On June 13, 2005, I was the Alpha patient, the first patient to receive a brand new type of intraocular lens that had not even been approved by the FDA.  I have several rare eye conditions and it was the only hope of saving my vision.

From my journal:
June 13, 2005, Monday—This is the big day.  “Terrified” pretty well says it all.  We began it with a prayer and that prayer continued on silently through the day for both of us. 

              We arrived early, expecting a wait, but they took me in early, after I signed some special consent forms upstairs.  Since the FDA had not approved this, “you will have to sign your life away,” the doctor told me, but what choice did I have?  I signed page after page, and then initialed some handwritten lines added up along the side of the form in the margin.  One of them said, “I understand that no one knows how this material will interact with human tissue.”  Then they sent me back downstairs to wait for pre-op. 

               We shared a long hug when they called my name.  Most folks were there for simple cataract surgery so I am sure that no one understood why we made such a big deal out of this, but it was possible that I would never see Keith out of that eye again, or the other one for much longer either.    
As usual with me, it took several tries to get an IV, along with a lot of pain and blood. 

               “You are a real challenge.”  First try, first bandage. 

            “Yep, you’re gonna be a REEEEAL challenge.”  Second try, second bandage.

              “Oh, I’m so sorry.”  Third try, third bandage.  “Let me go get the resident expert.”  She must have been, because she got it first try.

             They told me I would be in a “twilight sleep," that I would be able to respond but wouldn’t care and wouldn’t remember.  Famous last words.  I remember everything, including everything the doctor said as he worked.  Especially after they threw that sheet over my face.  The claustrophobia came in with a rush.  “You have oxygen, Mrs. Ward, you can breathe.”  Right.  Sure.  Someone must have accidentally turned it off. 

               Then the blue kaleidoscope show started, and at least I was no longer staring at what I knew must have been an inch thick, non-porous, air-tight wrap over my whole body.
 
             “We have full angle closure.”  Yikes.  Not good.  Maybe I should not have done so much research—I know too much.

              “Iris prolapse,” I heard next.  What?  This is what they said would abort the surgery, but Dr Osher kept going.

              “This is not small enough.  Give me another muscle hook.”  Now that’s not a pleasant thought. 

              “That’s too big.  Give me a smaller one.  No, not that one.  It’s still too big.  I want the (some number).” 

              Tug, tug. “I can’t get it.”  Tug, tug.  “Let me try the (some instrument).”  Tug, tug.  “Got it.”  Thank goodness, I was about ready to yank it out myself, whatever it was.

              “Now it’s time to make some decisions.”  Now?  What does he mean "now?"  Isn’t this a little late?

              “This is difficult.”  Amen.

              “Thank you, Lord.”  It was not the last time the doctor thanked God, nor me either.

              Assorted technical stuff and lots of video off, video on for the next two hours.

              “I’ve got Healon 5 (?) behind the lens.  (Flush, flush, flush).  This may be obsessive but I can’t leave it or she’ll have a capsular blockage.  I’m not going to use this on the other eye.  (Response:  Not at all?)  Can’t risk it.”

              “I’m putting in enough drops to float the Queen Mary.” 
After nearly three hours under that sheet, the light show stopped.

              I cannot see a thing with the right eye.  “Your eye will stay shut because of the anesthesia till sometime tonight.”  That explains that.  I did not even realize it was shut.

                My blood pressure is 170/98.  Terror will do that to you.
 
The things that go through your mind during a time like that always seem ridiculous when it's all over, but near-hysteria is another product of terror.  I think hearing everything he said, especially when he became agitated because things were not going well, made it worse.  He may have thought I was calm merely because I never uttered a sound until he asked a question, but I was just too petrified to move.
 
             Look through that again.  The thing he said that I remember best was, "Now it's time to make some decisions."  That came closest to making me lose it.  Isn't the middle of a first ever surgery a little late to be making decisions?  I learned later what he really meant.  This man was as ready for this surgery as he could be, staying late several evenings with a full surgical team to practice on pig eyes before he ever touched me.  He knew exactly what tools to use and the course of the procedure.  What he did not know, was how my 15 mm nanophthalmic eye would react when he placed the 50 diopter prismatic IOL inside it, and what he might have to do if something unexpected happened—like full angle closure or an iris prolapse.  He did not know how, or even if, I would be able to see afterward.  He very carefully explained that in clear, no-nonsense language the day before.  Yes, he was as ready as he could be.  There was nothing slapdash, hit-or-miss about it.  And due to all that preparation, he succeeded in saving my eyes for a while longer, accomplishing the same near-miraculous feat six months later with the left eye.

              How well do you plan for the major trials of your life?  That is exactly what each temptation is—just like a major and very dangerous surgery.  No, you cannot know exactly when it will happen.  No, you cannot know exactly how Satan will come at you.  But do you have a plan in place for defeating him?  Are you building a fortress around your soul with prayer, Bible study, and the fellowship of brothers and sisters who can help?  "If this temptation comes, this is what I will do," and then work on those very things.  Have you planned which passages to read, which hymns to sing, what words to pray, or who to call for encouragement?  Or are you going into major surgery with an unlicensed surgeon who flunked his anatomy test—are you counting on an unprepared you and only you?  I had a doctor who is considered one of the top five eye surgeons in the world and even he practiced!

              When the actual trial comes, it will hit you hard and fast and it will be far worse than you ever imagined it could be.  But how much worse will it be if you are not even a little prepared?  When you do not prepare to win, you have prepared yourself to fail.

              NOW is the time to make some decisions.  If you think you can just sit back and start operating and everything will be fine, you will lose your patient at the outset—and that patient is YOU!
 
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. (Titus 2:11-14).
 
Dene Ward

[This was written a few years ago after a serious surgery with even more serious complications.  Just so you have the proper context…]
 
              When I was little and listened to the sick list at church, no matter where we went, there was always someone who was “chronically ill.”   All that meant to me was they were never at church.  I couldn’t fathom an illness that never got any better, that gave you good days and bad days, that made you careful not to “overdo” because of the adverse effects that might have on you.  Now I understand, and wish I didn’t.

             I no longer have any social life--my doctor is my social life.  I see more of him than any of my brothers and sisters in the Lord.  I talk on the phone more to his office help than to church folks.  I spend more hours sitting in his examining chair than I do in a pew.  In fact, they ought to rent me a room there. 

              And I know this will take a toll on my spirituality.  It becomes more and more difficult to keep a good attitude.   While I certainly have more time to study, not having a current class to prepare to teach makes it less a priority and easy to put off, especially when reading is so difficult.  Helping others is nearly impossible, especially when you don’t even know what’s going on with the brethren any more.  So yes, my spirituality is suffering.  I struggle to keep it every day.  But the circumstances cannot be helped.

              What I do not understand is people who do this to themselves on purpose:  those who darken the meetinghouse door only enough to keep the elders and deacons off their backs, and leave while the last amen is still echoing down the hall; who never take advantage of the extra Bible studies held in homes, a safe place to ask questions without embarrassment and learn from those who have wisdom and experience in life; who avoid all the social gatherings of the church scheduled between the services, while regularly finding time to be with friends in the world, not to teach, but simply to socialize; who never have a Bible lesson prepared—that’s only for the children—who never attend a wedding or funeral so they can “weep with those who weep and rejoice with those who rejoice,” those who are healthy enough to jog, to play tennis, to hunt or fish, to go to ball games and sit in the hot sun for hours cheering, but simply do not want more than they consider the bare minimum to get by as a Christian. 

              Here is the problem with that:  there is no such thing as the bare minimum.  If Satan can get you to believe that lie, he has sabotaged any chance you have to make it to Heaven.  God expects us to give our all, no matter how much that may be; more for some, less for others, depending upon the circumstances of life.  It is difficult enough when the minimum IS your maximum, but doing that to yourself on purpose will only make you miserable in both lives, this one and the one to come.

              The early Christians understood that they were spiritual lifelines for each other; they would not let go for anyone or anything.  They spent time together, strengthening one another from the beginning, and because of that they were able to withstand horrors we can only imagine.  If you wait till the horror is upon you to reach out for that lifeline, it is probably too late.
 
And all that believed were together and had all things common…And day by day continuing steadfastly with one accord in the Temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they took their food with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people.  And the Lord added to them day by day those that were saved, Acts 2:44,46,47.
 
Dene Ward

My grandniece has Spinal Muscular Atrophy Type 1.  SMA1 is a disease that causes progressive loss of motor neurons, leading to muscle weakness and atrophy.  Type 1 usually shows in babies 6 months and under.  The infants will have difficulty moving, eating, breathing, and swallowing.  They will be unable to lift their heads on their own and unable to sit up on their own.  Most victims of this disease do not survive past age 2 due to respiratory failure.  Abigail has already survived the odds, having turned four this year, but her life is not an easy one.
 
             Abigail must often be rushed to the hospital.  Even a simple cold could be the end.  She recently gave us a fright as she was once again loaded into an ambulance and carted off first to an ER and then a PICU.  Abigail takes it all in stride, and today she is going to teach us a lesson we all need to hear. 

              My niece, Abigail's mother, recently posted the following on Facebook:

             "Abigail's full name is Abigail Andreia (on-DRAY-uh) Saltz.
          [Her father] was very partial to "Abigail," and I...was not. He always wanted purely Biblical names for our children and I told him we could use Abigail IF he could think of a middle name that had three syllables, accent on the second syllable. He stretched his Biblical names rule by choosing a Greek word for her middle name meaning "brave," because it seemed a fitting descriptor for the queen we were naming her after and an admirable quality to live up to.
              Wow. The things you don't know.
            I have told Abigail what her middle name means so many times now that she thinks her *actual name* is Abigail Andreia Brave Saltz. When she has to do something scary she says, 'Gimme a minute. I' takin' away da Andreia and da Saltz so all I have is da Brave. Brave means being still even when you're scared.'
             Today the IV techs marveled at how still she was while putting in her IV.
           And this is what people mean when they say their children teach them far more than they teach their children."

              Abigail has always been the happiest child I have ever known.  I always suspected she was brave—children who have physical difficulties often are because of the things they experience from early on.  Now I know exactly how she does it.  She "takes away" the names that might be in the way so she can make use of the name that counts--Brave.
 
             Can I ask you this morning, what names do you need to take away?  The only name that should count for you is Christian—a child of God, a disciple of Christ.  That name will give you strength when temptations arise.  It will give you peace and contentment when you don't understand.  It will give you courage and steadfastness when trials beset your soul. 

            And why is that?  Because through that name we have life (John 20:31), we have hope (Matt 12:21), we have justification (1 Cor 6:11), we have remission of sins (Acts 10:43) and salvation (Acts 4:12).  We also have absolutely no excuse for failure because the one who wore that name left the example for us to follow, and said it was possible to do so.

              Four year old Abigail knows the power of a name.  Remember the name you wear.  Take away all the others and use that one to be faithful to the end.
 
Let them praise your great and awesome name! Holy is he! (Ps 99:3).

Dene Ward
 

Keith got a reprieve yesterday—I woke up with laryngitis.  A deaf man and a woman barely able to utter a whisper do not make a compatible couple.  We struggled through the evening after he came home from work.  He would ask a question then walk away until I finally threw something at him to get his attention so he could read my lips as I answered.  We would sit at the table together and I would talk without first making eye contact—I had to throw something at him then too.  You get the picture.  Most of the time a pillow or napkin was within reach, otherwise we might have had a real mess to clean up.

            Our biggest problems in life are usually caused by speaking when we should have been quiet.  On the other hand, there are times we should speak that we do not, times we get a case of spiritual laryngitis.  The more I think about it, the more I realize that my only motivation for having kept quiet at those times was fear.

            We preach to our young people about peer pressure, encouraging them to speak up about friends doing wrong, about believing unpopular beliefs, or to simply stand up for those everyone else is picking on as if these were easy things to do.  Do we do any better when certain subjects arise among our own peers?  Is it so easy to risk losing a friend, losing a sale, losing status in the community, losing the good opinion of people we want to impress?  No, we don’t do any better most of the time.  We are just as afraid to speak out as our children are.

            The thing we need to convince our young people of—and ourselves—is that we are afraid of the wrong thing.  With knowledge comes responsibility. 

            If I see you about to do something I know will hurt you and do not say anything, I am guilty of hurting you as much as if I did that hurtful thing to you myself. If I say to the wicked,  'You shall surely die,'  and you give him no warning,  nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, in order to save his life,  that wicked person shall die for his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. Ezek 3:18.

            If I fail to tell others that I am a Christian, if, like Peter during Jesus’ trial, I am afraid of the consequences that might bring me, I have denied my Lord,  Every one therefore who shall confess me before men, him will I also confess before my Father who is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father who is in heaven, Matt 10:32,33.

            If I see a wrong and fail to speak out, I am nothing more than a coward.  I have become a friend of the unjust man rather than a champion of his victim, and will be included in his curse.  (Prov 29:24.)

            Truly, fear gives you spiritual laryngitis.  It totally disables you.  You become useless to the Lord.  That is the thing you should fear more than anything else. 
 
What I tell you in the darkness, speak it in the light; and what you hear in the ear, proclaim upon the house-tops. And be not afraid of those who kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell, Matt 10:27, 28.
 
Dene Ward

We are a self-centered and selfish culture.  If you think that has not found its way into the church, you are wrong.  If you think it hasn’t found its way into your own heart, you are probably wrong again.  Have these words ever left your mouth?  “No one came to see me when I was sick/injured/in the hospital?”  There is your evidence right there.

             God meant for us to minister to others every day and in every circumstance of life.  Too often, if we see our lives as a ministry at all, we see it as periods of service broken up by periods when we cannot serve—for example, when we are ill.  In other words, when things don’t come easily, when things are not perfect, we are “on break” or “out to lunch.” 

              If anyone had an excuse for taking a break, it was Paul while he was in prison.  Yet he tells the Philippians that he was fulfilling his mission to preach the gospel, “this grace,” even while imprisoned, Phil 1:5-7.  God recently taught us this lesson of perpetual ministry in a way we will not soon forget.

              Keith had major surgery in May that kept him in the hospital five days.  In fact, it kept me in with him since I can more easily communicate with this deaf spouse of 40 years than anyone else can, and I took care of many basic nursing chores too.  

              We have always made it a point to treat service people as people, not personal slaves or furniture.  Many waitresses have told us they remember us from earlier visits precisely because of that.  We tried to do the same with the hospital medical staff.  We didn’t complain; we didn’t make demands; we took care of our own needs as often as possible, and said please and thank you when we had to ask for something.  We never really thought about that—it’s just something we do because the Lord would have us treat everyone kindly and with respect.

              One night one of the nurses took me aside and asked about our “religion.”  “There’s something different about you,” she said, and gave me an opening to talk with her about the Lord and our church family. 

              Another night one of the nurses stayed in our room talking to us far longer than she needed in order to accomplish her task.  Finally she said with a sigh, “I need to go check on the others, but I’ll be back to talk more when I can.”

              Yet another day, one of the nurses who had been with us for three days was leaving for four days off, and knew that she wouldn’t see us again.  She made a point to come say good-bye. 

              While we were there we handed out tracts and blog cards.  We wrote down church addresses and website addresses.  We gave out email addresses.  Although we had taken those things with us “just in case,” I was shocked at how many we were able to give out, at how many people wanted to talk.  We thought we needed their care, but God showed us how to give it right back.

              What is happening in your life right now?  Don’t assume that you cannot serve when you are physically indisposed.  Don’t hang an “out to lunch” sign on your life because you have too much going on right now to pay attention to anyone else.  What did Jesus do while he was hanging on the cross?  How many did he minister to?  His mother, a thief, the very men who drove the nails, and all of us as he died for our sins.

              Jesus expects us to live as he did, thinking of others’ needs first.  If you have done it long enough, it comes without thought, even in turbulent times, painful times, sorrowful times.  The trick is to do it while things are good.  Do it in the grocery store.  Do it on the freeway.  Do it at school and work and when you speak to your neighbor.  It must become natural in order to come automatically in trying circumstances.  Any difficulty you have, especially when things are easy, is a telling factor—it shows how little you have been working on it.

              Service, first, last, always--and regardless of circumstances—that is the motto of a true disciple of Christ.
 
I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ, Philippians 1:12-13.
To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak, Ephesians 6:18-20.
 
Dene Ward

When you are born with a disability, especially a rare one that no one has heard of like I was, or when you develop one in your twenties that is practically invisible like Keith has, you have learned to handle all sorts of inappropriate and insensitive remarks with grace and equanimity.  You begin to feel like you should quack once in a while—as it all rolls off your back.

              But there is one remark that always rankles, me more than Keith, although it is always directed at him:  "You can hear what you want to hear."

              Sometimes it's supposed to be a joke—a poor one; sometimes it's one of those "manly" gibes; but every time it shows ignorance on the part of the one who says it.  The temptation is strong to wish the malady on them for just one week and see if their tune doesn't change.  I have to beat that unkind thought off with a stick far too often.  Not Keith—he doesn't hear it!

              He started going deaf while he was in the service.  No one knows why; it does not run in the family.  He was prescribed his first pair of hearing aids six months into our marriage at the age of 27, and he has gone downhill steadily.  He is not just "hard of hearing;" he is now labelled by the specialists as "profoundly deaf."

              If he can't see your mouth, he can't "hear" you.  He lip-reads most of the time.  When the church decides to reserve the front center seats for a certain group that does not include the visually or aurally impaired, they are effectively removing him, and those like him, from the worship.

              At home he cannot hear me calling from another room.  Even if we are working side by side, we cannot talk as we work because he is keeping his attention on what he is doing.  Especially if we are doing something like peeling and chopping tomatoes for canning, he cannot even take a half second to look at my lips without endangering himself.  And I don't know about you, but I would find it hard to say much in half a second.

              At night when the lights go out, all communication ceases.  No pillow talk for us.  We have even had to work out a signal just in case I hear a prowler in the night, something I can do involving touch that tells him there is danger, but that he needs to keep quiet.

              When I have to be away from home overnight, he doesn't sleep well at all.  You cannot go to bed with your hearing aids on any more than you can with your glasses.  Without them, he cannot hear the smoke alarm, even though it is right outside our bedroom door.  A bad guy could hack the door down with an axe and be on him before he knew it.  Doesn't make for easy sleeping.

              When he works outside, he cannot wear his hearing aids.  They will short out from the moisture of perspiration.  Anyone who works with him has to learn how to communicate, and let me tell you, it can be exasperating.

              Yet, I can understand why people do not quite get it.  First, it's not always about volume.  A man and a woman could say something at precisely the same volume and assuming he can see them, he might hear the man but not the woman.  She speaks in a higher frequency.  Children are even worse, especially the younger ones whose speech is not yet clear. 

              Accents are a problem.  People from another country often speak in a different cadence, so besides pronunciation issues, the small things he has grown to count on that you never even notice are just "off."  So, yes, to the ignorant, it might seem like he can "hear" when he wants to.

              Even lip-reading is not the ultimate solution.  Many words "look" the same.  What "reads" like one word can easily be another.  He counts on knowing the subject in order to figure out the words.  Names and numbers have absolutely no context.  More often than not he gets them wrong, no matter who is saying them or how loudly.

              "Hearing" is a real chore for him.  What he hears is a fill-in-the-blank test.  He is constantly working to read lips, remember the context, and consider several possible words in a split second—every second.  Trying to keep up in a conversation with more than two others is next to impossible.  Sitting down to a relaxing conversation is a pipe-dream.

              "You can hear what you want to hear?"  Believe me, there are many things he would love to hear but can't.

              Like the voices of his children when they were little and wanted to tell Daddy something.  And now his grandchildren.  Gradually, they just gave up trying.

              Like the phone ringing when I got stuck in Birmingham in the middle of the night a long time ago.  It's a wonder I ever made it home.

              Like the several times I've needed urgent help outside in the yard, or even from another room in our one story, thirteen hundred square foot house and he could not come running. 

             Like being able to hear himself and others well enough to stay in key during the singing at church.  Here is a man who once played violin, one of the most aurally demanding instruments there is.  When we were dating, we talked about someday me playing the orchestral accompaniment to his violin concerto.  Never happened—he was already too deaf when we married.

               But he still loved to sing.  One time some middle schoolers sat in front of us at a church that will remain unnamed.  We noticed they were passing notes, but thought nothing of it until the service was over and they had left some trash in the pew.  He reached down to pick it up and throw it away.  There in his hand lay the note they had passed:  "Do you hear that guy behind us.  He sure sounds weird.  Who told him he could sing?"  God did actually, and he does, no matter what anyone else thinks, but he does wish he could hear well enough to still do it well.

              Yet that little comment, "You can hear what you want to hear," does have a valid application, even for normal hearing people.

              “Hear this, O foolish and senseless people, who have eyes, but see not, who have ears, but hear not. ​Do you not fear me? declares the LORD. Do you not tremble before me? I placed the sand as the boundary for the sea, a perpetual barrier that it cannot pass; though the waves toss, they cannot prevail; though they roar, they cannot pass over it. ​But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart; they have turned aside and gone away. They do not say in their hearts, ‘Let us fear the LORD our God, who gives the rain in its season, the autumn rain and the spring rain, and keeps for us the weeks appointed for the harvest.’ (Jer 5:21-24)

              This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. (Matt 13:13)

              If we don't want to hear the truth, we won't.  We can even hear the words and come up with a completely different meaning, thus, Jesus' warning:  Take heed how you hear, (Luke 8:18.

              So if you suddenly feel a need to say, "You can hear what you want to hear," to someone who is hearing disabled, stop--remember to apply it to yourself first.
 
And unto them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah, which says, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall in no wise understand; And seeing ye shall see, and shall in no wise perceive: For this people's heart is waxed gross, And their ears are dull of hearing, And their eyes they have closed; Lest haply they should perceive with their eyes, And hear with their ears, And understand with their heart, And should turn again, And I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear. (Matt 13:14-16)
 
Dene Ward

You can learn a lot about a word by looking at its Greek original, even if you aren’t a Greek scholar.  When you see that we are supposed to be “striving” for the faith (Phil 1:27), and you find out the word is sunathleo, how difficult is it to see the English word “athlete” there?  Immediately you know that striving involves hours of disciplined training, a ton of sweat, and a whole lot of determination.  How smart do you really have to be when you discover that “faith working through love” (Gal 5:6), which uses the word energeo, means that you are to work energetically, with an attitude of “do it or bust?”
 
             So in our continuing study of faith I found this passage:  I made supplication for you that your faith fail not…Luke 22:32.  I looked up “fail” and found this Greek word, ekleipo. 

              I’ll have to admit—I saw nothing at first.  Finally I looked up other uses of the word and found, just a page over in my Bible, Luke 23:45:  the sun’s light failing.  The context was the crucifixion when, according to the verse just above that one, darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour.           

              “Aha!” my feeble brain said, “an eclipse,”--ekleipo.  The light of the sun failed because something overshadowed it.  Now how do I use that in my study of faith “failing?”

              Sixteen years ago I woke up with what I thought was an earache.  I called the doctor and he prescribed an antibiotic.  The next morning some of the ache was gone, but enough remained for me to discover the true source of the pain—it was a tooth.  I had developed an abscess and the pain had simply radiated to my ear, but the medication at least knocked it back to its original source. This time I called the dentist and left a message.  It was late on a Friday afternoon and I needed to see someone before the weekend. 

              By that time, nearly 48 hours into this, I was moaning on the couch, totally unable to function.  I hadn’t even thought about dinner, much less started cooking it, even though I expected Keith home within the hour.  I hadn’t finished putting the clean sheets on the bed, or washed any dishes all day long.  I hadn’t accomplished any bookkeeping, or filled out the forms that were soon due for my students to enter State Contest.  Nothing mattered but that aching tooth and the sore lump now swelling on my jaw line.

              A few minutes later the phone rang, and I eagerly snatched it up, expecting a dental assistant.  It was an ex-Little League coach of my sons’.  Keith had suffered something resembling a seizure while riding his bike the thirteen miles home from work, and was lying right in front of his house, in the middle of the rural highway. 

              “The ambulance just arrived,” he said.  “I think if you hurry, you can be here before it leaves.”

              What do you think I did?  Lie back down and moan some more?  I was out of that house in a flash and did indeed beat the ambulance’s departure for the hospital.  That “seizure” turned out to be a stroke, and I sat in the hospital for five days afterward. 

              You can think your faith is important to you.  You can think you would never let anything “eclipse” it.  You can be positive that you are strong enough to handle the most intense trial or the most powerful temptation.  You can be absolutely wrong.

              I have seen men who stood for the faith against the ridicule of false teachers commit adultery.  I have seen women who diligently withstood the long trial of caring for a sick mate become bitter against everyone who ever tried to help them, and ultimately against God himself.  I have seen families who were called “pillars of the church” leave that very group when one of their own fell and was chastised. 

              Look to that passage I found:  I made supplication for you that your faith fail not.  Jesus was speaking to Peter, who subsequently declared, “I am ready to go both to prison and to death,” but not many hours later, he denied the Lord when those very things confronted him.  He was not prepared, and his faith was eclipsed by fear.

              Just as surely as my worry over my husband’s health totally eclipsed a very real and intense pain in my physical body, just as certainly as fear eclipsed the faith of a man like Peter, the events of life can eclipse your faith, causing it to fail.  Carnal emotions can overshadow you—lust, bitterness, resentment, hurt feelings among them.  It’s up to us to keep those things in their proper place, to allow nothing to detract from our faith in a God who promises that none of those things really matter because of the spiritual nature of the life to come.  It is, in fact, up to us to be spiritually minded, instead of carnally minded, to put the physical in the shade and let the light of the Truth shine on the spiritual.

              With a spiritual mind-set, nothing can eclipse your faith.  Your faith should, in fact, eclipse everything else.
 
 If then you were raised together with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated on the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things that are above, not on the things that are upon the earth. For you died, and your life is hid with Christ in God, Colossians 3:1-3.
 
Dene Ward

We don’t travel a lot, but when we do we try to find a group of brethren who share our faith.  Most people call this looking for a “sound church.”  After several unsettling experiences with so-called “sound churches” on the road, I started studying the phrase.  Guess what?  You won’t find it anywhere in the Bible, not in any of the nine translations I checked.
 
             I have already mentioned a time when we forgot our “church clothes” and had to attend services in jeans and flannel shirts—camp clothes--and the cold reception we received.  Another time I was in a city far away from home for a scary surgery.  We remembered our church clothes, but it didn’t seem to make a bit of difference.  We walked in the front door, went down the middle aisle and sat two-thirds of the way down—Keith must be able to see faces in detail so he can lip-read.  We were at least 10 minutes early.  No one approached us, nor nodded, nor even looked our way.  Finally the woman in front of us heard Keith say, “I can’t believe no one has even greeted us,” and turned around to introduce herself.  After services we walked down the aisle surrounded shoulder to shoulder by the (still unwelcoming) crowd, stopped at a tract rack for a minute or two, and finally walked out the door before the preacher finally came out calling us to say hello.  It wasn’t like we didn’t give him plenty of time.  No one else even bothered.

              Contrast that to the time we entered a building thinking that we probably didn’t agree entirely with this group because of a few notices hanging on the wall, but were greeted effusively by every single member the minute they saw us.  We were even invited to lunch, while at the previous church I mentioned, living in a hotel between dangerous procedures, no one even asked if we needed any help.

              So when our recent study of faith came upon a passage in Titus about being “sound in the faith,” I decided to check the entire context and see what that actually meant.  Since I must be brief here, I hope you will get your Bible and work through it with me and see for yourself.

              First, the phrase applies to individuals, not a corporate body.  Titus 1:10-16 gives us a detailed and complete picture of someone who is not “sound.”  They are the ones the elders in verses 5-9 are supposed to “reprove sharply” so they may be “sound in the faith” v 13.  Look at those seven verses (10-16) and you will see a list that includes these, depending upon your version:  unruly, vain talkers, deceivers, false teachers, men defiled in mind and conscience, unbelievers (who obviously claim otherwise), those who are abominable, disobedient, and deny God by their works, being unfit for good works. 

              The context does not end just because the next line says, “Chapter 2.”  In that chapter Paul clearly defines what “sound in the faith” means, beginning unmistakably with “”Speak the things that befit sound doctrine, that the older men…” and going straight into the way people should live.  Read through it.  Everything he tells the older men and women, the younger men and women, and the servants to do and to be fit somewhere in that previous list (“un-sound”) as an opposite. 

              If people who are unruly are un-sound, then people who are temperate, sober-minded, and reverent in demeanor are sound.  If people who are defiled in mind and conscience are not sound, then people who are chaste, not enslaved to wine (or anything else), and not thieves are sound.  If people who deny God by their works and are even unfit for good works are not sound, then people who are kind, sound in love, and examples of good works are sound.  Go all the way through that second chapter and you can find a (opposite) match for everything in the first.

              Now let’s point out something important:  if being a false teacher makes you unsound, then being a teacher of good and having uncorrupt doctrine does indeed make you sound, but why do we act like that is all there is to it?  You can have a group of people who believe correctly right down the line but who are unkind, unloving, un-submissive, impatient, and who do nothing but sit on their pews on Sunday morning with no good works to their name and they are still not a “sound church!”  Not according to Paul. Nine out of the ten things on that “un-sound” list have nothing to do with doctrine—they are about the way each individual lives his life.

              I am reminded of Jesus’ scalding words to the Pharisees in Matthew 23:23:  Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you tithe mint and anise and cummin, and have left undone the weightier matters of the law, justice, and mercy, and faith: but these you ought to have done, and not to have left the other undone. Yes, our doctrine must be sound, but doesn’t it mean anything to us that Paul spends far more time talking about how we live our lives every day? 

              If the church is made up of people, then a sound church must be made up of sound people who live sound lives.  That is the weightier matter of the law of Christ.
 
For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified: Romans 2:13.
 
Dene Ward

I don’t know how many times I have had someone tell me that my other senses will all improve once I am completely blind.  I just smile and tell them I appreciate their concern.  It is the grateful, loving thing to do, while jumping down their throats and biting their heads off with a sharp retort certainly isn’t.  If they didn’t care so much they wouldn’t try to be helpful and I am just as responsible for my words as they are for theirs.

              As to that comment, it is just a myth.  It isn’t that suddenly your hearing will improve when you can no longer see.  It’s that suddenly you use it to better advantage.  When you could see who was approaching you, you didn’t need to hear the door open, judge the weight of the steps and length of the stride, and determine whose voice it was.  Now you must, so you do.  Even still sighted, I have always seen more than Keith has.  When you have poor vision, you concentrate harder and take care to notice more.  I see signs he never does.  I notice the color of cars and houses.  I know two oak trees flank a driveway, not just one, and I remember that when we go back to someone’s home the second time.  He just looks for the address, numbers I can never see from the car.

              All of that made me wonder about our spiritual senses.  Did you know you can find all five mentioned in a figurative context in the Bible?

              Jesus had a lot to say about people who are spiritually blind.  For judgment came I into this world, that they that see not may see; and that they that see may become blind. Those of the Pharisees who were with him heard these things, and said unto him, Are we also blind? Jesus said unto them, If you were blind, you would have no sin: but now you say, We see: your sin remains, John 9:39-41. 
 
             The prophets also talk about spiritual blindness.  It isn’t just that some people cannot comprehend God’s word—they blind themselves to it when they do not want to see what it says.  Peter also mentions people who are spiritually near-sighted in 2 Pet 1:9.  You can find more passages about spiritual blindness than any of the other senses, and they should scare us all to death.  Be careful when, in a spiritual discussion, you find yourself uttering the words, “I just can’t see that.”  It may be that you have become spiritually blind.

              You could make a similarly long list of passages commanding us to “hear,” “listen,” “hearken,” and “take heed.”  Jesus said in the context of the parable of the sower, “Take heed what you hear,” and also, “Take heed HOW you hear.” 

              Just as some are “hard of hearing” physically, the prophets and preachers dealt with those who were hard of hearing spiritually.  Jeremiah and Ezekiel both were told to go preach to a people who would “refuse to hear.”  Do you think it cannot happen to us?  The Hebrew writer warns, “See that you do not refuse him who speaks,” 12:25, and Paul warns of those who have “itching ears.”  Keith has special medicine for exactly that thing.  Too bad it doesn’t work on the spiritually deaf as well.

              Do you think you can’t have a spiritual problem with your nose?  For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? 2 Corinthians 2:15-16.  The point is exactly the same—if you don’t like what becoming a follower of Christ means, it will stink to you, but to those who understand, who comprehend, who hear and see the true nature of things, he will smell wonderful.

              The Hebrew writer talks about those who have “tasted the heavenly gift…and the goodness of the word of God” 6:4,5.  If you don’t know people who think the Bible is anything but good, who believe that it is, in fact, the source of human misery, you haven’t tried too hard to spread it.  Always there are some who take a taste and spit it out with disgust—the same people who cannot see, cannot hear, and cannot smell the sweet aroma of Christ.

              And always there are those who cannot feel, whose hearts will never be pricked by the gospel, who are numb to its appeals.  Paul told the Athenians at the Areopagus, And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, Acts 17:26-27.  Not many of those people groped their way to the Lord in the end, but a few did.

              Did you notice something about all those spiritual senses?  When a physical sense leaves you, you learn to make better use of the ones that remain.  Unfortunately, when a spiritual sense leaves, the rest seem to follow suit.  If you won’t see, then you won’t hear.  You won’t let the grace of God touch your heart.  You won’t enjoy the smell of his sacrifice nor the taste of his love--if you have tasted that the Lord is gracious, 1 Pet 2:3.

              Can you imagine a more miserable existence than never seeing a sunset, never hearing the sweet coo of a baby, never tasting a ripe strawberry, never smelling the yeasty aroma of bread fresh from the oven, or never feeling the warm sun on your back?  That’s exactly the kind of lives people live when their spiritual senses don’t work.  But you can fix them all with one easy cure—heal your heart.  God told Ezekiel that if the people repented he would give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. Ezekiel 36:26.  Once your heart can be touched, the other senses will come flooding back into your life, almost overwhelming you with new sensations.

              The five physical senses are a wonderful blessing from God.  The spiritual ones are even better.
 
In that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book, and out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind shall see. The meek shall obtain fresh joy in the LORD, and the poor among mankind shall exult in the Holy One of Israel. Isaiah 29:18-19.
 
Dene Ward

Most of the time people assume that because I am not in the middle of a crisis, everything is fine with these eyes of mine.  It is difficult to understand that they are surviving on “borrowed time,” that they have outlived the prognosticators, and that any day could be the beginning of the end for my vision.

              Occasionally someone still asks about the things I have been through, and I still answer them without thinking--until they begin to shudder, and I take pity and stop.  One experience in particular makes people shrink about half their size as their shoulders draw in and their chins drop to their chests with a groan.  Even the everyday isn’t pleasant.  Eye drops are some of the most painful medications in existence, and an evening headache is par for the course.

              “Is it worth it?” some asked.  In fact, one person tried to talk me out of any more surgeries.

              Is it worth it?  I began all these procedures before either of my grandsons was born.  Without them, I would never have seen those sweet, tiny faces.  Was it worth the pain and the terror I sometimes felt right before yet another sharp instrument or harsh chemical headed for my eyeballs?  Do I even need to answer that? My doctor thinks I am strong.  No—I was a grandmother in prospect, and a stubborn one at that.

              Some people obviously do not think the Lord is worth any sort of pain at all.  They give up when it gets difficult, and “difficult” can just mean they have problems with relationships, or they must give up activities they enjoy.  They have yet to encounter physical pain; the emotional pain was all it took.

              Keith and I have received threats in the mail, threats that the FBI took seriously enough to send an investigator to look into.  We have endured gossip and slander that spread a couple hundred miles.  We came within two days of being homeless because of, as Paul called them, “false brethren.”  Was it worth it? 

              As we enter old age, looking to the end is no longer a distant view, and that makes it comforting to know that we have a reward waiting for us precisely because we endured those things.  We have yet to face physical torture, and though I no longer consider that an impossibility in this country, I doubt it will reach that point before we are gone.  To have put up with any sort of pain for the Lord, emotional or otherwise, is a blessing.  Finally I understand how the disciples could “count it all joy” to give up or endure something for the Lord who gave up all for us, even if that something is trivial comparatively speaking.

              Was it worth it?  Yes, Heaven is worth it all, but gratitude should ultimately reach the point that merely being able to sacrifice for the Lord is worth even more.  True spiritual maturity revels in seeing our Lord and Savior, not in seeing Paradise; in the ability to serve a God we can see before us, not in being pain- and worry-free forever; in being beside the Father who loves us, not in enjoying one giant eternal party.

              Sometimes going through pain in life, pain that has nothing to do with your Christianity, opens your eyes to spiritual things.  Was that physical pain worth it?  Did it give you a longer life?  A better quality of life?  Did it give you more time with your loved ones?  Usually that is enough to make it “worth it.”  Now ask yourself, what can you make it through for the Lord?  Will it be worth it?  God has the ability to make it so, but only you can make the decision to endure.
 
Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. 1 Peter 4:12-16
             
Dene Ward