Luehrs Line --------------------: Homecoming Celebration

Friday, October 14, 2011

Homecoming Celebration

It has been a long week in many respects. My body seems to be struggling with side-effects of lingering chemo poison. So I am not feeling at my best. It has been difficult to wait and watch a sister in Christ come to the end of her race. Many have heard the news...it travels fast here in the Buhl/Castleford farming community. We are a close interwoven band of neighbors, friends and family. Serving God is rather normal. Yet it is a reminder to all that when death actually occurs how fragile and short life is. Normal is relative. Jeanie was not a normal Christian. She took her faith in Jesus very seriously. If you knew her she was a special friend to each of us. She had the uncanny ability to befriend everyone. So early this morning around 2:30 am Jeanie entered into Glory. My first words to the news of my friend Jeanie was, praise God! Her race was complete. Heaven, with her Savior Jesus waiting for her. He was and is the ultimate prize. I am confident the words were spoken -- well done good and faithful servant. What a Homecoming it must have been in heaven. Tears of uncontrollable joy. I am happy. I am sad to miss a friend--but only for a while. My homesickness wells up within me and I am comforted by knowing one day I too, can and will dance on streets of gold with my friend. Words can't say enough to cover the aching pain in our hearts at this moment. Time will continue to tick. Life goes on. Yet a legacy is forever stamped across many lives. It's an opportunity to carry the torch and let the light shine. It's what all the saints come to the end of this life say: Love Jesus -- know Him -- know His Word -- make Him known to others. This is the legacy I intend to carry on -- not just because of Jeanie but because He calls us to share our story's, our hurts, our victory's. This is for His glory and to encourage each other. Pray for Jeanie's family and many friends who were touched by her amazing faith and kindness. The stories are countless -- so many leaned on her as their rock. It is time for some new rocks to emerge. It is time for a deeper faith to shine brighter in myself and those who knew Jeanie. It is a wake up call -- our days are numbered. We never know when the end really is coming. Jeanie told me this week she did not expect to live this long with cancer, but how thankful and grateful she was. She was given so many opportunities to be bold in her faith and speak about what the Lord has done in her and offer the free gift of salvation to others. How very precious. It's not about Jeanie -- it's about Jesus and that is what life is really all about.

Final thoughts...waiting for funeral details. I will post them when available. Please lift this family is prayer. Thank you!

2 comments:

shmilyluehrsOctober 15, 2011 at 11:14 AM
I am so sorry to to hear of the loss of your friend, but I rejoice with you that she is no longer suffering and is now dancing in heaven! Love you.
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The onion Farmers WifeOctober 18, 2011 at 4:58 PM
Beautiful tribute to a truly beautiful woman....she like you, Anna are so strong and amazing! God Bless you and thank God for our beautiful friend Jeanie...she is missed and so loved.
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My Cancer Story

Many have asked me how long have you been sick? When did this all begin? Tough questions even for me to answer...all I can say at this point is I finally found some Doctors who listened to all my symptoms and did something about it. Late in April 2011 I went to see a family practitioner who sent me to a GI specialist for a colonoscopy. This resulted in a diagnosis on May 13th, 2011 of cancer in the colon. The extent was unknown at that point in time. I had to wait until Monday May 16th, 2011 for a CT scan. Then wait till Tuesday for an appointment with the surgeon, who would later remove the colon. I was informed of the biopsy results: adenocarcinoma. The CT did not show any signs of the cancer spreading to other organs (praise the Lord). In fact the CT did not even show the tumor. It was estimated by the GI Doctor to be the size of a golf ball. So surgery was scheduled for May 31st, 2011. Surgery was successful. They removed about a foot of the sigmoid colon and 20 lympnodes. I had to wait again for lab results. On June 2nd, 2011 I was told about the lab results. The tumor had evaded through the colon wall. Two out of the twenty lymph nodes tested positive for cancer. This elevated the stage of my cancer to 3 B. This is when I knew chemotherapy would be necessary. Recovery from surgery went well. GI functions are returning on their own and pain was easily controlled. I had my first appointment with the oncology team at MSTI (Twin Falls) on Friday June 17th, 2011.

I started chemotherapy on July 13th. The plan was set to give every two weeks for infusion treatments of poison. Sounds great on paper. The reality is this: chemo drugs deplete the body of healthy cells as well as potential rouge cancer cells. Keeping this schedule of every two weeks has proven to be difficult. On my off weeks I get my blood levels checked. This is to determine if it is "safe" enough for me to get chemo again. Safe...uh...it's poison right? Anyway chemo treatments have come and gone now, twelve in all. I finished up with my last round on January 27th.

On January 29th 2012 I had a CT scan. My oncology doctor said everything looked fine. No cancer detected. Doing the party dance! I am officially on the other side of living cancer free. I am celebrating in many ways. This has been the hardest thing in my life to do. Not to mention to try to balance so called "normal" life at home on the farm.

As far as the future goes with my health I have a few more doctor appointments scheduled. I will have another colonoscpy in May. For now, it is just watch and monitor my blood work and pray cancer doesn't return. Prognosis is good and I am believing and trusting in a mighty God. He is faithful!

Fast forward seven years -- 2018! Still cancer free! After many lab tests, blood work and CT scans so far no cancer detected. Miracles still happen everyone!

Favorite Quotes

Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadow. It's what sunflowers do. Helen Keller

"Every good work should be a revelation of the glory of God. What makes the good deed an act of love is not the raw act, but the passion and the sacrifice to make God himself known as glorious. Not to aim to show God is not to love, because God is what we need most deeply. And to have all else without him is to perish in the end. The Bible says that you can give away all that you have and deliver your body to be burned and have not love (1 Corinthians 13:3). If you don't point people to God for everlasting joy, you don't love. You waste your life." John Piper ---Don't Waste Your Life

"Surrender is the key that unlocks the vault of God's best and deepest treasures." Charles Swindoll

"You can't move people to action unless you first move them with emotion. The heart comes before the head." John Maxwell

Spiritual growth is a conundrum. The key to spiritual growth is developing healthy and holy routines called spiritual disciplines. But once routine becomes routine we need to change the routine. Why? Because sacred routines become empty rituals if we do them out of left-brain memory instead of right-brain imagination. When we learn how and forget why we start going through the motions spiritually. Mark Batterson

Serenity Prayer

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardship as a pathway to peace; taking as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have; trusting that You will make all things right if I surrender to Your will; so that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with you forever in the next. --Reinhold Niebuhr

Luehrs Line --------------------

Friday, October 14, 2011

Homecoming Celebration

2 comments:

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