CANCER....a word that strikes fear, disillusionment, pain, lack of hope and death in one’s heart and mind.
I will share a story with you. My name is Karyl Greenlaw. I will be 67 yrs old next month. I had kidney cancer nine years ago and had my kidney and adrenal gland removed as well as part of the 11th rib. I was assured that the cancer was gone as they really don’t have chemo for renal cancer. Just four days before they told me I had renal cancer, my 29 year-old daughter passed away and of course I was with her. I had not invited God back in my life at that time. I was still very angry with him from the time I was 17 until then. I was 57 years old at the time and even angrier with Him for losing my daughter. The anger and rage in my family and with myself was because I believed the doctors when they said it was gone. When I turned 60 years old I invited God back into my life. I made a commitment at the time to do my very best to really find out what His word was all about. I knew I could not just accept some of the Bible, I had to accept it all or nothing. Now Jesus was a different story. I totally believed in Him and always knew His story was the truth. I never saw abusiveness in Him as I felt God was abusive and brutal at times, both in my life and in the Bible. So, I started going to classes after I found HopeCovenantChurch. About a year later, I started meeting people and listening. I was always asking questions about what was being taught. I didn't like the answers that God provided in His Word. However, after much crying, anger, pain, trying to control the outcome of my life and begging God, I got some tutors, Hershel and Coleen Melton. I had friends by then, Anna R., Judy W., Patti P., Lonnie S., Georgia and of course Donna T. I was in Jim Selland’s Bible class and we took two years to get through I Corinthians. During that time I learned so much that I couldn’t divorce my husband and this life wasn't about me. This life was about praising God and being a servant for Him and learning to act like Jesus did, humble, peaceful, caring and understanding. Well, needless to say, I struggled minute to minute with that and have never made the grade. I decided it had to be about the journey instead of being perfect as that wasn't going to happen.
I started feeling poorly a few years ago again. I went to the doctor and as many of us have faced, especially if you are a woman, it’s in our heads, we are stressed and pre or post menopausal. However, I pushed them and said I want tests done. Well, I had a CT scan done on my lungs and stomach and there was a nodule by my heart. That was two years ago. The lung doctor said we will watch it. It didn't grow too much the first year. This last year it started growing and, of course, I was a smoker of forty-seven years, two packs a day. I was coughing and spitting and hoarse of voice, aching and just generally feeling like crap. In January of this year when I coughed there was blood. After two days of that I went to the emergency room and they put me in the hospital. Now mind you, I am not a good patient. I am somewhat rebellious of spirit and nature. They let me out the next afternoon but what they found was a Hilar mass near the heart so they couldn't biopsy it and it was forging into the bronchial tubes. I was sent back to the surgeon, Dr. Maxwell. He said it was time to remove it and let’s see what it is. All tests I had for cancer and valley fever came back negative. On April 7th I had a smoke two hours before my surgery. Now mind you, I had to do some intensive months of resentment therapy with Mark Sullivan last year so I could resolve some issues with the Lord and my family, and they were painful. I had Hershel and Coleen that helped keep me sane and pray over me and pray with me through out the year as my dysfunction continued as I was trying to understand what God wanted me to be and what he wanted me to follow and how I could do that. Then Mark Sullivan came in and taking me through an intense four months of resentment therapy that totally kicked my butt. I was sick and tired of hurting others and being hurt and I knew from God’s words that there was something better and I wanted it. I saw it in others at church in my Christian family and I was going to go through literal hell and back to have it and I felt I did. The resentment towards the Lord, wow, was amazing. I was in a class of David Keane’s and he was doing the Old Testament. In 6 weeks of being in there and going through the resentment therapy, BING BANGO, clarity was huge about who God really was and what he wanted from me. I connected finally after all those years. I was plugged in. Did I change my behavior totally? Nope, I am human. I am broken. There was hope though. So now here we were April 7th, 2010. A lot of my church family, including Pastor Duane and my surgeon came and Duane prayed. Duane has always had time for me even early on when my rage was at its peak, which is now gone. I went into surgery and as many of you am aware of and I almost died. They pulled all the stops out to save my life. I had told God for a week or two before the surgery I wasn't ready to go yet as I wanted to be apart of a few ministries yet and bring some to our church and network with other churches in Chandler. You know, God has the plan. God spared me to this point today. I had lost tons of blood, was in critical care unit for two weeks, and had plugs in my body everywhere and 80 percent oxygen flowing for me to breathe after the ventilator. I don't remember too much other than I was in pain and I remember a lot of my church family coming everyday to pray and to just give me a kiss. Anna, Judy Wells, the Blackburns, Patti, Duane, David, Mark Sullivan and his wife. Patti P. and Lonnie S. were with me right from the very start. The list continues. The doctors telling Rick and me, “She isn't over the hump yet. We don't know if she is going to make it.” I remember the Sunday before. I did a skit at church for my church family that Scott put together where there was a letter left on a park bench. Three of us read that letter three different times. In that letter the Lord said, “Stay steady in me, stay steady in me. I love you so much I sent my only son to die so you could have eternal life with me.” That’s what I kept remembering. I didn't know what Gods plan was for me and I still don’t. I am like so many people in the world. This isn't a done deal where I am healed and it may never be, as they found renal cancer again and valley fever pneumonia. I should have been dead. My age, my smoking, cholesterol levels, diabetes, COPD and third stage renal failure in the other kidney are all devastating factors. Are we getting the picture here? A cell had broken loose from nine years ago and metastasized to the lung. Then somewhere along the line I got valley fever pneumonia and it was left untreated and was severe. My sisters and brothers let me give you Gods truth. He keeps his promises. He loves us. I was lucky as his plan at this time today was not for me to go to Him. Surgery is frightening however, we have a true family at Hope and I needed them desperately to pray for me, to visit with me, to cook for me, to love me, to accept me, forgive me and praise God along with me. They did. I don't know what Gods plan is for me or anyone else. I know some of my relationships with my adult daughters are toxic for the most part and I have had to separate from them and pray for them. I need to be there when they need their mom and then step away again. The good news is they had accepted Christ into their hearts a few years after me. We as Christians have to know God’s word, share it with others, pray over it, and invite God in our lives and our hearts and most of all our decision making. The Holy Spirit is who I call the one who gives me epiphanies. All of a sudden it comes to you and YOU GET IT and whatever you were struggling with. If we don't make these attempts every day and only go to church once a week and that’s all the time we have for God, then I guess we have nothing to complain about. Or if we check boxes on our fellow Christians we once again take the focus off of us and are looking at others, judging, criticizing and whining. Let me wind this particular writing up with I have not smoked as of today since April 7, 2010, after forty-seven years and two packs a day! I am alive today. I praise my God to the highest. I thank everyone in my spiritual family for the prayers, the caring and loving from Duane and David all the way across. To all of you, thank you for loving me sincerely and genuinely. You have loved me, and accepted me. I never had that in my entire life. God is huge beyond any of our wildest imaginations. My husband and I had been estranged for eighteen years, yet he was there through the whole last six months. At the hospital he actually held my hand when I was in pain, wow. Just a few short years prior we were beating each other up physically and verbally. My pride today is that I am a Christian woman. I am grateful God loves me. I am beyond grateful for His many blessings and experiences. Some good and some horrific but the blessing is in the courage He sustains in each and every one of us. All we have to do is tap into Him for it. Now as it turns out, I shared a few different stories with you. As many of you know, I am a talker.
Thanks and blessings,
Karyl
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