Dear sweet Friends and Family,
Over seven months ago, on July 9th, I got a phone call from James that sent me to my knees. It was the news of his mother's leukemia diagnosis, and the prognosis was dire. In the days and weeks that followed, we realized the slow agony of living with a 'diagnosis' - the intense hurry that one feels, accompanied with the agony of the slow pace that everything seems to travel around you. As I stop to look back on this side of the process the one feeling that surges to the front of all the dozens of raw emotions is this: relief.
Angie, James mother, is home. She has actually been home since January 29th, after 40 days in the hospital for the third round of chemo followed by a Bone Marrow Transplant. Today they returned for another checkup and the DNA of her blood cells now all identifies with her donor, her brother Charlie.
God has healed her. Your prayers, the prayers I begged you to pray for us, have been heard. The prayers I wept on the floor, begging for our Father God to turn and touch her body with healing, have been answered with healing in her earthly body. She has been given more time. We are amazed. Astounded. Perhaps even surprised at the miracle in spite of the terrible medical odds she was given.
I am humbled and quiet. Would I feel the same relief and gratitude had God ordained for her to "graduate", as she calls it, to her new life and new body, in heaven? Could I quietly continue to trust Him if things hadn't gone "my way"? My children are memorizing Psalm 139, and we recently got to the part that says, "Every day ordained for me was written in your book before even one of them came to be." On this side of healing it gives me great peace that she is indeed living out every day given her by the Creator since the beginning of time, but would I feel that same peace if I were standing in sorrow at her graveside? sigh* I have much to learn and grow into.
So, we thank God. We hold out our hands in praise and gratitude. There are often no words when I stand in worship on Sunday mornings, only tears of joy, gratitude and amazement. When I think of the events of the past seven months, the past ten years, there are often no words I feel I can use that capture it. No words can describe my feeling overwhelmed by the greatness of our unfathomable God, who measures the ever-expanding universe with the span of one hand yet knows the number of hairs on my head this instant. Our God. Who is like Him? I am crying in gratitude as I sit here struggling how to even express to you my gratitude. My relief. My surrender.
We thank you. Thank you for your prayers, your emails and letters. Your love and concern. Thank you for asking, for caring and walking with us through this season - whether you are near or far. What an amazing tapestry of lives and experiences we share, eh? Thank you.
Today is James' birthday. I know the best gift he has been given this year is the time we spent in Taiwan, and the promise of time we have left on earth with his mother. And oh - the longer I live, the amazing gift of eternal life through Christ just keeps getting richer and richer. All the folks who have gone before, the Savior I love more and more. The Great God that I long to fall before. He truly does save the best for last, eh?
Here are some snippets from some of Angie's emails along the journey of her treatment, a window into her heart:
12/24/10
...I am pretty fine so far, really. There are so many things, those little things especially, I know in my heart that it is by my Father, for example - after all those hundred processes of sterilizing everything to get me checked into this "no germ room" which is quite fancy, the next day when I used the recorder, surprisingly, I found a tape of Psalty's singalongathon 2 which has the just right music for me to dance with in my room. It is good exercise and I enjoyed it.
1/14/11
...I have to mention about the gift of friendship I got with those nurses who take so good care of me. I even think that IMB can consider to send M to be patients in the hospital to do their ministry, just like send M to be teachers, students, doctors......, because nurse, doctor and patients are in such a natural way to share life, respect, trust, courage, life values, love, and personal life, family life and good chance to share the redemption of Jesus when you peek a hole. Most of them see death and feel weak to comfort patient and frustrated, they were taught 4 stages in school, but find it not satisfied. See we share, so we, as equally human, face death together, and I have a saying.
1/23/11
Dear son, James,
I deeply appreciate your this email about update on your life. How important it is! It is a narrow road to search, time past so fast and quietly, Look for His little light in the darkness, listen carefully His whisper and calling and wait for Him very patiently.
After all when you lie down, your creator is the one to truly value your life, and only Him. Isn't it?
So, this will be our last mass email/facebook update for awhile. May this thread of our story somehow encourage you in your journey. Our God is faithful, no matter the outcome and how we interpret it through our earthly eyes. This cancer story has a happy ending. But Angie is a true follower of Jesus Christ, so her ultimate ending, when she does indeed "graduate" to heaven will be much better than "happy" - it will be no less than glorious!
Peace and Joy,
Kristin Cheng
