my pain dictate my belief and/or how I respond.

My response: 

Don’t feel terrible about asking honest questions, especially ones that arise with pain. How else will we learn when God identifies the illusions in our theology if we can’t ask the honest question and seek him for answers? That is not cynical or doubt-filled; that’s reality, a place where the Spirit loves to work because that means you and Father have some sorting out to do.

I think it takes more faith to ask God the brutal questions than it is to pretend to believe things that are not real in our heart. And don’t worry that I will tire of you. I think Father has had something for us in this conversation that will touch others as well, and that makes it easy to give my time to it.

Now let me try to respond to your previous email.

I wasn’t trying to get you to not focus on Lynn. That would be like telling you not to think about an orange. That’s all you would think about. Instead, as you think about Lynn, let God move you from how much you’ve lost, to how much of a treasure she was. Be grateful for all she added to your life and that you got to share together. But also look beyond her to the Father who loves you far more than she did. All that you need to get through each day is in him, and far more. He has encouragement, affirmation, wisdom, and joy for you to discover still. It will take some time, but he wants to be the source of your life.

You quote a familiar litany of verses from which it is easy to conclude that getting the answer we want in prayer is a transaction. If I do this, God will do that. But it rarely works that way, so don’t we have to wonder if it was ever meant to? Would Jesus just say those things to torture us, or do they all hang on deeper realities with less certain outcomes? At the heart of these issues is what it truly means to believe in Jesus.

Take the Joseph Prince quote, for instance. Jesus is already looking at a specific individual, in this case, the centurion. He knows what he wants and affirms he has his answer. We take that and extract a principle that if we just believe as he did, we’ll get our answer too. That’s what is so dangerous about this kind of teaching from those who claim to preach the Scriptures. We tell them what they want to hear, but don’t tell them the truth and leave them to be disillusioned when it doesn’t work out the way they wanted.

Just because we believe hard for something we want, doesn’t mean it will happen. That’s not what Scripture teaches. Our belief is not vested in things; it is vested in him. We believe in him, which is not the same as believing him for the things I want or think I should have.

One of my favorite lines these days I’ll be using in a future book is Jesus saying to someone, “I simply showed you what was real, and you dared to believe me.” That’s what belief is. It isn’t trying to achieve our preferred reality and getting Jesus to help us. It isn’t a creedal assent to the nature of Jesus or expressing our conviction that he is trustworthy. Believing in Jesus is believing his view of the reality we live in. Remember when Peter confesses that Jesus is the Christ the Son of the Living God, and then two paragraphs later, he is arguing with Jesus about going to the cross. He believed he was the Son of God but didn’t believe Jesus when he spoke about what was about to happen. “Believe in him” without believing him, is just so much religious gobbledygook.

He wants me to believe his reality. I know you both thought you’d been promised Lynn’s healing. If you had, it would have happened. Part of the way we learn to follow him is realizing, we get it wrong sometimes. I have wanted things so badly, I convince myself that he wanted it to turn out that way, even though everything kept pointing to a different outcome. I don’t believe that was because Jesus didn’t want to heal her or made a choice not to; she was a casualty of the brutal war between fallenness and the coming kingdom. Seemingly you both got far longer than you otherwise would have, which is a testimony of his working. Sadly, however, you didn’t get all you wanted. I have no idea why, but a God that “allows” such things is not the God of the Bible. Somehow it was a consequence of other things we can’t see or part of a higher purpose. Sometimes we get to know, sometimes we don’t, but what doesn’t change is my trust in him in all the realities I experience.

All those answered prayer Scriptures are predicated on our being inside him and his unfolding purpose in the world. Abiding in his words is not just reading Scriptures, but believing what he says about the people and situations I am in. It’s steeping myself in his reality and the way he thinks so that I’m a partner of his in his unfolding work. ‘By his stripes, we are healed”, is not the prooftext that Christians don’t have to get sick or stay sick. It’s a statement of the reality of his kingdom that will bring healing to us all and the greater cosmos through his suffering. Some of that happens in this world; some of it happens in the next. This is the tension between the kingdom come, and the kingdom-yet-to-come. Currently, we live in a war zone. There are casualties just because of the gravity of darkness and evil in the world. But by his stripes, we will all be healed, isn’t about disease alone, but redemption, transformation, and ultimate freedom from sin and evil. It’s incomplete in this realm; it won’t be in the next.

What’s the use of praying if he’s not going to answer? He does answer, though not always with what we want. We don’t pray to get God to do what we want, but to tune our hearts to his wants. It’s to listen and where he shows us to exercise our role as his joint-heir to help bring it into being. But that doesn’t mean we’ll always get it right, that each of us is promised 85 years of sickness-free living. It just has never worked that way, which means we have twisted Scriptures to try to say that. Part of listening to him is seeing how circumstances play out. If he tells me he will heal someone if I pray and he does, that’s awesome. If I think he tells me that and in praying they don’t get healed, then I have to conclude I missed something there. He doesn’t change. I believe him and that he is bigger than how any circumstance turns out.

Where I feel let down by him is only a result of my limited perspective. He never lets us down. He’s always working for the highest good, which doesn’t always fit what we want. He’s my refuge to run to when I’m disappointed, frustrated, and angry. His love is the only certain reality in my life. Everything else is negotiable, but when I begin to doubt his love for me and his greatness in the universe, I start to sink into the despair of the enemy’s lies. I can fail. Others can fail me. I can be confused and disappointed, but the one thing I have known for the last twenty-five years is that I am deeply loved by the God of the universe and I am learning more every day how to believe his view of reality instead of my own. When I know how he does his work, I can better understand how to participate with him.

All is not lost, Alan. You’ve suffered a horrible blow, not only taking your wife from you but now meant to devour your faith and render you spiritually impotent for the rest of your days. However, God has better ideas for you. He gave you a fantastic gift for twenty-five years. For reasons we won’t know here, this was her time, and now you get to grieve her loss in your life. God understands your pain to the core. He hates death, too. Remember, it is the last great enemy he has yet to destroy, and we’re all going to go through it short of his coming again. But then, no more. Death will no longer hold sway over us.

So, when the time is right, you’ll be able to shake off the hurt, celebrate the joy of Lynn’s gift in your life, and join Jesus yet again on the battlefield only to discover that this, too, will make you stronger in his hands, freer in this life, and gentler in your ways.

To be continued…

Read on to Part Nine here.

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This is part seven of our continuing story of Alan and Lynn that began as In the Shadow of Death. Now Lynn has passed away from metastasized breast cancer in the face of a promise they both held in their hearts for her healing. Alan is left to deal not only with his grief, but his view of a God he was certain would heal her.

You can read from the beginning starting here.

Read on to Part Eight here.

[If you’d like to receive this series in your email inbox when they are posted, simply fill in your email address in the box at the upper right of this page: “Receive Blog Posts via Email.”]

We’ve switched the headline, but the story continues. This is part 6 of our continuing story of Alan and Lynn. Now that Lynn has passed away due to metastasized breast cancer, Alan is left to deal not only with his grief, but his view of a God he was certain would heal her.

You can read from the beginning starting here.

To be continued…

Read on to Part Seven here. 

[If you’d like to receive this series in your email inbox when they are posted, simply fill in your email address in the box at the upper right of this page: “Receive Blog Posts via Email.”]

This is a continuing email exchange between Wayne and a man who is struggling with healing, faith, love, trust, and mortality as his wife appears to be dying from metastasized breast cancer in the face of a promise they both held in their hearts for her healing.

You can read from the beginning starting here.

From Alan on May 21, 2019 (25 days after his first email):

Thank you for words of life. They are truly helping me. I read them and peace just “happens,” and for that, I am most grateful.

The past few days have been interesting. I have convinced myself at times that the reason she is “lingering” is that God is healing her. I realize that He can heal her in a millisecond, but it helps me to think that He is putting her back into a state of complete health.

I do wonder what in the world is going on? But, as you said, God is doing something. Maybe someday He will make it all clear, or maybe not.

I guess one just has to decide whether or not they truly believe that God is good. While all the pain, frustration, and lack of explanations are real, they do not knock us off the rock upon which we are standing that is labeled, “God is good.”

I think I mentioned to you that I struggle with all the affirmative Scriptures – “If any two of you agree” “Anything you ask in my name” “By His stripes we are healed” that somehow wind up with caveats or disclaimers like, “If it is His will” that are not included in the particular Scripture. It’s like God gets let off the hook because we do not understand the true meaning of a verse or its context, or we have not exegeted it properly.

I’m not trying to be irreverent or ugly toward God in expressing this frustration; it’s just a real issue at this time. May I let you in on something: Years ago, I believe that while having a conversation with the Lord as I was driving, He revealed to me why Jesus was beaten. You see, neither Leviticus nor any of the other books that outline the specific instructions God Himself gave regarding the Day of Atonement—wherein the sins of God’s people were dealt with for another season—say anything about beating the sacrifice. On the contrary, the sacrifice was to be without blemish.

So why was the Lamb of God beaten? Obviously, you know the answer that is in Isaiah 53–“by His stripes, we are healed.” Peter also mentions this wonderful truth. I believe that Jesus could have said to Pilate, “You can crucify me, but you are definitely not whipping me,” and sin would still have been cleansed. It is so clear to me that He allowed Himself, the Lamb of God, to go through that horrific beating so that we can be healed. So, that we as His beloved children can know Him as “I am the God that heals you.”

I believe that the Holy Spirit said to me as I was driving, “People get healed the same way they get saved or born-again: “You have to believe.” Just as if we confess with our mouths, the Lord Jesus, and if we believe in our hearts that God has raised Him from the dead (Romans 10), we shall be saved. I believe that this is how we receive the reality of “by His stripes, we are healed.” Not everyone is saved because not everyone believes. Not everyone is healed, because not everyone believes. (Not saying that in any condemning way whatsoever).

On my ministry website, I have an entire podcast about Isaiah 53 and all that Christ endured for us that is in addition to our salvation. I relate this to you so you can know that this is the belief that I had going into this cancer-journey with Lynn when she was diagnosed with Stage 4 metastatic breast cancer three days before Christmas, 2014. To be completely transparent, now I have to re-think what I believe. Maybe it was not the Holy Spirit whispering to me what I thought was Him teaching me about healing.

Lynn has beaten the odds repeatedly. From a “2-3 month” death sentence that has turned into four years and five months and who knows how much longer, to the “She has 2-3 days to live” death sentence that the hospice folks pronounced at the beginning of February when we called them in. My sister gave me Psalm 107:20 back in January 2015 – “He sent his word and healed them, and rescued them from the grave,” as a verse to hold onto when this all began. She is a fighter, but more than that, God has allowed her to live. I am very grateful for that and don’t want to seem ungrateful because I am having a crisis in an area of my faith.

Wayne, during a Sunday morning worship time a few years ago, God showed me a cave in a vision. In that vision, death appeared and tried to walk out of the cave, and God punched him right in the face, and he fled back into the darkness of the cave. Lynn reminded me of that vision a couple of months ago, when I voiced some trepidation about the diagnosis of having tumors in one’s brain. She asked me if I really believed what I have been saying I believe for several years? (Wives are good at putting us on the spot like that).

I wanted you to know that I have invested a lot of my personal, strongly-held beliefs in His appropriating healing for us through the Lamb of God’s having been beaten for our healing. Do I stop believing that? Do I stop preaching that? I know that His ways are higher than ours and that it is dangerous to develop a theology on personal experience, but I want so much for it “to work” and to be able to say, “Yes! By His stripes, she has been healed!! It works! It’s true!”

I don’t want to have to say, “Well, I guess I was wrong,” or “God is sovereign, and He knows what is best.” Of course, He is and does.

I am determined that He is good. My life’s mission that He gave to me is to share the eternal, passionate, unconditional love of God. But, most sincerely and transparently that I can be, I confess to you that this is the hardest thing I have ever been through. I don’t understand it. I don’t like it. It sucks!!!!!!!!!

I love Lynn more than I can even begin to say. Yet it jolts me that so much of my thoughts and fear of being without her is filled with selfishness. “Alan’s beliefs.” “Alan’s faith tested.” “What is Alan going to do without his Lynn?”

We have settled into the bottom of the ninth inning with two outs. It’s either God does a miracle, or she steps into Heaven. Each further decline brings a fresh tsunami of tears and waves of that selfish fear. In between those times, I hold her as best as her frail body will allow, tell her not to fear, and say, “I’ve walked you to the door of the other side. You can step through whenever you are ready. I will be ok.” (I also said, “Tell Jesus I said hey,” which made her smile a little.)

Again, as you have said, she is either not quite ready to go, or the healing is about to explode here on earth.

Before I could finish my response, Alan wrote again one day later:

I was with Lynn today as her breath became labored and then went away.

I believe the Lord let me know when she was close to crossing to the other side, so as I have before, I took her hand and said, “I’m taking you to the door, don’t be afraid, just step through.”

It took her a while after that, but then I saw in the Spirit that she was actually stepping over a stream to the other side into the loving arms of Jesus. She was so covered that I could not see her, just Him holding her, enveloping her with His love. (She has been wearing socks for weeks, and in my vision, I saw someone remove her socks, and she was so thrilled to be barefoot. Someone told her it was ok to splash in the stream, and she was having a fun time before she stepped to Jesus).

Wayne, I’m more devastated than I can say – Scripture says we became one flesh—my heart has been violently ripped in two.

But I am also happy she is no longer in pain, and that she is in Heaven, cancer-free. I asked her to wait for me, to look for me, and to tell Jesus I said, “Hey.”

Now, what do I do?

My response:

I have some things that might help in response to your past two emails, but now there is nothing to say except I am so, so sorry that you did not get the miracle you wanted and have lost your Lynn. This news was a stab in my heart, even though I didn’t know Lynn. I feel like I’ve gotten to know you both over the last few weeks. My heart breaks for you and your pain in this, albeit temporary, separation from Lynn. I can’t imagine losing Sara at this stage of our journey, but even if I did, I know nothing takes our Father by surprise.

And, the strange thing about the death of a loved one is that she’s in such a space of unfathomable love in the presence of Jesus and his Father without all the distractions of flesh and distrust. You, however, are left here without her. A part of your heart has been ripped out, most certainly though it is best to have her safely home if the miracle you wanted wasn’t to be.

Somehow his purpose in this life was fulfilled in Lynn, even as Father still has things in mind for you. The loss is part of it, but God has a purpose for you in still being here. You don’t have to figure out what it is now or in any future time; it will unfold. Now is the time to grieve, to embrace God in the pain of your loss, to let him over time fill the space your wife vacated. That happens with loads of tears, and they are not proof of your lack of faith. Hold your heart before the Father. I will be praying for you, too.

From Alan on May 25, 2019 (29 days after his first email):

I am broken like a smashed vase. The reality that Lynn will never, ever be in our home again, will never be there waiting when I get home is unbearable. I realized that I have had someone to talk to every day for over 30 years, and now I am all alone. Nothing that mattered to us as a couple matters now. She’s gone. Forever. I don’t even really know what promise I have of being reunited with her in Heaven.

Lynn said she’d look for me, but now that she is in the other realm, is she finding out that is not the way it will work? I’m so overwhelmed by the permanence of death and even the suddenness of her being gone. We had a five-month runway before she was flying into eternity, and I knew her death was possible, even probable in spite of my attempt to have faith and believe for her healing here on earth. But, it feels so sudden. She’s gone. Forever. Gone. And I am feeling without hope.

My response:

I’m sorry, so sorry that you lost Lynn, and all the pain you’re going through now is a normal part of the fog grief. Invite God into this season. This is where faith really has to count, not when we get what we want, but when we don’t. I’ve known many to stand where you now stand, with all the pain and disillusionment you’re feeling, and God got them through it, and they found their way to the heights of joy even here in this world. You will never get over the loss of Lynn, but you will get on to other experiences with God, your children, and your friends.

Joy will come in the morning. It will take some time, though. Don’t despise the hurt, because it only marks the depth of your love. But don’t get stuck there either, or her memory will only bring pain and despair, and you’ll lose the ability to celebrate what you had for as long as you had her.

I have no doubt you will see her again, that the separation here is temporary and that we will see and know those we have loved in this life, most especially the one with whom we have been united in body and spirit. Fear not, my friend; she is not gone forever. She isn’t even gone now. Every treasured experience you had with her, every bit of wisdom she added to your life, every place where you were loved, lives on inside of you. You’re a different person because of her. You will always be.

Given the last email you wrote to me before her death, I knew this would be really difficult for you because it isn’t just the death of your wife, but the destruction of a theological conviction you had, that if you could “have faith and believe for healing here on earth,” she would be healed. If that is true (and I am confident it is not), then either God failed you, or you failed Lynn by not having enough faith. Either will only cause you unreconcilable pain because they are built on a false theological premise. We will talk about healing, prayers, and faith later. I had hoped to write you back about it all before Lynn died but did not get a chance to do so. I will someday, but that certainly is what’s most important now.

Just hold in your heart the possibility that your doctrine of healing may not be complete, and that God didn’t fail you, nor did you fail Lynn. This was obviously her time, and that time is coming for all of us. Her death is not the failure of your faith, but the culmination of it. God with us, even in the darkest moments of human existence, where we face full-on the futility of this age. Death is still our enemy. It is God’s enemy, too. He didn’t create us to be torn away from those we love, but that is the price of redemption. Sin had to die so that we could embrace the fullness of eternal life. It’s so rarely true that couples die together.

You will survive this and even thrive in the life Father still has ahead for you. Trust that the Jesus you’ve known all your life will fulfill your heart in ways you cannot conceive. Don’t focus too much on the questions that plague you. Just wait until his glory comes. Grieve with the Father whose heart even hurts more than youea at the toll this fallen world has taken from you. Find him there and what he does in you will become a great comfort to others. Even Paul despaired of life in a crushing experience he speaks of in II Corinthians 1. He could only make sense of it knowing the comfort they would receive in it would make them more comforting to others who traverse the Valley of the Shadow of Death.

You have my prayers and love. I’m happy to do whatever I can to hold your heart in the presence of the Father. He’s big enough to get you through this. But for now, it just hurts. I get it. Let it hurt. Don’t run from the pain; run to him in it.

To be continued…

We’ll switch the headline here, but the story continues. Read part 6 here:

Part 6:  When You Don’t Get The Miracle You Want…

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This is a continuing email exchange between Wayne and a man who is struggling with healing, faith, love, trust, and mortality as his wife appears to be dying from metastasized breast cancer in the face of a promise they both held in their hearts for her healing.

You can read from the beginning starting here.

From Alan on May 8, 2019 (12 days after the first email):

I wanted to share an amazing thing that I realized this morning: I’m not freaking out. God has taken the words you have shared with me and used them as living water that is flowing peacefully in my soul. It is as if the raging waves of emotion have heeded His command “Peace, Be still.”

Don’t get me wrong, I have wept, and prayed with all of my might. But the sense of sheer abandonment I was abiding in is slowly being replaced by His being made more real to me. I actually sense Him in a different way than I ever have before.

There is no way to sugar-coat what facing the possible death of the woman I have loved most of my life feels like. It’s a nightmare, a horror story. What’s different is that now I am a little less scared.

Lynn is smiling at me more these past couple of days. Yesterday evening she thanked me for serving her. I told her it was my honor and pleasure to do so. She grabbed me as I was leaning over the bed to better hear what she was saying and planted a big kiss on my cheek. It was awesome!

She is wanting to get up again and to try and walk. Who knows how this will play out but God? I do know that I still believe for her healing, but in a calmer way than before. His peace has invaded my faith.  We’re thankful for another day and are even more thankful for His presence that is walking with us.

Wayne’s Response:

I love this.  Evidently, she’s doing better, if she wants to try to get up.  I wish at times like this we knew what God was doing, but we almost never do. Abiding in his love and living in the uncertainty of the present is how so much of my journey has gone. This is the best place, regardless of what happens, to be “in the Spirit”. If Father brings healing your joy will be overwhelming. If she lingers awhile in the twilight of her cancer, you’ll have words to say and love to share, and if (and I pray not), this is her home going, then you’ll have the bittersweet days of watching your love be stronger than the tragedy that has beset you.

I am thankful as well for each day you have. I, too, am praying for the miracle of miracles that heals her body and gives you years and years together. And I am so grateful that Father has led you to this point in the midst of it all.

From Alan on May 11, 2019 (15 days after the first email):

Wayne, as always, thank you. Perhaps I spoke too soon about not being freaked out. I am so sad to think of her not being here. Even though she is bed-bound now, at least she is still here. We can still hold hands and talk to each other even though it’s hard for her. Of course, I hate that she has been stuck in that bed for weeks, but selfishly there is a peace in knowing she will be there to smile at me and say “Good morning.”

I have been weeping more and more because my love for her is pleading please get better, please don’t go! But, Heaven is silent, no miracles on the horizon that I can see. The emptiness and gloom that I see in my life without her are too much to consider. Everywhere I turn in this house I see something to do with her, some touch she added to make it our home. Maybe I am too emotional, but this is just so hard.

Wayne’s Response:

I know that it is, Alan. Someone once told me the reason we have so much fear and anxiety in our imagined futures (life without Lynn), is that we cannot imagine grace. Therefore, we are always in our future alone, having to survive by our own skills and we just can’t see a way through it. But when we actually get there, God is there too, with resources we can’t contemplate until we’re there.

I am confident he will be with you each day, in this crisis and through it. Heaven is not silent; it only seems so to you.

I don’t know how many years you’ve had with Lynn, but I have watched many people go through this. They do survive, and even thrive in a future God still has for them. You can’t imagine it now; I get that. But you will go on and all the memories and experiences you have had with her will live on in you too. Grief takes the sting of the memories we have about someone we love and turns them into the joy of having known and experienced them. You’re not there yet, so I don’t think you need to rush it. Just know you won’t be alone, not for one day, not for one second.

Right now, you’re loving her in the uncertainty of whether this is her time or not.  That is the most difficult place I know of, and though you are not sufficient to that task, he is. And I do trust him in all that’s unfolding both for you and Lynn. You don’t control the outcome here. She doesn’t either. It just means you have to put everything on his lap every day and roll with whatever comes—joy or pain.  I’m so sorry, brother. I wish I could save you from this.

Though I don’t think God is causing any of this, he will cause it to work for good. It’s what he does—triumph out of tragedy.

From Alan on May 17, 2019 (21 days after his first email):

Every night as I tuck her into the hospice bed, we bump fists and say, “Another day!” Lately I have had to help her make a fist, but that is ok. She even instigates it if I should forget.

I have wept more in the past couple of days than I wanted to. Your words have so strengthened me and I thought I was making great progress in being “ready.” I have a ways to go.

Yesterday was the worst day in the recent nightmare and probably in four years. She woke up with her big brown eyes shining at me and we talked some and I helped her exercise her legs in the bed. The CNA comes on Tuesday and Thursday and Saturday to give her a bath (in the bed) and I was getting her stuff together for that as I always do. Out of the blue, Lynn began to I guess hallucinate or become paranoid – she started telling me to “make sure the cameras are off.” I tried to reassure her but it only got worse. Eventually, she was so agitated that she was crying out, “I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die. Take me to the hospital.” I called the hospice folks and they said to go ahead and give her some of the medication they have provided for pain and agitation. I did and eventually she settled and fell asleep.

Hospice wants me to keep her medicated “around the clock.” It’s driving me crazy not to be able to talk to her at all. I mean I can talk but to not have her respond even with a fist bump is creating a new level of sorrow. It’s like a new vein of tears has been tapped.

I am still praying for her to be miraculously healed. But, Wayne, for the first time I asked God to take her as opposed to letting her suffer like that. I really do not want Him to take her, I want Him to heal her and be like Jesus to Mary and Martha – “Did I not say if you believe you will see the glory of God?” I’ve felt like the Holy Spirit at one time was prompting me to think about what we would do with a miraculously healed Lynn. I prayed, “Lord, help us to handle your glory the way you want us to, to give you the glory in the way that pleases you.”

She is sleeping soundly and has been for over 24 hours. I will help her make a fist in a little while and say, “Guess what? Another day!” I can barely see the screen to type this so I will stop. I love Lynn so much.

From Wayne

I’m not sure why you worry about how many tears you cry. Tears are not a sign of defeat or lack of faith. The sorrow you feel is directly tied to the depth of love you two have shared. Cry all you want. Embrace God in the tears. He understands your pain better than you do. He often, “with loud cries and tears” offered himself to God.

As I’ve said previous, this is the worst of all times with someone we love, when they linger in the throes of death. Once they pass, we are freer to grieve to healing. Now we’re just caught in the ongoing nightmare as you call it.  It’s hard. I’ve been there, not with Sara thankfully, but with others I love. Would that they get healed, or pass on quicker, but her lingering has to do with her desire to survive and some work God is yet doing in her heart and soul. Death doesn’t come easily very often, but what a gift to have you in her pocket at this season. She is not alone. She has someone sharing her pain and uncertainty with her.

Somehow, I think we’ll see at the end of all things, what a valuable time this is for you and for her. Pain is not our enemy. Embrace it and the tears, as well as God in them, for he is surely there and someday you’ll see this all as a gift that’s so hard to see now.

And trust the hospice people about medication. They have been through this a hundred times or more. I know you want to keep her ‘aware’, but that serves you more than her. I don’t write that easily. I know those are hard words, but the fears and pain that overwhelm her aren’t worth it for either of you.

Loving in the chaos of this fallen world is not easy. My heart breaks that this has gone on so long for you, but you or your prayers are not the determining factors here. Would that they were. There are just greater realities here than either of us can fathom. We don’t control events; we just do our part and entrust the rest to our loving Father.

You’re in our prayers, Alan.  I only have words of honor for you and what you’re going through and how you’re responding. I can’t imagine God saying anything at the moment than, “That’s Alan, my beloved son and in whom I’m well pleased with how he’s loving my Lynn.”

To be continued…

Read Part 5 here. 

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