Today I'm traveling to the funeral of our friend and neighbor, Sandra Shiraz. She was always so full of joy. She loved Jesus a lot and she loved our family. We sure will miss her. Last week, after she had passed, my son looked at her desk and saw that she had hundreds of scriptures and prayers written out. Here is one piece of paper he found with a prayer at the end:

Life has to change when cancer enters in. We cannot go back to the same ways of doing and being. Cancer compels us to look at our habits, our attitudes, and our priorities. It calls us to reexamine and reassess what we've always held to be true. Cancer itself changes us. Its very intrusion into our lives forces us to think of the present and the future differently.

It presents us with opportunities to hold onto and embrace even more what is good in our lives. It presents us with opportunities to purge what is unhealthy and unfulfilling. We cannot go back to the old ways that do not work anymore. They simply weaken us and inhibit our healing and well-being. We need instead to reframe the way we live to include everything new that will build us up.

Changing is so hard most of the time and I resist it a lot. But God, you reach out to us to help change everything that hurts us and keeps us from being who you have made us to be. Help me to take your hand and follow where you want me to go. Amen