BV3: BE VICTORIOUS - III

UNCERTAINTY is the theme music of the Dragon. Every chorus is laced with it. Indeed uncertainty seems to be the principal source of suffering in our world. Think about it.

Physical pain is real. It hurts but what often what takes a greater toll on us is the fear, the uncertainty of whether it will get worse or last forever. And whether we will have enough medicine and fortitude to tolerate it. So it is with every tragedy. While we are often able to manage in the present we are hampered by the uncertainty/fear of what is coming next and uncertain we will be able to manage that. 

That is true for most people with cancer. Some have physical symptoms, even deadly ones, but far more people suffer from what might happen than from what is actually happening at the time. It is the fear, the uncertainty that haunts us day and nite like a wet black cloud . 

We ask ourselves how can that be when we live in such a brilliant and wonderful world. How can there be so much uncertainty of outcome but there is. It's the  "beyond our control" that really gets us because it is the thing we value most. And how can we possibly be victorious over something that is out of our control?

Perhaps there is another way to look at that. And that is the key! Victory is possible. More on that tomorrow.  

First reflect on our primordial desire/quest for something so expansive, so all encompassing as control. We sense that control of our circumstances is necessary to feel safe and to pursue our self interests. Yet control eludes us. How can we overcome our need for control? First understand it better.

If this world and our lives were created with a purpose then why, oh why, were they created  with so much uncertainty- so much "out of controlness"? My hunch is it is because we are meant to learn something important by dealing with being out of control over and over again - some deep truth.

In this life we are given the opportunity to reach for control, even taste bits of it, to revel in it, even strive for more of it. We often think enough money or power over people will suffice. Yet those with scads of  money and/or positions of power testify that nothing protects them from tragedy or cancer nor guarantees a cure for either one. Sooner or later we all discover control is a mirage - we can't have it all   --  and maybe , just maybe some of us discover there is something better that we are meant for.

Is there something bigger going on here? Is this thing we call real life really only a story? Is our story like a movie with a plot, a purpose played out in "Narnia", on a grand stage called earth? Is it an unfolding story for each of us? Maybe there is a deeper story also, a mystery that is meant to intrigue us enough to get us thinking, trying to figure it out - looking for the key? Why is it we often don't think about such things until our life is threatened - til we get cancer?

Until then we "get by", we manage, we survive but we also get weary which drives us to keep searching for something more. Some discover there is nothing that lifts a weary soul like the promises of God.

No one realizes that in the happy snappy land of success. It is not until some flavor of trouble or tragedy, some trauma or failure, some emptiness or despair comes along that our once championed sense of "I've got this" submits to whoa "I guess I don't".  Maybe that is why God permits all the uncertainties and bad stuff in our world to exist. So we can figure out "we don't got it " and maybe, just maybe we ought to talk to Him about it. Not just read what scripture says about Him (which is cool) but actually talk to Him. 

Victory over cancer is possible using things that are under our control and even easier if we get God's help ---which He is ever ready to give. I address both in next few blogs and it is not just an evangelical sales pitch - nothing quit that simple. 

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