Happy Birthday, Anchor of Hope!

Last night, the Anchor of Hope Cancer Ministry celebrated its first birthday! I can't tell you what a blessing this group has been in the life of our family! God led us to form this ministry in response to the cancer journey we ourselves had experienced with our daughter, Hannah. The stated purpose of this ministry is to "make a difference in the lives of people in our church and community by offering God's hope and love through encouragement, practical support, education, and prayer for cancer patients and their families." Well, guess who's gotten the most encouragement through this group? I believe that Brad and I have!

The people who participate in the Anchor of Hope ministry, either by attending the support group meetings or by working behind the scenes as encouragers (or both!), are some of the most amazing people I've ever known. I feel so privileged to be a part of this group! You would think that a meeting where people just sit around and talk about cancer would be so discouraging, wouldn't you? We've found this group to be just the opposite. We leave uplifted and encouraged every time. To find out more about the Anchor of Hope Cancer Ministry and support group, click here. We would love to have you come and visit us sometime!

We also had a special visitor at our Anchor of Hope support group meeting last night. She was a reporter from Arkansas Baptist News. Brad and I visited with her for about an hour first, and then she stayed for our support group meeting, even celebrating our birthday with us. If you receive the Arkansas Baptist newspaper, watch for the story in the edition that will come out during the first or second week of October. If you don't get the Arkansas Baptist newspaper in the mail, I will post a link to the online edition as soon as it's available.

God has truly blessed the Anchor of Hope Cancer Ministry in its first year...I can't wait to see what He has in store for the future!!

Googling Glioblastoma

The day we returned to Arkansas Children's Hospital to have the sutures removed after Hannah's brain surgery, we were told that her tumor was a Grade IV Glioblastoma Multiforme. My brain immediately started whirring; mentally spelling out g-l-i-o-b-l-a-s-t-o-m-a, fully intending to google it the second we got home. Then the doctor's voice brought me back to that little treatment room...he was saying, "Now, don't go home and google glioblastoma. You won't like what you read about it...and besides, what you read won't apply to Hannah anyway. Most people who get glioblastomas are older and the prognosis is not good. She's young and healthy, and with treatment, I think she's got a good chance of cure." After hearing what all that treatment would involve, we left there that day, and went to eat at Firehouse Subs in Little Rock...one of Hannah's favorite places.

We ate in kind of a daze, not even tasting our food, discussing what we had just heard. The three of us made several decisions that day, the biggest of which was that we were going to place Hannah in God's hands and fully trust Him in this situation. One small part of that larger commitment was to follow the doctor's advice and not google glioblastoma. I studiously avoided any information about glioblastoma cancer. When Ted Kennedy was diagnosed with glioblastoma about a month later, I put my fingers in my ears and sang, "La la la la la la la" every time they talked about it on the news. Well, not literally, but you know what I mean! I did listen to the Ted Kennedy stuff enough to know that he was on the exact same treatment protocol (surgery, radiation, Temodar) as Hannah was...and I figured, if Ted Kennedy is getting it, it must be the best treatment available. So I felt good about the treatment she was getting.

Over time, it almost became a source of pride for me. I had so much faith that God had everything under control, I didn't need to know anything about glioblastoma. And things were going so well. Hannah had completed her radiation treatments, she'd had several clear MRIs, she was dealing well with the oral chemo drug. Actually, I was kind of afraid that if I did google it, what I saw might shake my faith...so I resolutely continued my glioblastoma google fast.

Then, in September of 2008, seven months after our first meeting with that doctor, we met with him again. This time, he gave us the news that Hannah's cancer had returned, in the form of multiple tumors on her brainstem and spine. With tears in his eyes, he explained that Hannah had less than a five percent chance of survival at this point. After absorbing that devastating news for a few minutes, we left his office and headed home. As we drove home, I decided it was time to google, and shortly after we arrived, I sat down at my computer.

Here's what I read on Wikipedia:

"Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM) is the most common and most aggressive type of primary brain tumor in humans. Despite being the most prevalent form of primary brain tumor, GBM's occur in only 2-3 cases per 100,000 people in Europe and North America.

Glioblastoma has a very poor prognosis, despite treatment consisting of craniotomy with surgical resection (removal) of as much of the tumor as possible, followed by concurrent or sequential chemo therapy, radiation therapy, and symptomatic care with corticosteroids. Other than the brainstem gliomas, it has the worst prognosis of any CNS (Central Nervous System) malignancy.

It is very difficult to treat glioblastoma due to several complicating factors:

* The tumor cells are very resistant to conventional therapies
* The brain is susceptible to damage due to conventional therapy.
* Many drugs cannot cross the blood-brain barrier to act on the tumor.

Common symptoms of the disease include seizure, nausea, headache; the single most prevalent symptom is progressive memory loss, personality changes & neurological deficit.

Symptomatic therapy:
Supportive treatment focuses on relieving symptoms and improving the patient's neurological function. The primary supportive agents are anticonvulsants and corticosteroids.

* Historically, around 90% of patients with glioblastoma underwent anticonvulsant treatment, although only about 40% of the patients required this treatment. Recently, it has been recommended that neurosurgeons not administer anticonvulsants until a seizure occurs.

* Corticosteroids, usually dexamethasone given 4 to 10 mg every 4 to six hours, can reduce edema (swelling), diminishing mass effect and lowering intracranial pressure, with a decrease in headache or drowsiness.

Prognosis:
The median survival time from the time of diagnosis without treatment is 3 months, but with treatment survival of 12-24 months is common. Death is usually due to cerebral edema (brain swelling) or increased cranial pressure."

"Well," I thought, "Everybody knows Wikipedia is not a dependable source of information"....so I searched and searched and searched for something else, something positive about glioblastoma multiforme. You know what? There is nothing positive about glioblastoma multiforme! So I searched for treatment options and treatment centers. Almost all of the major cancer treatment centers were using the same protocol our doctor had recommended for recurrence...additional radiation treatments (tomotherapy this time) and an Avastin/Irinotecan combination, along with steroids to keep brain swelling under control. Then I looked at the cure rates for these centers, and I found that there were no cures. Treatment generally extended patient's lives, but no one survived long term.

Eventually I found a site called "Young Adults Surviving Glioblastoma", and I thought, "Finally...Something encouraging!" And it was encouraging, at first. The home page was full of pictures of vibrant, smiling young people in a variety of settings...riding bikes, climbing mountains, or surrounded by friends and family. I read their stories and rejoiced in how well they were all doing. And I thought, "That will be Hannah. We can put her on this website someday." Then I clicked on another page on that same site, and my hopes came crashing down. This page was full of obituaries...for all of those healthy-looking young people I had just been reading about.

When I finally got up from the computer, my world had been completely rocked. For several days, I was shaken to the core. For the first time, I understood that Hannah had been diagnosed with what is basically a terminal cancer. What does a mom do with this kind of information?

Gradually, I came to the realization that nothing had really changed. Sure, I had more knowledge about what we were dealing with, and it wasn't good, but that didn't change the fact that God was in control. It didn't matter what the research showed; it didn't matter what the cure rates were; it didn't matter that there were so many obituaries on that website...Hannah's life was securely in God's hands, and He knew the number of days He had planned for her. And no matter what her future might be, my job as her mom was to trust Him...the One who loved her even more than I did. And when I released her back into His hands, the peace returned. It wasn't easy, and it wasn't a one-time deal. I had to consciously choose to trust Him, often many times a day, with what was happening in our lives. And He was faithful...giving a peace that passed all understanding even in the midst of excruciatingly difficult circumstances. He's pretty awesome like that!

I'm not sure why I felt prompted to share all of this tonight. It's definitely back in the "heavy post" category. But maybe God can use it to help someone who's going through a life-threatening illness with a loved one. It's not easy...in fact, it's very, very hard...but God will be faithful to see you through it. Trust Him.

UNCOOL!

Seems like I've been writing a lot of heavy posts lately. Well, here's something to lighten up the mood a little bit! Bethany's youth group at church has been doing a series lately about how it's okay (actually preferable!) to be "uncool" in today's culture. They capped it off last Wednesday night with Nerd Night. Here are some pictures from the evening, starting with our awesome youth leaders...



Doesn't it make you want to be "uncool", too?!

Respite Retreat (continued...)

About seventeen years ago, I was attending one of those infamous Southern Baptist committee meetings at our church in Fort Smith, Arkansas. We were engaging in some informal conversation around the table before the meeting actually began, and the pastor asked one attendee a question. She was an older lady, who had been a member of the church for a long time...the pastor knew her quite well. He said, "As a pastor, there's something I've always wondered...What is the most painful type of loss someone can endure? I know that in your lifetime, you have lost your parents, your husband, some of your brothers and sisters, and a daughter. Which loss was the most difficult for you?" The dear woman replied with shining eyes, "Oh, Pastor...the loss of my daughter was by far the greatest loss I ever experienced. The others were painful, but I still grieve the loss of my daughter every day in my heart." And our pastor answered, "That is exactly what I've heard over and over again in all the years of my ministry...that the loss of a child is the most painful loss there is."

I was about 27 years old at that time, with one young daughter and another on the way, and as I heard her response, I thought to myself, "Wow...I hope I never have to face that!" For some reason, that conversation has stuck with me all these years. And from time to time, it comes to my mind, and I wonder about it. Since I haven't experienced any of those other types of losses, I've wondered if what I heard that day is really true.

Last weekend, we spent hours listening to bereaved parents pour out their hearts, both in group meetings, and with us privately. We did our own share of pouring, as well! As I shared in my previous post, we twelve couples came from ten different states and Canada, and our stories of loss were, for the most part, very different. But here are some things that, over the course of the weekend, we discovered we had in common:

--The pain we share is deep, and it is very real. There were parents there whose son lived for only two heartbeats after birth, and parents whose daughter lived to be an adult with a child of her own. There were parents whose child had suffered months or years of illness, and parents whose child's life was gone in one earth-shattering moment. Two couples had lost two children. I still don't know if the conversation I overheard 17 years ago was completely accurate...I really think there are things that could be worse than death when it comes to your children...but the pain and grief I heard and felt last weekend was immense. It didn't matter how old our children were or how we lost them...the pain was deep, and it was real.

--Most of us who were there had come to terms with God's sovereignty in taking our children to Heaven sooner than we would have liked, but as one dad put it, "We reserve the right to protest." While we all agreed that our faith has gotten us through our experiences, nearly all of us have experienced some real spiritual struggles.

--All of us have struggled with feeling "different" or "out of place" like I mentioned a couple of posts back. Our thoughts are different, our outlook is different, our conversation is different. One mom said, "Everyone around us is talking about kindergarten and we want to talk about calculus!" Who has time for small talk and chit-chat, when there are issues of such great importance to discuss? I think that's one reason we enjoyed visiting so much...we spent all our time talking about issues and experiences we felt so passionately about.

--All of us have struggled with getting back into "real life" after the death of our children. People usually don't know what to say to us, or if they should say anything at all. And we're no help...sometimes we want them to talk to us and sometimes we don't! One mom said that they felt like they carried death with them everywhere they went, and it had deeply affected their relationships with others. Oddly enough, the place we all agreed was the most difficult to go back to was church! I think part of that is just the emotion inherent in attending a worship service, but I suspect some of it may be that we seem to feel it necessary to keep up a "front" in church...so that others will think we are just as perfect inside as we appear to be on the outside. I don't know...I'm still pondering that one.

--Strange as it may sound, we've all experienced some degree of memory loss or "brain fog" related to our child's death and the time that's past since then. I thought it was just me, or the fact that I'll be turning 45 in a couple of months, but I guess not. Maybe it's because our thoughts are so consumed with "calculus" all the time...I don't know. I'm just glad to know that I'm not the only one!

--All of the moms felt like they had aged rapidly since the death of their child. All of us described the experience of looking in the mirror and wondering what had happened to us! And not just in appearance...it seems that that extra weight of grief has taken a toll on our bodies as well.

--This may be surprising, but when one dad described their experience of losing their 3 month old baby as 100% terrible and 100% wonderful at the same time, we all murmured in agreement. We all agreed that as awful as losing our children has been, so much good has come from our experiences as well.

--All of us had a strong desire for our children to not be forgotten. Every one of us, in different ways, have sought ways to memorialize our children. I had never thought this would be a big deal for us...we truly believe Hannah's storm was more about God than it ever was about Hannah...but as time goes by, I do find myself wanting to make sure that Hannah's life is not forgotten.

--Finally, we all agreed that we could never survive these experiences without our faith in God. I often heard people at the retreat wondering aloud how people got through things like this without Him. I've said that many, many times myself. And as difficult emotionally as last weekend was, we all left there uplifted, because we all knew we would be seeing our children again. Best of all, we all left knowing that the time we've spent without them here will be redeemed in Heaven someday...every minute will be made up for. And how amazing is that?

Respite Retreat

All I can say is ... Wow! What an amazing Labor Day weekend we had! On Friday morning, we dropped Bethany off at school and headed out to Henrietta, Tennessee, just outside of Nashville. We were excited, but nervous...not really knowing what to expect at a retreat for bereaved parents. We arrived about 4:00, and were immediately struck by the beauty of the Hiding Place lodge and its surroundings. We carried our stuff inside, found our room, and began meeting the people with whom we would be sharing the weekend. There were twelve couples there, including our hosts, David & Nancy Guthrie, and we were from ten different states and Canada. We were of all ages and backgrounds, and by all outward appearances, had nothing in common.

We had dinner together at 5:30, and talked about our hometowns, our jobs, our travel that day, etc., but did not discuss what we all most wanted to talk about...our children in Heaven. We all knew that later that evening, we would each have the opportunity to tell our story. And after dinner, that's what we did. Or at least we started to. The lodge had a large living room area with comfortable couches and chairs, and we sat in a large circle and shared. We actually only got through three stories that evening, and we continued into the next morning. It was both heart-wrenching and heart-warming to sit and listen to each couple as they shared the most difficult experience(s) of their lives. Our experiences were all very different, yet we were immediately bonded together by our common heartbreak.

After we finished sharing our stories, we spent time discussing various aspects of grief. Topics included how husbands and wives often handle their grief differently, dealing with people who don't understand, issues related to holidays and other special days, cleaning out your child's room, etc. On Saturday night, we had a little comic relief when we played "The Trulywed Game". Brad and I were contestants...we didn't win, but we had fun playing. (And I discovered that he has no idea how many pairs of shoes I own!) Then, on Sunday morning, we had an incredible worship service, in which Nancy reminded us of all the ways that Jesus speaks into our sorrow...

"My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and watch with me." Matthew 26:38

"Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life."

John 9:3

"My grace is sufficient for you; for my power is made perfect in weakness."

II Corinthians 12:9

"Don't be afraid!...I hold the keys of death and the grave."

Revelation 1:17-18

"Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens and I will give you rest."

Matthew 11:28

...All much-needed reminders as we walk this road. And after this weekend, I think we're both a little more prepared to keep putting one foot in front of the other until we finally step off this earthly road and onto the Heavenly one.

I plan to share more about the Respite Retreat in a future post, but I need to close for now. I do want to ask you to be praying for Jedidiah Harper and his family as he will be undergoing extensive scans and tests tomorrow. He has completed his chemotherapy treatments and these tests are to ensure that his cancer is gone for good! I know so well what a scary time this is for him and his family, though, and I ask that you will hold them up in your prayers tonight and tomorrow. Thank you!

Strangers & Aliens

Last night, I went to the first meeting of a new Beth Moore study at our church. There were not too many of us there...maybe about 7 or 8 women. About half were people I knew from our church, and the others were visitors. And I knew it was going to happen...it's inevitable at any "first meeting"...we had to go around the room, introduce ourselves, and tell a little bit about ourselves. Have you ever noticed that when women are asked to tell a little bit about themselves, they always talk about their children? They might mention their husband, they might briefly touch on their job, but they ALWAYS tell about their children.

I never know quite what to do in this situation. Do I just say that I have a 15-year-old daughter named Bethany, and leave it at that? Or do I risk the gasps of shock and murmurs of sympathy and say that I have two daughters...one of them in Heaven? I hate making people uncomfortable or drawing undue attention to myself, but at the same time, it just doesn't feel honest to tell people that I have only have one child.

I didn't have very long to think about it last night. I was the second one in the circle. About half of the group knew my story anyway. So, I took a deep breath (I've learned that it's easier not to cry when I do that) and said my name, that my husband was a high school principal, that I was a speech pathologist, that I had a 15-year-old daughter named Bethany, and that I had a daughter in Heaven. I was so relieved that I managed to get it all out without choking into awkward silence, that I almost forgot to inhale. It actually took me a couple of minutes to get my breath back. The introductions continued around the circle, with all the ladies sharing about their children and families.

With that task accomplished, the leader spoke a few words to introduce the series, which is about the book of Esther, and for the next hour, we sat in semi-darkness watching the video. For awhile, I had some difficulty focusing on what Beth Moore was saying, because as I sat there in there in that room surrounded by all those very friendly women, I suddenly felt like I was a stranger and an alien. I realized for the first time--well, not really for the first time; I've been aware of it before, but this was the first time I've put words to it--that everything, absolutely everything about me is colored by the fact that I'm a mother who has lost a child. Everything I see, hear, say, and think passes through that filter. I can never take that veil off...it is a part of my very being. I suddenly felt so "different" from all of the other women there, and I felt very alone. Not lonely, mind you, but alone. There's a difference.

But here's the cool thing. That was last night. At this time tomorrow night, I will be in another group. And in this group, I will not be alone. I will be surrounded by people who understand me...and I will understand them. Tomorrow morning, Brad and I are leaving bright and early for Nashville, Tennessee, where we will spend the weekend at a Respite Retreat for bereaved parents, hosted by Nancy & David Guthrie. I've posted a lot about Nancy Guthrie in the past. She and her husband have lost two young children, and she's written several wonderful books about their experiences. There will be 10 or 12 couples there, including the Guthries, and we will be spending the weekend together, sharing our stories and growing together in our faith. I think it's going to be an absolutely amazing experience, and we are so looking forward to it!

You know, there's another very good (actually much more accurate) reason I felt like a stranger and an alien in that room last night. It's because I really am one, and so are you, if you are a child of God. This world is not our home...we're just traveling through it on our way to Heaven. I recently read that Heaven shouldn't be called the "afterlife"...instead, this world should be called the "beforelife." I love that!

In Hebrews 11, the author lists Abel and Enoch and Noah and Abraham, and then says this in verses 13-16:

"All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country--a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them."

How cool is that? He has prepared a city for us...where we will finally, truly be "at home." What an incredible day that will be!!

A Year and A Half...

Today marks 18 months since Hannah left this world for Heaven. Sometimes, it seems like forever since I last saw her face; sometimes, it seems like it was just a few minutes ago. Tonight, it feels like forever.

Before Hannah's homegoing, I was completely unacquainted with grief. I had never lost anyone close to me before, other than grandparents, who were "supposed" to die. I assumed that when you lost a loved one, you were sad for awhile...maybe three or four months or so...and then you "got over it". I'm almost embarrassed to admit that now...how completely ignorant I was! I had no idea that that sadness lasts, and lasts, and lasts.

Early on in our grief, we were told the following: "The hole will always be there, but the edges will become less sharp." I have found that to be very true. The intensity of the grief has diminished, but the hole is definitely still there. And I guess I would have to say that I don't want the hole to go away, and I don't want to fill it with anything else either. That hole is what makes me yearn for Heaven, and for the time when God will set all things right.

I've been surprised at how, even after 18 months, Hannah never seems to leave my thoughts. It's not like I just sit around thinking about her, but as I go about my daily activities, she's always there in my mind. And they're not really sad thoughts (at least most of the time), it's more just wondering what she'd think about something, or what she's doing right now.

And I wonder what it will feel like in another 18 months...or in 18 years, for that matter. I no longer expect to be "over it" by then. All I do know is that eternity is a loooooong time, and these 18 months or 18 years will be like the blink of an eye in retrospect! In the meantime, I'm going to keep gathering manna! (See previous post.)

Good news tonight...Jed Harper had his last chemo treatment yesterday! You can click on the "Praying for Jedidiah" link in the right hand column to get caught up on his story. He's been such a courageous and faithful little fighter. He'll be having his next scans on September 8...please join me in praying for complete healing from cancer with no recurrence!

Also, we've launched our "Sovereign in the Storm" website at www.thesullivan4.com. You can click (here) if you'd like to find out more about how you can have our family come share our testimony with your church, Sunday School class, youth group, or organization. We're excited about how God may choose to use Hannah's story to advance His kingdom!

Manna

I've always loved honey. There are not too many things better than a hot biscuit with butter and honey on it. Unless it's a peanut butter and honey sandwich...my favorite kind of sandwich ever since I was a little girl. And the other night, Bethany and I tried something new. We were inspired by a sopapilla she ordered at our favorite Mexican restaurant (El Parian in Malvern!). This phenomenal-looking sopapilla had a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top, and then was doused with honey and cinnamon sugar. She grudgingly let me have a couple of bites, and it was as good as it looked. So the next night, we decided to try to duplicate it at home. Well, sort of, anyway...I'm not enough of a culinary genius to make sopapillas, so we just fixed ourselves each a bowl of vanilla ice cream, drizzled honey all over it, sprinkled it with cinnamon sugar, and put a couple of maraschino cherries on top for good measure. It was actually quite good, I must say. You'll have to try it sometime!

When I was a little girl, sitting in my Sunday School class in the basement of First Baptist Church of Phillips, Wisconsin, I learned all about the Israelites wandering in the wilderness for forty years, and how God gave them manna to eat. Our teacher described manna as little wafers that tasted like honey. And I can actually remember wishing I could taste manna, because I knew I would like it. Anything that tasted like honey had to be good. I remember thinking that the Israelites were really lucky that they got to eat that stuff every day. Little did I know that someday I would be eating manna every day myself. Let me explain.

When Hannah's brain tumor was found, my mind was flooded with "What If's". What if it's cancer? What if she's never the same after brain surgery? What if she dies during surgery? Then, once she had survived the surgery with basically no after-effects, and we found out it was cancer, a whole new set of "What Ifs" took over. What if she loses her hair? What if the chemo makes her really sick? What if her brain is damaged from the radiation? What if she doesn't survive this?

If you had asked me at the beginning of this journey if I could handle...

shaving my daughter's head for her...

watching her gradually lose her vision...

pushing her in a wheelchair when she could no longer walk on her own...

listening to her struggle to talk because she could no longer find the words...

feeding her when she could no longer feed herself...

holding her hand as took her last breath...

...I would have said, "No way. There is no way I could ever, EVER do any of those things! I am not strong enough to do all of that." And I would have been right...There is no way I could have done any of those things on my own. But God gave me manna in the form of His strength every day.

Do you remember what God told Moses to tell the Israelites about the manna? They were only to gather enough for each day. Did you catch that...only enough for each day! Some of them tried to save themselves a little work and gathered some extra for the next day. Do you remember what happened to that manna? According to the ESV, "it bred worms and stank." (Exodus 16:20)

In the same way, God gave our family manna for each day....just enough for each day. We couldn't look ahead into the future and worry about "What Ifs". We just had to trust God for our manna each day. If we did try to look too far ahead and let the worries and what ifs take over...well, it just got wormy and stank!

The other thing the Israelites had to do was go out and gather the manna (Exodus 16:16). It didn't just fall into baskets for them...they had to go out and get it. In the same way, I think we have to seek God's strength, and then be willing to receive it when He gives it. There were plenty of times when it would have been easier just to curl up into a fetal position and be angry about, or at least question God's plan. We had to be willing to open our hands and receive God's gift of manna.

Finally, the manna was sweet like honey (Exodus 16:31). When I look back on it now, there was a lot of sweetness during Hannah's illness. Even though there were some really, really difficult times, there are some sweet, precious memories that we wouldn't have otherwise, if not for her storm. Just the awareness of and appreciation of "good days" is a priceless gift.

Can you tell that I'm really excited about manna? I think I'll go fix myself a peanut butter and honey sandwich...or maybe a bowl of honey & cinnamon covered ice cream!

Back to School...

I love school supplies. There's something about brand new, never-written-in notebooks, clean loose leaf paper wrapped in plastic, binders with tabbed dividers, "bouquets of freshly sharpened pencils" (one of my favorite lines from "You've Got Mail"), and neat stacks of pristine pocket folders that I just like. Every new school year is a blank slate; a fresh start. There are no crayons or safety scissors on our list this year...there haven't been for many years now...instead, we have things like protractors and compasses. And if I can't help Bethany with her geometry homework this year (which is highly likely)...no worries; her teacher does podcasts explaining the difficult problems! Hopefully, she can figure out how to watch them, because I probably won't be able to help her with that either.

Hannah shared my affinity for school supplies. She always wanted to shop for them as early as possible for the best selection, and the second we got home with them, she would get busy. She'd separate them all by class, then painstakingly label each item with her name, her teacher's name, the class title, etc. The loose leaf paper would go into the binders, and dividers would be put into place. Then she'd place everything in a neat stack, largest items on the bottom, smallest on the top. She would have her schedule, locker number, and combination all memorized within five minutes of receiving it. The girl just loved school! On the other hand, I won't even comment about what Bethany's heap of school supplies looks like on the kitchen table right now!

This summer, instead of buying school supplies for Hannah, we would have been buying items to furnish her college dorm room. We would have been moving her into her dorm at Ouachita Baptist University this Saturday. It's hard for me to even imagine what that would be like. I think she would have been really nervous...before she got sick, she was easily freaked out by change...but she would have been excited, too. And I wonder how I would feel.

I see lots of moms on Facebook lamenting the fact that their kids are starting college this fall, and talking about how sad they are going to be that they won't be living at home. I suppose I might feel that way too, if we had not the experience we had. But now, I really want to comment on all those posts, "Don't be sad! Be happy...be thrilled...that your child is moving on to the next step in life. You can talk to them every day on the phone. They will come home to visit on the weekends. Don't waste a moment of precious time being sad that your child is growing up. Enjoy every second of it!!"

Last night, I brought Bethany to open house at her school. I barely even remember open house last year...I was just trying to survive the night. The emotion was still so raw at that point, and it was excruciatingly difficult to be there among all of Hannah's classmates as they were starting their senior year. This year was better, but still difficult, just in a different way. Hannah was diagnosed with cancer during her sophomore year of high school...and Bethany will be starting her sophomore year tomorrow. She has the exact same slate of teachers that Hannah had in the tenth grade. So, as we went around from room to room last night, visiting with all of those teachers, it was just kind of surreal. They are wonderful teachers, and I'm so glad they will all be teaching Bethany this year, but I'm sure that it will feel kind of strange to them as well.

I'm so thankful for Heaven. I'm so thankful that there is so much more to look forward to than a dorm room at OBU. And I'm so thankful for John 16:22..."Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy." No one will take away your joy...I love that!!

How Great Shall Be Your Joy!

I just wanted to share a couple of pictures tonight. We are still gradually working on Hannah's room, which is now our Bible study/prayer/writing room, and this is our latest addition. No, I didn't stencil it...unlike many of my other blogging friends, I am not the creative-crafty type...it's basically a big, vinyl wall sticker. Even I can put a sticker on the wall!

I love the message here. There's just really nothing more I can add.

Life Is Good...?

Have you ever seen those T-shirts that say "Life is good"? They always have some kind of relaxation-inducing picture along with those words...like a lawn chair and a glass of lemonade, or a pair of flip-flops and a beach umbrella or something. They're nice T-shirts...they come in all different colors in sort of a weathered-looking fabric. Seems like I usually see them in sporting-good stores. I always look at them because I like them, but I've never bought one...partly because I think they're very pricey for T-shirts, but mostly because I'm not sold on the "Life is Good" sentiment. Oh, there was a time when I wouldn't have thought twice about that slogan...life was good, and always had been for me. My eyes had not yet been opened to the world of childhood cancer. Sure, I knew it existed. I had seen those St. Jude fundraisers on TV...you know the ones. Of course, I always changed the channel really fast so I didn't have to look at those steroid-swollen children with no hair or eyebrows...I felt bad for those kids, but I didn't know any of them. They weren't my kids, or my neighbor's kids, or my friend's kids, so it was easy to change the channel and blithely go on my way.

When we were in Gulf Shores, Alabama, earlier this summer, we went in one of those tourist traps stores. This one is called Souvenir City, and the door is shaped like an enormous shark's mouth. If you've ever been there, you've seen it...You can't miss it! After taking the obligatory picture...

...we went in and looked around. As I wandered through the T-shirt section, I spotted a group of shirts that looked just like the "Life is Good" shirts from a distance. I walked up to them, and found that these were a little different. These shirts actually said, "Life is Crap" and had pictures like a tree falling on someone's car, or a guy hitting his thumb with a hammer. Some were kind of funny...like one that had a picture of a men's restroom and a ladies' restroom. The ladies' room had a line of about five women waiting to use it, and of course the men's room had no line. Anyway, these shirts gave me a chuckle, and then got me thinking.

Life isn't always good...but God is. Sometimes life is crap...but God is always good. In his wisdom and sovereignty, He has allowed our family to see and experience some of the more crappy parts of life. He has taken us beyond seeing young strangers with cancer on TV, to learning the names and faces and families and stories of so many cancer battlers right here in Arkansas and beyond. It is such a privilege to be able to lift these families up in prayer, and to keep up with their journeys through the storms.

In John 9:1-3, the disciples questioned Jesus about why a man was born blind, trying to determine whether it was caused by sinfulness. Jesus replied, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned," and then He goes on to explain the purpose of the man's disability: "This happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life." Did you catch the "so that"? The "so that" rules out bad luck, haphazardness, and neglect. God had a specific, divine purpose for the man's handicap. And today, some 2000 years later, I believe that is still true. In His sovereignty, I believe that God allows...might I even say ordains...the difficult times in our lives. But He will always, if we choose to allow Him, display His goodness through them.

So which shirt had the right message? For me, it's a combination of the two. Life is sometimes crap...but God is always good!

Family Portraits & Some Special People

In my last post, I shared about how I was dreading getting our family portrait made for the church directory this week. My friend Wendy left a comment, suggesting that we bring a photograph of Hannah and include it in our portrait. That was actually something we had already considered doing. The promotional literature we'd received from the church encouraged people to bring family pets or other special items to include in their portraits, so we figured that if it was okay for someone to bring their cat, we could surely bring a photograph. So that's what we did. The photographer took a few pictures of just the three of us, and then took several of more of the three of us holding Hannah's picture. We liked those pictures so well, we chose one of them to include in the church directory. Our church was such an incredible support to us when Hannah was sick (and even since then), walking every step of the journey with us, it only seemed natural to use one of those pictures for the directory. So, overall, the photo session ended up being a positive experience.

But that was not the end of our photo sessions for the week. For some time, we've been wanting to take a new "middle of the road" picture. The one above has been such a vivid symbol of our journey down the road of cancer and the loss of our daughter. It was taken by my sister-in-law, Maria, in Briggsville, Arkansas, just about two miles down the road from the cemetery where Hannah is now buried. The day after this picture was taken in October of 2008, Hannah lost all of her beautiful, curly hair. The land on both sides of the road is owned by members of the Sullivan family. This is a very rural area, and not a single car passed by the whole time we were taking pictures. We took a lot of pictures that day in a variety of different settings...but the "in the road" pictures were our favorites because of the inherent symbolism.

Well, this weekend, we finally had the opportunity to do some updated pictures. There was only one problem...instead of a nice, cool day in mid October, it was a 100 degree day at the end of July. We waited until about 6:00 in the evening, when the temperature had plummeted to about 98.5 degrees, to sit down on the steaming asphalt. Needless to say, we didn't sit there very long, but we ended up with some nice pictures. Thanks, Maria!

This morning, we had the opportunity to share our testimony in at Mount Carmel Baptist Church in Cabot. We were invited by one of Hannah's nurses from the Hematology/Oncology clinic at Children's Hospital. We had not seen her since leaving Children's Hospital for the last time in February of 2009, until we ran into her and her husband at a Chris Tomlin/TobyMac concert in Little Rock about six weeks ago. We got reacquainted that evening, and they invited us to come and share with their Sunday School class. When we arrived today, we were so pleased to see three more of Hannah's nurses there. We had a Hem/Onc clinic reunion right there in the fellowship hall!

These four nurses, and the other nurses who work in the Arkansas Children's Hospital Hem/Onc clinic and the Gold floor are truly amazing people. They go to work every day and freely give their hearts to children with life-threatening cancers, and have their hearts broken again and again. I know that for me, personally, during the year that we spent so much time at Children's Hospital with Hannah, these nurses became a lifeline. Even as Hannah's health deteriorated and I know it had to be shocking for them to see her decline from visit to visit, they always greeted us with smiles and encouraging words. I remember one of our last visits to the clinic...Hannah was so ill that it was hard for her to sit up in a chair in the waiting room, and there were no beds available in the chemo infusion room. One of these nurses took us to a conference room which contained one of those pull-out sleep chairs that you find in hospital rooms, and fixed it so Hannah could lay on it while we were waiting for an available bed so she could get her chemo. That's the kind of kindness that a parent never forgets.

When we left Children's for the last time, on our way to the hospice center, one of the hardest things we did was say good-bye to these nurses. Actually, I shouldn't say "we", because I didn't do it. If you've read this blog for awhile, you know I'm a self-confessed avoider of emotional situations...I let Brad say our good-byes. These people had become such an important part of our lives, and when we left that day, we didn't know when or if we'd ever see them again. Several of them did come to Hannah's visitation, and that was such a huge blessing to us. But, until today, I'd never thought about it from their perspective...they told me today that they experience the same thing. They become involved in these children's lives, and many of them are healed and they are able to rejoice with those families as they return for follow-up visits. But, some of these children go to Heaven, and when they do, their contact with these families comes to an abrupt end. Most of the time, they never see the family again, and never know how they are faring in the aftermath of their cancer journeys. So it was a blessing for us to see them, and a blessing for them to see us. It was pretty cool how God worked that out this morning. As God brings it to your mind, please pray for these special people...that God would give them what they need to continue to minister to these kids and families each day like they do!

Family Portrait

Tonight we will be having a new family portrait made for our church directory. Ugh. This is not a task I am looking forward to. As a matter of fact, I think we would skip it entirely, if it were not for the repeated reminders from the church in the form of bulletin reminders, emails, and recorded phone messages that "time is running out" if we want to be included in the directory. We've put it off until almost the final day of the final week. It's not that we don't want our family represented in the church directory...we do...it's just the thought of having a family portrait taken without Hannah.

The three of us have had our picture taken together lots of times since Hannah's been in Heaven...just casual photographs spontaneously taken here and there. But this is different. It's a "portrait", not just a picture, and we've got to decide what we're going to wear, drive to the church, wait in straight-backed chairs for our family's turn, do multiple poses for a photographer, and then probably listen to a sales pitch. Just the three of us.

Hannah had some very OCD tendencies sometimes...and one of them was that she hated odd numbers. When she adjusted the volume on the car radio, she always set it at an even number. One time I asked her why it even mattered, since the volume number display disappeared a few seconds after it was adjusted, and it couldn't even be seen anymore. She laughed and said, "I don't know...It just matters to me." She was always a good sport about her obsessive-compulsiveness, and often laughed at herself. And even now, when I adjust the volume on the radio...yes, I always put it at an even number and smile to myself.

So tonight, it will feel strange when our odd-numbered family smiles for the photographer. It will feel so incomplete, somehow. But...thank God...even as we face this glaring reminder of Hannah's absence in our family's life, we know that it is just a matter of time until our family is reunited. We are still "The Sullivan Four"...we're just separated for a little while.

If God Is Good... (Part 4)

OK...We've had a little deviation from this topic for a few weeks now, but I really want to get back to it. Just a reminder...much of what I'll be sharing comes from Randy Alcorn's book, "If God Is Good: Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil."

Since our experience with Hannah's cancer and ultimate homegoing, I've been very interested in the subject of suffering, particularly as it pertains to Christians. I think that as Christians, we often assume that if we "do everything right", we should be immune from suffering and hard times. God should see all the good things we are doing...going to church, giving our tithe, reading our Bibles, praying for missionaries...and exempt us from pain and heartache. But I think most of us have figured out by now that it doesn't really work that way. So how do we keep our faith from falling apart like a cheap lawn chair when suffering or tragedy comes our way?

I think one way to keep that from happening is to prepare for suffering ahead of time. When I learned how to scuba dive, I spent a great deal of time in a classroom, watching videos, reading manuals, and learning how to use the equipment before I ever did a Jacques Cousteau off the side of a boat. And breathing through a regulator under water (a totally unnatural feeling) was completely different than breathing through a regulator in my classroom at the Scuba Doo Dive Shop. Without the prior preparation, it would have been easy to panic when taking that first breath underwater. But because I had been prepared, I was able to relax and survive that first diving experience. In the same way, spending some time consciously preparing for the suffering that will inevitably come into our lives enables us to survive it when it comes.

So how do we prepare for unknown future events? Randy devotes many, many pages to the importance of our worldview. I love what he says about God's omniscience: "God knows everything, including every contingency, and He knows what is ultimately best in ways we cannot. God can see ultimate purposes and plans that we can't. He can know it is better for someone to die now rather than later: "The righteous perish, and no one ponders it in his heart; devout men are taken away, and no one understands that the righteous are taken away to be spared from evil" (Isaiah 57:1). We have no way of knowing, for instance, whether a disability might be used to cultivate personal qualities that would more profoundly honor God and bring the person greater eternal reward in Heaven. Because God knows all things in the past, present, and future, God is uniquely qualified to know when to ordain or permit evil and suffering and when not to."

For me, just knowing that God is fully cognizant of the big picture and that He is constantly working our His purposes is a huge help to me in understanding suffering and its purpose. We would never, ever have chosen for Hannah to die now rather than later...but in His total omniscience, that was His plan for her. Knowing that, and fully understanding that truth, makes it easier to face the continued pain of her physical absence in our home.

More to come on "If God Is Good..." in another post. That's enough on that topic for tonight.

Now a little housekeeping...You might notice a couple of additions to the blog. Just under the picture of our family in the road, there is now a place you can click if you would like to get additional information about how to schedule one of us or all three of us to come share at your church, Sunday School class, ladies' group, men's group, youth group, etc. And I've also added a link on the top of the right hand column where you can subscribe to my blog via email. To be totally honest, I'm not really sure what happens if you subscribe...you'll either get an email with the full text of my latest post, or an email letting you know that I've added a post to the blog. I subscribed myself, so I guess I'll find out after I publish this post! Anyway, a couple of people had asked for that, and I just now figured out how to add it. Hopefully it will work! I really do appreciate everyone who takes the time to read what I write...I always pray that God will somehow speak through me to meet a need in someone's life.

Changes

Today I'm blogging from Hannah's bedroom. Well, actually, it's no longer Hannah's bedroom, because her bed is no longer here. For quite some time, we've been wanting to do some changing around in our house, and this past weekend, we finally did it.

For Hannah's 17th birthday, her big present from us was all new bedding...a beautiful white comforter with small black flowers, and all the pillows and stuff to go with it. She and I had shopped for it together and had lots of fun picking it out. She was really excited about it! Brad and I knew she would potentially be spending a lot of time in her bed in the months ahead and we wanted her to be comfortable and surrounded by things she loved. Her bed had a beautiful cherry headboard and footboard that we had bought several years ago for $100 from some friends who were moving, and she also had a nice dresser and bedside table. When she went to Heaven four months after her birthday, we basically just shut the door to her bedroom and left it as it was. Back on August 29, 2009, I wrote a post all about her room, closing by saying that we wanted to make "something special out of this room...a quiet, peaceful, inviting kind of room, a place where you can study your Bible, or spend some time with the Lord. I'm ready to open the shades, let the sun shine in, and keep the door of this room open again. But I'm not sure how to do it yet...we're still waiting for God's timing."

Well, apparently God's timing was this past weekend! For some time, we've been talking about moving Hannah's queen size bed into Bethany's room to replace her full size bed. Bethany has gotten so tall, she could really use that bigger bed! So we finally decided to do it. And, of course, if Bethany was going to get Hannah's bed with the nice headboard and footboard, she needed to get the matching dresser and bedside table as well.

So the process began last Thursday evening (which also just happened to be exactly 1 year and 5 months from the last time Hannah was in her room), with me removing all of Hannah's "stuff" from her dresser and table. The drawers of her bedside table were full of notes she had taken during youth group meetings and church services. There were also letters from her friend, Brittany, and some notes she had apparently passed back and forth during class. There was a jar of money, some stale candy, school schedules, and lots of cheap jewelry. On top of the table was her Bible, and some other keepsakes. I carefully went through all these items and kept everything that had her personal touch on it, placing them in a beautiful, black and white fabric-covered box. Some tough decisions had to be made...I can't keep every piece of paper she ever wrote on, or every pair of earrings she ever wore. I tried to choose just those things that were special...a particular item of jewelry that she wore a lot, or papers that included personal notes or doodling. I must admit that it was hard to think of all of Hannah's "stuff" being reduced to a box.

After the bedside table was empty, I moved on to the dresser. I opened up her top drawer, which contained all her "unmentionables", and was immediately flooded by the memories. How many times had I washed and folded those items...probably even grumbling about having to do so much laundry...and now I hadn't even seen them in so long! I managed to shut off my brain for awhile and removed all these things from the drawer, placing them in a trash bag. What else do you do with this kind of stuff? I can't imagine donating a bunch of used undergarments to anyone (although I remember when the Clintons did it!)...but I haven't been able to bring myself to take that trash bag to the dump yet. It's still sitting there, just waiting. I'm not sure yet what's going to happen to it.

The second drawer was her blue jean drawer, and it was almost completely empty...because I actually took over some of her jeans for myself several months ago, and I had passed several pairs down to Hannah's cousins. There was only one pair of jeans left in there...her favorite pair, with heart-shaped stitching on the back pockets. I folded them up and put them on a shelf in her closet. Those are not going in a trash bag. Done with that drawer!

The next two drawers were overflowing with T-shirts...Magnet Cove Panthers basketball, student council, FBLA, science club, American Idol, Odyssey of the Mind, Disciple Now, Arkansas Children's Hospital, junior high band, all-region choir, church camp...She had tons of T-shirts. And she rarely wore any of them. She preferred to wear "cute" tops. I have a plan for these shirts, though...I went through and pulled out all the special ones, and I am going to have a quilt made out of them. I am really excited about that! When it's finished...and I'm sure it's going to be awhile...I'll post a picture!

The bottom drawer of her dresser was filled with pajama pants. She loved pajama pants, and she received lots of them as gifts during her illness. Lots and lots of them. Many of them have not even been worn, and I have put them in a trash bag as well, but they will be donated...maybe to a women's shelter that our church is in the process of forming.

So we got all of that done on Thursday night...and on Friday morning, we started painting Bethany's room. Painting was a necessity because her blue and brown walls would clash terribly with Hannah's white and black bedspread. She chose a very bright turquoise color for her room, and after two coats, it looked great. We moved Hannah's bed and furniture into her room that evening, and it was beautiful! She moved all of her things from her little-girl looking white furniture into Hannah's furniture, and the transformation was incredible. Her "little girl" room is gone...it's now a young lady's room. She couldn't be more pleased. Check it out!



That evening, with all the furniture now gone, I had the extremely difficult task of sweeping out Hannah's room. Remember, the door has been closed and the room untouched for almost a year and a half. As I moved the broom around the room, I of course swept up a lot of dust, but along with the dust was a lot of hair...Hannah's hair. I had an irrational desire to keep that pile of dust and hair, just because it was a connection to Hannah, but after some hesitation, I vacuumed it up. I actually do have a whole bag full of Hannah's hair in my closet...I kept it when we shaved it off during her second round of radiation treatments, thinking maybe we could somehow make a wig out of it for her. But it was too dry and brittle to be of any use. I've never even looked in that bag since that day...but I always know in the back of my mind that I have it.

After sweeping out the room and closing the closet doors (the closet is still full of her clothes and stuff...just couldn't do that yet...I'm just going to keep those doors closed for awhile), Brad and I moved our desk in here and set it right in front of the window. This is the view I now have as I sit and write...

I'm not going to take any other pictures of the room yet...it's still a work in progress. I'm looking for a comfy chaise lounge type chair to put in here along with a nice set of shelves. We're going to keep Hannah's academic awards hanging on the wall where she put them, and her bulletin board is still up with all the stuff she stuck on it. We're planning to mount a hook on the wall and hang her letter jacket on it. On one entire wall, we hung a Disciple Now '07 banner that was signed by the members of Hannah's youth group after she went to Heaven. So there is still a lot of Hannah in this room, and it feels really good to be in here. I love that there is life and light in this room again!

"For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light, we see light." Psalm 36:9

Time in Tennessee

Before I talk about the weekend, I just have one thing to say....

WE HAVE HIGH SPEED INTERNET!

Yes, I realize it's 2010 and most people have had high speed internet for a long time. We, however, live in the country, and have only had two choices...dial-up or satellite...for internet. We did dial-up for awhile, and when we just couldn't stand it anymore, we got satellite internet. Well, it never was all it was cracked up to be, especially considering the price we were paying. It was not much faster than dial-up, and during high traffic times (pretty much anytime we wanted to be online) it would slow to a crawl. Watching YouTube videos, looking at pictures posted on Facebook, blog-surfing...forget it! It wasn't worth the time investment! Then we began hearing that some of our neighbors were getting AT&T U-Verse internet service and we checked into it. We made several phone calls to AT&T and were repeatedly told that high speed internet wasn't available in our area. We finally got connected with a local AT&T rep, who was able to get us set up today. I am far too excited about this....I'm not sure this is healthy!

Anyway, back to our trip to Tennessee this past weekend. We left on Thursday and drove to Nashville, where we had dinner with Bruce & Lisa Wethey. They are incredibly talented musicians who travel around the country leading worship in various venues. Check out their website at www.bruceandlisa.com! They came to our church back in November of 2008, and we met them at that time. Lisa had been diagnosed with a non-malignant brain tumor several years earlier, and she shared her story as they performed at our church that evening. Of course, it was of great interest to us, as Hannah was in the middle of her battle with glioblastoma at that time. Lisa was about to start radiation treatments at that time, and Hannah had already been through two rounds of radiation treatments, so we visited quite a while that evening. They continued to follow our journey through our emails. They came back and performed at our church a few weeks ago, and we had another opportunity to visit with them and get caught up on all that had happened since we had last seen them. Since we were planning a trip to Knoxville, we made plans to get together on the way. We ended up having dinner with them, and then sitting in our hotel lobby with them for a couple of hours. We really enjoyed our visit with them.

The next day, we traveled on to Knoxville, where we met up with some old friends of ours, Lindy & Crystal Apon. Back when we lived in Fort Smith, Lindy was the youth minister at our church and we became good friends with him and his family. Their son and Hannah used to play together a lot when they were preschoolers. We moved from Fort Smith about fifteen years ago, when Bethany was a newborn, and we had not seen them since then. It was great to get re-acquainted with them. We played frisbee golf, went whitewater rafting, played ping pong (well, at least Bethany and Brad did), and learned some new card games. Lindy is now the pastor at Parkway Baptist Church in Knoxville, and we had the great privilege of sharing our testimony there on Sunday morning. It's amazing how wherever you go, the body of Christ is there!

The main thing we came away from this weekend with was an increased desire to share our testimony of God's goodness and grace through the storms of life. Up until now, we have accepted speaking opportunities that have been offered to us, but have really not actively pursued them. We believe that God is calling us to be more intentional in seeking opportunities to share. We don't know really what that's going to look like--we have demanding jobs and a very active teenage daughter--but we want to be obedient to His call. We're beginning to work on a few projects...a website, informational materials, etc...and we'd appreciate your prayers as we seek to follow His leadership in this area. We are excited to see what God has in store for us in the days ahead!

Fun With the Sullivan Family

Tonight, I'm going to take a break from the "If God is Good" posts and share some of the fun our family had over the 4th of July weekend. Over the past several years, Brad's parents have hosted what they call "G & G Camp" (Grandma & Grandpa Camp) for their grandchildren, who all happen to be girls! They've done lots of fun things over the years, including horseback riding, kayaking, visiting museums, exploring caves, rock climbing...you name it, they've done it! This year, we parents were invited too, and we spent the weekend at a ranch/resort just outside of Dallas.

We all traveled to Texas from our various locations, and our first stop was the new Cowboy stadium in Arlington. We got a wonderful tour of this amazing facility, and had lots of fun taking pictures while we were there...

Here are the cousins taking in the view (the youngest cousin, Faith, didn't get to take the tour with us)...

And here they are pretending to be VIPs in the box seats...

And posing by the NFL logo...

And, of course, posing as Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders in their locker room!

And the Dads had to get in on the act in the players' locker room...

After the tour, we traveled the rest of the way to the ranch, where we met up with Brad's sister, her husband, and their sweet little girl, Faith. We don't get to see her very often, because they live in Waco, so we really enjoyed our time with her. Here she is checking out the pool...

Playing with a new toy...

And hanging out with her oldest cousin, Bethany...

We really didn't do much after we got to the ranch...other than a trip to the grocery store, we didn't even leave. We basically just hung out by the pool, grilled burgers, and played games. We had our first-ever Sullivan family Bunco tournament, and enjoyed playing Apples to Apples and Phase 10.

Hannah would have absolutely loved every minute of it. There was nothing she enjoyed more than spending time with her family. She was the oldest cousin, and thought her younger cousins were hilarious...even when they weren't trying to be. She would love playing with Faith, who was born just two months before she went to Heaven. She always loved playing games, although we never could figure out why, because she almost always lost. And while we were there, I missed her constantly, and kept feeling like she should be there...but it wasn't an unbearable weight. We shared many fond remembrances of her while we visited...and it was okay.

I dreamed about her last night. That's only the second time I've dreamed about her since she died. Most of it is pretty hazy...Someone (maybe Bethany) was shouting, "Hannah's back! She's here and she's fine!" And I ran into her room and she was sitting cross-legged on her bed and smiling. Her hair was thick and curly and she was stunningly beautiful. We hugged and talked and laughed. I have no idea what we talked about, but I could "hear" her voice and her laugh, and I was amazed that she sounded just like she did before she got sick. There was an undescribably glowing peace upon her, and my clearest memory from this dream is the unspeakable joy I felt at seeing her so healthy and whole. When I first woke up this morning, I didn't even remember the dream right away...it just suddenly came back to me mid-morning. At first it made me sad, because I wanted so badly for it to not be a dream...but then I was reminded that she is healthy and whole and beautiful and peaceful. My joy at seeing her again is simply postponed. And that joy will just be that much sweeter after this time apart!

If God Is Good... (Part 3)

More thoughts from Randy Alcorn's book "If God is Good..." tonight:

Randy says that most of us don't give much thought to evil and suffering until we experience them ourselves. That was definitely true for me. Before our lives were turned upside down by Hannah's cancer, it seemed like those kinds of catastrophes only happened to "other people". But, Randy points out that if we don't spend some time contemplating our response to suffering before it happens, we will be forced to "formulate perspective on the fly, at a time when our thinking is muddled and we're exhausted and consumed by pressing issues."

Consider these differing perspectives on suffering. A friend of Randy's shared this story:

"When I was admitted to the hospital in sepsis with a 50/50 chance of survival, I asked the chaplain how we could believe that God is love, when this felt like the antithesis of love. I said I wouldn't inflict this much suffering on someone I hated, let alone someone I loved. She told me she would "look it up," then left my room and never came back. I posed the same question to the social worker who came to visit me a few days later. She told me that God's like a giant and we're like little ants, and sometimes He accidentally steps on our ant hills and some of us get hurt. She said our suffering is random and God's probably not even aware of it."

Wow. Where is the hope in that? Why even bother?

Contrast that story with this one. In May 2000, James Montgomery Boice, pastor of a large church in Philadelphia, shared with his congregation that he'd been diagnosed with liver cancer. Here's what he told them:

"Should you pray for a miracle? Well, you're free to do that, of course. My general impression is that the God who is able to do miracles--and He certainly can--is also able to keep you from getting the problem in the first place. So although miracles do happen, they're rare by definition.... Above all, I would say pray for the glory of God. If you think of God glorifying Himself in history and you say, where in all of history has God most glorified Himself? He did it at the cross of Jesus Christ, and it wasn't by delivering Jesus from the cross, though He could have.... God is in charge. When things like this come into our lives, they are not accidental. It's not as if God somehow forgot what was going on, and something bad slipped by.... God is not only the one who is in charge; God is also good. Everything He does is good.... If God does something in your life, would you change it? If you'd change it, you'd make it worse. It wouldn't be as good."

Eight weeks later, Pastor Boice stepped into Heaven. I love his perspective. There's nothing left for me to add.

If God is Good... (Part 2)

This is the book I'll be referring to a lot in the next couple of posts. As I said last time, I'm no theologian, so I'm happy to defer to Randy Alcorn on most of what I'll be sharing. I want to be sure it's clear that these thoughts are not original with me. Some of what he says is hard to hear, but I think there's real value in it.

A Barna poll asked, "If you could ask God only one question and you knew He would give you an answer, what would you ask?" The most common response was, "Why is there pain and suffering in the world?" John Stott says, "The fact of suffering undoubtedly constitutes the single greatest challenge to the Christian faith, and has been in every generation. Its distribution and degree appear to be entirely random and therefore unfair. Sensitive spirits ask if it can possibly be reconciled with God's justice and love." The problem of evil in the world is sometimes used as the "ultimate trump card" to argue against the Christian faith. Atheists often use this argument to "prove" that God does not exist.

Now here's the statement from Randy (I think I've read enough of his books to be on a first-name basis with him!) that really struck me: A faith that leaves us unprepared for suffering is a faith that deserves to be lost. He quotes John Piper: "Wimpy worldviews make wimpy Christians. And wimpy Christians won't survive the days ahead." Then he quotes Auschwitz survivor Viktor Frankl: "Just as the small fire is extinguished by the storm whereas a large fire is enhanced by it, likewise a weak faith is weakened by predicaments and catastrophes whereas a strong faith is strengthened by them." He says that when people lose their faith because of suffering, it's usually a weak or nominal faith that doesn't account for or prepare them for evil or suffering, and that any faith not based on the truth needs to be lost.

Here come the big guns....He says, "If you base your faith on lack of affliction, your faith lives on the brink of extinction and will fall apart because of a frightening diagnosis or a shattering phone call. Token faith will not survive suffering, nor should it. Losing your faith may be God's gift to you. Only when you jettison ungrounded and untrue faith can you replace it with valid faith in the true God--faith that can pass, and even find strength in, the most formidable of life's tests."

Whew! Food for thought, huh? That's enough for one night...More to follow on another day.

If God Is Good...

On the day we found out Hannah had a brain tumor, I sent an email to a few close friends and family members letting them know the news and requesting prayer for our family. This email was the first of over one hundred that were sent out during her year-long battle with cancer. (See "Hannah's Story in Emails" over in the right-hand column.) These emails were forwarded many times over, resulting in prayer for our family literally around the world. I always closed my emails with the words "God is good, all the time". I believed those words then, and I still believe them now.

So I was intrigued when I found a book by Randy Alcorn titled "If God is Good: Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil". I am an avid reader, and Randy Alcorn is one of my favorite authors ever. He's written several excellent fiction books including "Deadline", "Dominion", and my personal favorite, "Safely Home". In his fiction works, there is always at least one character who dies, but whose story is continued from their perspective in Heaven. Fascinating stuff. He's also written several non-fiction books, including "Heaven", which can only be described as a tome. It's extremely well-researched, very deep theologically, and extremely long. I started reading it when Hannah entered hospice care, and just couldn't get through it all. There's a much more manageable version called "Fifty Days of Heaven", which is basically the same book divided into fifty daily readings. Brad and I both read it in the days after Hannah's death, and he is currently re-reading it. There's also a version called "Heaven for Kids", which is fantastic for children who are seeking an understanding of Heaven. Bethany and her cousins read it after Hannah went to Heaven, and I think it was really helpful for them.

So back to "If God is Good". Before Hannah's illness, I was so very insulated from the pain in the world. One visit to the Hematology/Oncology clinic at Arkansas Children's Hospital ended that. During our year there, we met so many suffering children and families. And as I follow Jedidiah Harper's cancer journey (see "Harper House--Jedidiah's Testimony" in the column on the right), I am amazed that I don't know any of the people Jed's mom has met since they've been going there. That can only mean that many, many more families have started their own cancer journeys over the past year and four months...and many others' journeys have ended. If God is good...why do children get cancer?

A couple of weeks ago a sudden heavy rainstorm hit southwest Arkansas in the middle of the night, just a couple of counties over from where we live. It resulted in a flash flood which swept like lightning through a popular camping area, washing away twenty lives along with it. Many of those lost were children, and some families lost multiple members. It took several days for all the victims to be found, as their families waited in agony. If God is good...how could lives be torn apart in this way?

We were at the Gulf Coast a few weeks ago and visited with several people whose way of life is about to be dramatically changed by the oil spill. Their livelihood, their future, their very identities are intimately tied to what happens to in the Gulf. If God is good...how could He allow a disaster of this magnitude to continue unabated?

There are so many more examples. If God is good...how can He sit back while people in Haiti suffer; how can He allow young men and women to be killed in Iraq and Afghanistan; how can people suffer from incurable diseases like ALS and multiple sclerosis; how can terrorists strap on bombs and detonate them in crowded marketplaces?

I don't have the answers to these questions, but this is the topic that Randy Alcorn addresses in his book. And over my next several posts, I want to share with you what I'm learning as I've been reading his book. I'm no theologian--not by a long shot--but what he says rings true to me, and hopefully it will be of help to you as you face whatever your personal storm happens to be. Stay tuned...

Thoughts on Cancer, Death, and Heaven

What a morbid title this would be for a post...if not for that last word, right? It's that last word that makes the other two words bearable.

Yesterday afternoon I visited two ladies who are very close to Heaven. Both of them have been a part of the Anchor of Hope Cancer Ministry over the last year, and both of them have been encouragement to so many people, in spite of (or maybe because of) their illness. One of these ladies said to me yesterday, "You definitely chose the right name for the cancer ministry...If we didn't have hope, where would we be? That hope has really been my anchor." What a testimony from someone who is facing imminent death, unless God should choose to perform a miraculous healing in her life.

While I was visiting these two precious ladies, Brad was visiting a family in our community who had just lost a husband/father to glioblastoma, the same kind of cancer Hannah had. This man had lived almost two and a half years with this disease, practically an eternity in glioblastoma time. He had his initial brain surgery the same day that Hannah experienced her first symptoms, Valentine's Day of 2008. One of his daughters, a former classmate of Hannah's, once asked Hannah at school if she was scared about her cancer, and Hannah replied that no, she wasn't. Her mom told Brad that this simple statement from Hannah had really been an encouragement to her daughter as she watched her father battle the same cancer. This gentleman kept a picture of Hannah in his workshop, and now he has joined her in Heaven.

Last night was our Anchor of Hope Cancer Ministry support group meeting, and we had a couple of new members there. One was a dear, sweet lady who shared how she was diagnosed with liver cancer and was told by her doctor that she was "terminal." She said that was fine with her...she'd just get to see Jesus sooner. As soon as she came home from the hospital after surgery, she began giving away all of her belongings...her car, her clothes, her furniture...figuring she wouldn't need them anymore. That was almost two years ago. She went on to share about how she witnesses to everyone around her at every doctor's appointment and every scan. One of the other members of the group remarked that apparently God had lots more people for her to witness to!

The other new lady who was there is a multiple-year breast cancer survivor, and made this statement, "Cancer is the 'best worst' thing that ever happened to me." She went on to explain how having cancer had completely changed her life, for the better. She also shared how her own mother had lived for 23 years following a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer and a prognosis of three weeks to three months to live. Her one regret was that she was not with her mother when she died...she was on a mission trip and was unable to get home.

On the way home from our meeting, I thought about some regrets I have surrounding Hannah's death. I can honestly say (and I am so happy to be able to say) that I have no regrets about her life...we had a wonderful family life and have so many great memories of time spent together. There's nothing I would go back and change about the life we had together. There are some regrets I have about the last year of her life, though. I regret that for a long time we really didn't understand how very sick she was...that we made her go to school, even when she didn't feel well (although she was the one who insisted on going most of the time). I regret that we never had any deep conversations about what she was thinking and feeling as her health deteriorated. She was a very private person and never was one to share her feelings, and we were also very careful never to let her think that we had "given up" on her healing. By the time it became apparent that her healing could only come from a miracle, she was unable to have that conversation anymore. I regret that I didn't spend more time just lying in bed with her and holding her in those last days--even though she was 17 years old. In my head I know that she wouldn't have liked that, though...she liked her personal space, and didn't even like to be rocked as a baby. And I regret that she suffered unnecessary discomfort in her last 48 hours due to an oversight by the nursing staff at the hospice center.

But...these things that seem to be such a big deal to me are nothing...nothing!...to her. When I do find my mind drifting toward these things, I can almost hear her saying, "C'mon, Mom, it's fine. Don't worry about it. I'm great!" And she is. I recently downloaded a song by Mandisa (a former American Idol contestant...Hannah could tell you which season) called "You Wouldn't Cry". Take a look at the lyrics as you consider the awesomeness (is that a word?) of Heaven for a moment:

All you saw was pain

All you saw was rain

But you should see me now

Moments filled with tears

Lasted all those years

Disappeared somehow

You never said goodbye

On your knees you cry

You're still asking why, but

Blue has never been bluer

True has never been truer

Honey never tasted so sweet

There's a song in the breeze

A million voices in praise

A rose has never smelled redder

The sun has never been brighter

If I could find the right words to say

If you could look at my face

If you could just see this place

You wouldn't cry for me today

What you think you see

Isn't really me

I'm already home

You've got to lay it down

'Cause Jesus holds me now

And I am not alone

Your faith is wearing thin

But I am watching Him

And He's holding you, too

What may see like years will just be a moment

Oh, the day will come

When I'll show you where you're going

I can't wait to show you that

Blue has never been bluer

True has never been truer

Honey never tasted so sweet

There's a song in the breeze

A million voices in praise

A rose has never smelled redder

The sun has never been brighter

If I could find the right words to say

If you could look at my face

If you could just see this place

You wouldn't cry for me today.

We were really very blessed that we knew Hannah's death was approaching. Even though she couldn't talk back to us, we were able to tell her good-bye and how much we loved her. I can't imagine the pain for those who don't have the privilege to have those kind of last moments with their loved ones. All I do know is that in Heaven, God will make everything right again, and until then, He is holding us in His hands. He truly is our Anchor of Hope!

Stained glass window from Oyster Bay Baptist Church in Gulf Shores, Alabama, where we shared our testimony on June 6th