Thursday, June 27, 2013

Day 428 New Hope

For cancer survivors and for those still fighting cancer, it seems like every day there is a new hope on the horizon.  Tonight, Livestrong in Austin will be offering a free seminar on the importance of exercise in combating cancer.  It's too late to go back and add exercise to your lifestyle before cancer and, for me at least, it was impossible to exercise while going through treatment, but it's never too late to add the right exercise to your lifestyle now.  You can live stream this seminar on your computer tonight or see it later on their blog.  I've signed up for it and you can too at www.livestrong.org .

I heard this morning about a new drug being developed that will block the pathway of cancer cells so that healthy cells won't have to be damaged the way they are now with chemo and radiation.  As my friend Lisa lies in isolation with her mouth full of ulcers and lesions in her throat from the chemo, fighting a spiking fever and nausea while trying to rebuild her immune system, the thought of no chemo is truly a gift from God.

Eat to Defeat Cancer is a website I have long touted and it is based on the study of certain foods that starve the blood vessels that feed cancer cells thus inhibiting their growth.  I try to incorporate at least one and, most of the time, even more of these foods into every meal I eat.  To learn which foods, check out www.eattodefeatcancer.org .   The hope is that as more is learned about these everyday super foods, incorporating them into a daily diet can prevent cancer cells from growing in our bodies. 

Hope is such an important thing.  We can hope that exercise will help prevent cancer.   We can hope that new drugs will help kill cancer.   We can hope that eating the right foods will help starve cancer.   But the real hope isn't in exercise, drugs, or food.  The real hope is in God.  We are told over and over again in the Bible to put our hope in the Lord.  Three different times in Psalms, David writes:

"Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God."

You know how important the number three is and when something like this is repeated three times, it is the same as a gillion exclamation points.  Believe it!  No matter what is happening in your life, there is hope in God.  No matter the medical reports, there is hope in God.   No matter the dispair and desolation, there is hope in God.  Don't know where to find it?  Pick up your Bible.  Don't know where to look?  Start with Psalms and Proverbs.   God knows your every need and He'll guide you to the words you need to hear.  He loves you and wants the best for you but you have to seek Him and know that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.  He is a great and wonderful God.

Precious Lord, Jehovah Rapha,
You are the God who heals.  You heal hearts and You heal spirits and You heal bodies.  You know our every need.   I ask today that You show each of Your children exactly where their hope is.   It's in You, Lord.   In You.
Father, we thank You for Your healing Spirit which is moving mightily within each of our friends dealing with the enemy, cancer, today.   We ask that You touch Lisa and David, a young father just diagnosed with brain cancer, and Sadie whose scans are showing growth where the brain tumors were removed and Tony who is off to camp with other teenage cancer patients while waiting on a pathology report on the new mass taken from his abdomen and Bryce who is just finishing another round of chemo and enjoying his time off.
Thank You, Father, for everything You do on behalf of these precious ones and their loved ones who are suffering along with them.   Bless them, love them, heal them.
In Jesus' healing name we pray.
Amen

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