Hope Wrapped In Grace

A week ago today was, undoubtedly, one of the worst days in my life. If it could go wrong, it did. Big time. It ended with me missing a big meeting which was rescheduled for today. That rescheduling was wrapped in much grace. Grace showed up today as well.

The meeting was relaxed and fun. I actually love going before the District Board of Ordained Ministry and having a chance to talk with them, answer their questions, get their collective wisdom.  We talked about my church as that's primary. But we also talked about something else.

Today, they asked me to tell them about my melanoma, Melanoma Prayer Center, and Melanoma Grief Chapel. I had the opportunity to explain what "stage 3b" means and I put in an anti-tanning bed plug. I was able to tell them to please consider me a resource because if melanoma hasn't shown up in their congregation yet, it will, and I gave them some stats. And they listened! They cared!

We discussed what melanoma has done to my faith, and when they steered the conversation back to the church, it got steered back to faith and melanoma and not by me.

And then hope arrived. It was that rare thing that popped out of my mouth and it caused quite a reaction. But it needs to be shared. Not because it was something awesome that I uttered, but because it's beautiful simplicity is inherent in the faith-based segment of the melanoma community.

I think what kept DBOM coming back to melanoma was the peace and ease I discussed it with. And, in particular, discussed mine with. I think I caught them off guard by presenting them a colleague who lives appointment to appointment and who might have an as yet undetected renegade cell, which I also told them about. We really had quite a discussion!

I honestly don't recall the precise context of this, I was just talking, it came out, and they were "Say that again! Are you getting that in the minutes? Good! Get that in the minutes! What was that again?"

What it was...There's always hope even when hope becomes the hope of heaven.

And that is so. You'd think a group of preachers and lay leaders would know that. And I'm sure they did, they just hadn't thought about it quite like that. We always have hope. From life to Life, hope never leaves us because God never leaves us. Maybe hearing it from someone in my position added an extra oomph, I don't know. But seriously, the Chair was making sure the Secretary was getting it in the minutes and the Secretary was repeating it back to me to make sure he got it right.

So simple. So much grace. It bears repeating because it is so true.

There's always hope even when hope becomes the hope of heaven.

Be grateful!