What Do You Fear?

My parents and their daughter.

Both of my parents died with tumors in their brains.

My dad died at age 29, which is too young. His tumors were of the glioblastoma variety. In the 1970's, the chances of surviving were almost zero - they remain low today, even with all of our technology and medical knowledge. Dad was sick for four years. He was diagnosed after Mom saw him having a seizure. I was ten months old.

My mom died at age 60, which is also too young. She had ovarian cancer, and fell into the very small percentage of women who have that cancer metastasize to their brains. It's like a 1-2% chance, and she got it. She was diagnosed after initially being told she had diverticulitis - which is very different than cancer.

I remember the weekend that we found out that Mom's cancer had metastasized. Hubby and I were in Little Rock, helping my grandmother pack up to move. Mom called us from the back of an ambulance. She'd been fighting off horrible headaches and finally went in to find out why. "They think I have a brain tumor," she said to us on speaker phone. The look on my grandmother's face was pure horror.

The words "brain tumor" had devastated our family enough.

When Hubby and I went to bed that night, I was somber. I was so somber that I actually found that dark sense of humor which sometimes emerges when we are faced with horror. "Well, I guess my chances of getting a brain tumor just went way up," I said.

He responded strongly. I think he thought I was afraid, but I wasn't. I was simply stating what was slowly occurring to me: that I would be orphaned, soon, by something that medicine couldn't solve. And it occurred to me, too, that maybe I would face the same fate.

I remember when Mom was diagnosed with cancer initially, so many people asked me if ovarian cancer runs in our family. "Nope," I'd always say, "Not that we know of!" I began to realize that people were asking if I feared for my own life. I began to answer that because there was no family history of ovarian cancer, I guess I felt that I had just as good a chance of being hit by a bus as I did of dying of ovarian cancer.

How do I know, really?

I don't.

The thing is, I don't really care, at this point, how I'm going to die.

What I care most about is today. I care a little bit about tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. I care about the people God has given me to love. I care about my dog and our house and the pansies that I just planted. I care about serving as a pastor faithfully. I care about matters of justice and fairness. I care about beautiful music and art and books that are well-written. I care about taking walks that are good for me.

And not one of these things has anything whatsoever to do with caring about how I die. I'll die...someday. But what is that to me today, other than motivation to live life today?

Turns out, Jesus knew what he was saying when he said this: "So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today" (Matthew 6:34). Each day does have enough, and more than enough.

And that is just enough.