1 Corinthians 13 for People in Melanomaland

  If I could speak endlessly of all cancers and of doctors and treatments, but didn’t love others, I would only be a complaining victim or a brash patient.  If I could understand melanoma and if I understood all of God’s plans and possessed all medical knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could remove the beast from this world, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing but a soul-less braggart confident of my own abilities.  If I give everything I have to fight this disease and even sacrifice my family, I could, maybe, boast about being NED ; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing and my NED status would be meaningless.

  Love is patient and kind; melanoma is intrusive and vicious. I need to remember to let love rule.

  Love is not jealous or boastful or proud  or rude; melanoma can lead me into a sense of thinking only about me. It can also make me depressed and cranky. I need to remember to let love rule.

  Love does not demand its own way.  Melanoma can make me very demanding. I need to remember to let love rule.

 Love is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It's not my fault I have melanoma and it's not my family's fault either. I need not feel guilty or make them feel guilty when they do their best to look after me and I snap at their efforts. I need to remember to be appreciative and let love rule.

 Love does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Melanoma is just plain wrong but it cannot win. It can only do so much. It is limited to what it can do to my body and though that is horrible beyond words, it cannot touch my soul. It cannot follow me to heaven. It cannot kill my faith. I will always win against melanoma because God has already won the ultimate victory.

 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. Therefore, neither will I give up, lose faith or lose hope, and I will endure everything melanoma throws my way because God is Love. I have God in my life and I know Love. Melanoma serves to make me a stronger person. It may weaken my body, but it will not weaken my perseverance or my resolve. No! It will make me all the more determined.

  What is known today about cancer, and melanoma in particular, will give way to new discoveries. But love will last forever and it will not give way to anything!  Now our medical knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even diagnoses and prognoses  reveal only part of the whole picture!  But when full understanding comes, these partial things will become useless.

  When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. I didn't believe melanoma could happen to me. I did what I wanted to do and didn't listen.

 But when I grew up, I put away childish attitudes.  Melanoma has caught up with me and everything has changed.

 Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but one day we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.

  Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.

Melanoma isn't on the "forever" list!
Hallelujah! I am forever grateful!

(NED: no evidence of disease)