Tony
Snow's Testimony
This
article by Tony Snow, President Bush's former press secretary,
provides some sound advice for everyone, especially those
with deadly diseases or conditions.
Blessings
arrive in unexpected packages, - in my case, cancer. Those
of us with potentially fatal diseases - and there are
millions in America today - find ourselves in the odd
position of coping with our mortality while trying to
fathom God's will. Although it would be the height of
presumption to declare with confidence 'What It All Means,'
Scripture provides powerful hints and consolations.
The
first is that we shouldn't spend too much time trying
to answer the 'why' questions: Why me? Why must people
suffer? Why can't someone else get sick? We can't answer
such things, and the questions themselves often are designed
more to express our anguish than to solicit an answer.
I
don't know why I have cancer, and I don't much care. It
is what it is, a plain and indisputable fact. Yet even
while staring into a mirror darkly, great and stunning
truths begin to take shape. Our maladies define a central
feature of our existence: We are fallen. We are imperfect.
Our bodies give out.
But
despite this, - or because of it, - God offers the possibility
of salvation and grace. We don't know how the narrative
of our lives will end, but we get to choose how to use
the interval between now and the moment we meet our Creator
face-to-face.
Second,
we need to get past the anxiety. The mere thought of dying
can send adrenaline flooding through your system. A dizzy,
unfocused panic seizes you. Your heart thumps; your head
swims. You think of nothingness and swoon. You fear partings;
you worry about the impact on family and friends. You
fidget and get nowhere.
To
regain footing, remember that we were born not into death,
but into life,- and that the journey continues after we
have finished our days on this earth. We accept this on
faith, but that faith is nourished by a conviction that
stirs even within many non believing hearts - an intuition
that the gift of life, once given, cannot be taken away.
Those who have been stricken enjoy the special
privilege of being able to fight with their might, main,
and faith to live fully, richly, exuberantly - no matter
how their days may be numbered.
Third,
we can open our eyes and hearts. God relishes surprise.
We want lives of simple, predictable ease,- smooth, even
trails as far as the eye can see, - but God likes to go
off-road. He provokes us with twists and turns. He places
us in predicaments that seem to defy our endurance; and
comprehension - and yet don't. By His love and grace,
we persevere. The challenges that make our hearts leap
and stomachs churn invariably strengthen our faith and
grant measures of wisdom and joy we would not experience
otherwise.
'You
Have Been Called'. Picture yourself in a hospital bed.
The fog of anesthesia has begun to wear away. A doctor
stands at your feet, a loved one holds your hand at the
side. 'It's cancer,' the healer announces.
The
natural reaction is to turn to God and ask him to serve
as a cosmic Santa. 'Dear God, make it all go away. Make
everything simpler.' But another voice whispers: 'You
have been called.' Your quandary has drawn you closer
to God, closer to those you love, closer to the issues
that matter,- and has dragged into insignificance the
banal concerns that occupy our 'normal time.'
There's
another kind of response, although usually short-lived
an inexplicable shudder of excitement, as if a clarifying
moment of calamity has swept away everything trivial and
tiny, and placed before us the challenge of important
questions.
The
moment you enter the Valley of the Shadow of Death, things
change. You discover that Christianity is not something
doughy, passive, pious, and soft. Faith may be the substance
of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
But it also draws you into a world shorn of fearful caution.
The life of belief teems with thrills, boldness, danger,
shocks, reversals, triumphs, and epiphanies. Think of
Paul, traipsing through the known world and contemplating
trips to what must have seemed the antipodes ( Spain ),
shaking the dust from his sandals, worrying not about
the morrow, but only about the moment.
There's
nothing wilder than a life of humble virtue, - for it
is through selflessness and service that God wrings from
our bodies and spirits the most we ever could give, the
most we ever could offer, and the most we ever could do.
Finally,
we can let love change everything. When Jesus was faced
with the prospect of crucifixion, he grieved not for himself,
but for us. He cried for Jerusalem before entering the
holy city. From the Cross, he took on the cumulative burden
of human sin and weakness, and begged for forgiveness
on our behalf.
We
get repeated chances to learn that life is not about us,
that we acquire purpose and satisfaction by sharing in
God's love for others. Sickness gets us part way there.
It reminds us of our limitations and dependence. But it
also gives us a chance to serve the healthy. A minister
friend of mine observes that people suffering grave afflictions
often acquire the faith of two people, while loved ones
accept the burden of two peoples' worries and fears.
'Learning
How to Live'. Most of us have watched friends as they
drifted toward God's arms, not with resignation, but with
peace and hope. In so doing, they have taught us not how
to die, but how to live. They have emulated Christ by
transmitting the power and authority of love.
I
sat by my best friend's bedside a few years ago as a wasting
cancer took him away. He kept at his table a worn Bible
and a 1928 edition of the Book of Common Prayer. A shattering
grief disabled his family, many of his old friends, and
at least one priest. Here was a humble and very good guy,
someone who apologized when he winced with pain because
he thought it made his guest uncomfortable. He retained
his equanimity and good humor literally until his last
conscious moment. 'I'm going to try to beat [this cancer],'
he told me several months before he died. 'But if I don't,
I'll see you on the other side.'
His
gift was to remind everyone around him that even though
God doesn't promise us tomorrow, he does promise us eternity,
- filled with life and love we cannot comprehend, - and
that one can in the throes of sickness point the rest
of us toward timeless truths that will help us weather
future storms.
Through
such trials, God bids us to choose: Do we believe, or
do we not? Will we be bold enough to love, daring enough
to serve, humble enough to submit, and strong enough to
acknowledge our limitations? Can we surrender our concern
in things that don't matter so that we might devote our
remaining days to things that do?
When
our faith flags, he throws reminders in our way. Think
of the prayer warriors in our midst. They change things,
and those of us who have been on the receiving end of
their petitions and intercessions know it. It is hard
to describe, but there are times when suddenly the hairs
on the back of your neck stand up, and you feel a surge
of the Spirit. Somehow you just know: Others have chosen,
when talking to the Author of all creation, to lift us
up, - to speak of us!
This
is love of a very special order. But so is the ability
to sit back and appreciate the wonder of every created
thing. The mere thought of death somehow makes every blessing
vivid, every happiness more luminous and intense . We
may not know how our contest with sickness will end, but
we have felt the ineluctable touch of God.
What
is man that Thou art mindful of him? We don't know much,
but we know this: No matter where we are, no matter what
we do, no matter how bleak or frightening our prospects,
each and every one of us who believe, each and every day,
lies in the same safe and impregnable place, in the hollow
of God's hand.
