Death, Where is Your Sting?

As the dust settles and our little family begins to find its stride within the new normal, I find myself reflective often about the years I was blessed to know Bernice and the weeks, days, and hours leading up to her passing. On the Monday and Tuesday before she left us on that Saturday night, Bernice was in the hospital receiving blood and platelet transfusions in a desperate attempt to reverse her body's decline. Monday was difficult, but it was Tuesday that I think I began my own process of grief. A process that recycles itself as I go along, yes, but the start of it was that Tuesday morning. There was a clear and present difference in that day. She had had some bleeding that was both expected and unexpected that alarmed her and me both. In the hospital room I helped her to and from the bed and tried my darndest to mask how terrified I was and how helpless I felt. The last thing I wanted was for her to feel like I couldn't handle it. I could. I did!  But after I had settled her back in bed, I turned around to see her dear friend Charlotte standing in the doorway. She was like an angel that God sent for me right then and there. She said, "Rachel, I'm here for a couple of hours. Go get some lunch and enjoy some time with Jonathan and I'll take over for a bit."  It was like God himself was saying those words. Like He knew I was at my breaking point. So I burst into tears (though I tried so hard not to), wrapped my arms around her, and then walked over to Bernice's bedside. I held her hand and said, "I don't have to leave, Bernice. I can do this. I'm ok."  To which she responded, with that quintessential sparkle in her eye, "I know you can sweetie. I don't know what I would do without you. But you need some time for yourself too. I'm ok. Charlotte's here!  You go and relax for a minute."

I reluctantly left the room and went downstairs to find Jonathan. When he wasn't where I thought he would be, I plopped down in a waiting room chair and just cried. I cried for the pain I knew she was in, for the helplessness that she must have felt, for my own weakness, for the inevitability of what was happening, in mourning over what my life would look like without her in it, for that defeated feeling that was circulating in her, in me, in all of us. We couldn't do anything to help her, to stop what was happening, to reverse what had already occurred. I wept. Openly and raggedly. Until Jonathan came walking around the corner and knelt in front of me with our sweet Greysen in his arms and wept with me. He listened to me say "There is just so much blood. I can't stand to see her in pain. I would take this all on for her if I could. It's just not right that someone like her has to go through this."  I openly and angrily said, "What is the friggin point of cancer?? Why would there be something that siphons the life of someone else, only to die when they die?  What's the point??? It's like the medical equivalent of a cockroach. Why does it even exist??"  

In my anger I despised her disease. I still do. Cancer is ugly. It's cruel. It is destructive.  It strips you of your dignity. It wrecks your body. And in the end, it literally sucks the life right out of you. It is not at all understanding or merciful. It afflicts even the sweetest and most forgiving people on this earth with no intention of allowing them the long and full life they should have...

But as these days have rolled by. As Bernice's absence is so heavy at times that I can hardly catch my breath. I have had moments of time to consider what really is the point of cancer?  And why did my Bernice have to go through it?  The best answer I can give is this:

Cancer is not something that God "gives you". It is not a trial He places in your life. He did not deem you "worthy of suffering" enough to afflict you with cancer. Cancer is a disease that exists because of the fallenness of our world. It is a reflection of the imperfections that exist on this earth. We may never know what causes any type of cancer with any certainty.  I think that's because there's more at play than a simple or even complicated medical answer. Our world is fallen, it is FALLING, and we are powerless to stop it...

BUT...

The victory for us comes the next day. After our weak bodies have experienced the brutal blows of things like cancer, it still doesn't win. Bernice didn't "lose her fight", y'all. She WON!  The cancer that siphoned her very breath is DEAD and our sweet Bernice is ALIVE in Christ. What's the point in cancer? Who knows. Maybe Jesus will enlighten me at some point when I get to walk those golden streets with Him one day. But death has no sting for those who know Christ. Cancer doesn't win. It doesn't go on living after its defeated the body it stole. It dies right along with the flesh. But Bernice's spirit left that tired body and was immediately gathered up in GLORY!

I believe that with my whole being. And it's not some blind faith or some really good "Bible story" that I use as my measuring stick. Bernice told me not even an hour before she died that "He came down". Her exact words. Check out this verse of scripture: 

"For the Lord Himself will come down from Heaven with a commanding shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God." -1 Thessalonians 4:16

You will never convince me that the things I heard her say in those final days and hours of her life were simply grumblings cast out of her dying brain. "Did you see the woman with the rosary?",  "I feel different, something has changed", "I see these stories play out in front of my eyes when I'm between sleeping and waking. Sometimes it's people I know, sometimes it's people I don't know but feel like I should", "No, no. Patrick has to see me first", "He came down". She was surround by His angels all week long. His arms were outstretched to her, patiently waiting for her to run into them. And folks, when it came time, she RAN. She went so fast!  I can hardly wrap my mind around how quickly He gathered her up!  What a mercy that she didn't suffer long. What a mercy that He snatched her up so fast that the rest of us were left thinking "How did that happen so quickly?"  Oh, how He loves her...

So death, where is your sting?  Cancer, where is your victory?  That stupid tumor is dead and buried. It will never rise again. But Bernice was caught up in glory. She has a new body free from the earthly chains of cancer and sickness. She closed her eyes on earth and opened them in eternity. And though life without her still seems strange...wrong even...I know that I know that I know that she is rejoicing today. Whole and new and even more beautiful (if that's possible)...

Cancer doesn't win. Faith does. And death is not our defeat. It's our victory. We win every time...