Commitment & Sacrifice

It has been four months since God healed me.
In those four months, much has changed. And there's other things that have remained the same.

My body seems to be getting stronger, but then like every aging male I overdo what I should be doing and realize I'm an idiot for trying to do anything at all.
My stamina is getting better; which I didn't really expect. After all, I did have a portion of my lung sliced out along with a tumor. I still can't run and I don't have the capacity I once did - but I actually believe that I will.
It's not everyday a man walks away from stage four lung cancer and lives to tell about it; but I'm thankful that I have.

On the down side, my weight has exploded. 
I look like someone has placed an air hose in my hear and blew me up like a balloon.
In past years, I wrongly believed that people were just fooling themselves or trying to fool others when they said that they couldn't lose weight no matter what they tried. 
I cannot communicate to you the sorrow I have over believing they weren't trying hard enough.

In four months, I have gained 40 pounds.
The weight gain is a combination of inability to exercise and medication but the emotional/psychological toll is enormous. This struggle is almost as great in my mind as having cancer.
My clothes don't even fit anymore and the helplessness that goes along with weight gain and cancer is about the same in a person's life.
Without this happening to me, I would have never believed it. 

Another downside is trying to get back to doing what you are used to doing. Inevitably, a person must come to the point of physical realization and know in their heart - they just can't do some things anymore. 
It hurts, but I am there. 

I have a friend on whose farm I had been accustomed to helping out from time to time in the summer months.  He is a good man; pure heart - honor and integrity would be the words I would use to describe him. 
But yesterday, I was at his house and did a very minor task with him and his wife; then we went to my house and he plowed my garden area because I'm not able to handle a tiller. After this, we spread fertilizer.
These are common, easy tasks; today, I am in so much pain and so tired because I couldn't sleep last night. You'd think I'd take something for it but since I realized the medications are causing my weight gain, I won't take anything and I am absolutely miserable right now.
I tell this story because my friend is 15 years older than me and I can't keep up with him. 
My body has thrown in the towel for the time being - yesterday was just another event telling me that I'm not well. 

In the last four months, a lot has changed with me personally - it's the result of the experience that I've had since September 2011. 
But the world hasn't changed. 
People haven't changed.
For a time it seemed the world and the people in it - suspended the normal routine; that we hung up our stop watches and weapons. It seemed that we, those in my realm of the world, that we forgot about grudges and issues; that we forgot about getting ahead for our own personal gain and just wanted to get along for the good of the Body of Christ and for love of one another.

But that indeed was the problem, there was a suspension in reality; there was no permanent change within the heart. 
One of the reasons this blog began was to allow me to give what I believed was 'Final Instructions' or a final teaching to the believers who knew me or even cared a little. 
Amazingly, it worked.

Yet, once the prayers were answered - everyone went back to what they considered normalcy. And this very well could be the greatest failure of my entire life. 

My one prayer for this whole situation was for the Lord to use what happened to me through the Church that more would come to know Him. 
I have shared the story on social media, this blog and in public speaking - others have as well. In truth, I don't know why God healed me, but I know it isn't for the the Body of Christ to return to a humdrum existence.
I know it isn't for things to return as they were before I got sick.
I know it isn't for us to let the power of God slip from our presence just because we're complacently happy.

No, there must be something more, much more - we as the Body are missing something. This something isn't necessarily found in a mega-church. Just because something is bigger does not mean it is more spiritual. Following that logic, it would mean that Woodstock 1969 was more spiritual and godly than Pentecost - and everyone with any sense knows that can't be true.

No, what we are missing is something much more personal. 
What we are missing is internal; it is as real as the compassion in a human tear and as abundant as a child's love. We are missing that 'IT' factor most cannot describe but we know it is in the heart. 
I believe I can describe it with two words - Commitment and Sacrifice.

If you will look closely, you will quickly find that we, as the Body of Christ in this world, are lacking the Commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ we should have and we don't make the sacrifice in this world of ourselves to glorify Him.

I have only began to realize recently that my health challenges will continue for a very long time, even though God removed any sign of cancer out of my body.
As the challenges continue, God also continues to open my eyes to things I couldn't have seen before, which is the method He often uses in our lives to teach us.

This month, promotion paperwork came through to my Air National Guard unit - I have made Major. I was informed the ceremony will be Saturday. At first, I was excited but then I realized this was an impossibility. 
Also impossible was the date in June; so, it turns out that I won't be wearing oak clusters until at least July even though my unit went out of their way to make it happen on my behalf when I was sick - for which I will always be grateful.
The reason I can't attend my own promotion this month is because of my son.
When I was sick, I saw how much it really affected my children and I promised myself that if God did choose to heal me that I would do my best not to break my commitments to them.
This Saturday, May 4th, while it would be perfect for me because it is Star Wars day (May the 4th be with you) and because the unit made this happen for me - it wasn't a perfect date for my son to whom I have made a previous commitment.

What this means is that I made a commitment I am going to honor and make a sacrifice of my own out of love for him. I don't want any back pats because this is how things are supposed to be among parents with their children.
But I do want other parents to do it for their own children.
And if a parent is not willing to make a sacrifice over something that is important to them for their children, how much less are they willing to sacrifice something in their life to honor God?

In these modern times, I do not see the commitment to God or the sacrifice necessary to honor the Lord Jesus Christ as in ages past. It simply isn't there.
Unlike the first Christians who won the nations through the Roman Empire and spread the faith to the entire civilized world;
Unlike the men of the Protestant Reformation who took a stand for faith alone, grace alone and Scripture alone - winning countless thousands across Europe;
Unlike the missionary minded Baptist Societies that sent men like William Carey to lost lands out of a commitment to God and a sacrifice to self; 
Unlike those Christians of the early 1800's whose dedication to Christ gave birth to what we called the Great Awakening...
Today's Christians lack Commitment. 
Today's Christians lack Sacrifice. 
Today's Christians lack direction, faith and the courage to accomplish the will of God in our lives - and it shows because our churches are filled with unrepentant members and our lives are breaking down around us.

Today's churches and the people within them are jumping from fad to fad; new idea to new idea - like drunks in a fog. We do not know where we are going or what we are doing; little wonder why there isn't more blessings from above.
Friends, we don't need a new book to tell us what's happening.
We don't need another 'how to' conference which will accomplish nothing. 
We don't need something that tells us how to cope or how to build a bigger church. 
We do not need a boost from beneath but a birth from above.

No! 
We need holiness.
 We need repentance. 
We need commitment to the Lord and self-sacrifice.

When God healed me, I thought I would wake up every day with a smile on my face and sing to the heavens all day long. I really thought because of what had happened, not only would I have changed but it also would change the world.
I was wrong for I feel the great pain of the burden of Christ's great work within us slipping away as sure as the ocean tide moves along the seashore.

Honestly, the most disappointing thing about being healed is that nobody really cares except for my children. The reason for this is because they have what we were instructed by Christ to have, which is the faith of a child. This means they can rightly see what we are missing in the work of God in the world.
Everyone has returned to their own lives, their own problems and the one thing I thought would happen was that Christians would take their eyes off of themselves and turn more to the power and will of God simply because He had shown Himself if our midst.

I shared these thoughts with a friend; his reply: 'Well, now you know what Moses felt like.'
I don't know how true that is, but if there is any truth in it at all - I better understand Moses' anger with the Hebrews. 

There are thousands around the world who read this blog - I love to see the hits from China and Russia; Germany and the rest of Europe. It blesses me.
But each of us were drawn to this site because of Cancer in some way. If there is anything that can come out of cancer that is good - let it be our commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ and our personal sacrifice to make His will a reality in our lives, in our churches and in our communities - regardless of where we are in the world.

May we continue to pray for those who do not understand the urgency of the hour; for the time is near. 
May the Lord readjust our minds to view things as He would have us see them in this world.
May we continue to pray for those in 'closed' countries and the persecuted church.
May we work for the Lord together as best we can where we live; so that all people may know Him. And if we must change, may that change be for His glory and honor.

And may we all, until we meet again - win one for the good guys.