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Texting Through Cancer: Ordinary Moments of Community, Love, and Healing

From the Publisher, Upper Room Books:

When author Jan Woodard requested prayer after her breast cancer diagnosis, her texts, email, and mail were flooded with encouraging notes that inspired her to write about her journey through treatment. As she wrote a weekly column for her local newspaper, Woodard discovered that writing kept her from self-pity by helping her focus on others and shift from fear to faith.

In Texting Through Cancer, Woodard shares the peace she found in surrendering her cancer to God. Through 44 reflections she offers practical ways to find beauty in ordinary moments. Woven throughout her meditations are 12 spiritual practices that challenge readers to explore their own faith more deeply.

This book extends hope to those who wonder how to live fully today when uncertainty overshadows tomorrow. Readers will discover how to pay attention to small signs of God’s faithfulness, savor the gifts each day brings, and receive assurance that “all will be well” when they trust their tomorrows to God.

Texting Through Cancer is also available at Indiana, PA’s local The Book Nook, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, GoogleBooks, and heartsandmindsbooks.com. We encourage you to rate and review the book through your point of purchase.

For more of Jan’s insights, encouragement, and messages of hope, follow @textingthroughcancer on Instagram.

A Story Well-Lived

Early on the morning of Wednesday, June 3, 2020, surrounded by her family, Janet Watrous Woodard transitioned from this life to the next. She described her destination as a final shore where she would be finally immersed in the Love of all Love.

Jan believed in the transformative power of words. From an early age Jan was a writer. She was editor in chief of her high school paper, wrote countless articles for newspapers and magazines, and wrote for her denomination, the United Methodist Church, for 10 years.

Not only did Jan tell her own story, she helped others tell theirs. She led and facilitated retreats, workshops, classes and writing groups. Before she had children, Jan taught social studies at Indiana Area Junior High School. Throughout her adult life Jan taught adult education classes at Grace United Methodist Church.

A lifelong learner, Jan returned to IUP at 60 years of age to complete a master’s degree in adult and community education. She then relished serving residents as the activity coordinator at a senior living facility, St. Andrew’s Village.

Three years after her retirement, Jan found a lump in her breast. She said it was devastating, but it reinvigorated her call to write. This led to her weekly column, “Texting Thru Cancer,” later called “Texting Thru Recovery,” published both in The Indiana Gazette and on her blog, janwoodard.com. Inspired by Saint Julian of Norwich (the first woman to publish a book in English), Jan closed each of her posts with the words, “All will be well.” Jan’s dream to publish a book is being realized in her forthcoming “Texting Through Cancer: Ordinary Moments of Community, Love, and Healing” (Upper Room Books, March 2021).

Jan used words to teach and heal. With extraordinary courage and vulnerability, she shared her journey, and her words were a balm to this aching world.

Jan not only told her story, she lived it. She insisted a life well lived is one where you look outside yourself and toward the needs of others. She did this her entire life.

Jan valued hospitality. Her faith taught her to welcome anyone longing for a sense of home. Holiday meals were often crowded with family, friends, international students, widows, neighbors and anyone needing a place to belong. As co-founder of COURAGE and Cancer, Jan helped create a place where those impacted by cancer can share, grieve and support one another. Jan and her husband embraced a family who relocated from Kenya, enfolding them in her presence and care. Jan was “Mom” for Elizabeth and Rafael, and a beloved Grandma to their children, Fiona, Melody and Josiah. They loved each other fiercely.

A volunteer with the Refugee Working Group of Indiana County, Jan shared her passion for welcoming the stranger and working toward a more just world. In earlier years, she volunteered with both jail and prison ministries, trusting the words of Jesus: “When you visit those in prison, you visit me.” Jan taught her children and grandchildren to care for all people with dignity, respect and care.

Through her pilgrimage to the Iona Abbey of Scotland and classes in spiritual formation at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, Jan’s faith was nourished and deepened. Her study of Celtic Christian spirituality provided an ancient language of faith that grounded her in a fresh way.

Jan took in the world with every fiber of her being. She loved the feel of searsucker and the soft fur of kittens. She loved the smell of fresh-baked banana bread and the taste of mint chocolate chip ice cream. She loved to listen to music. Jan played the piano and often sang her children to sleep. She practiced gratitude for simple, everyday things, believing all of it was a gift.

Jan loved the outdoors. She would listen for birds singing at sunrise and exclaim wonder over a brilliant sunset. Jan spoke fondly of the hills of Ireland and Scotland. She enjoyed hiking with her children through Pennsylvania, New Zealand and the mountains of Colorado. Jan believed that in and through the created world, we see the majesty of our Maker.

Jan loved water, from waterfalls and hot springs to rivers and lakes; Lake Wallenpaupack and Yellow Creek were among her favorite places in Pennsylvania. She loved kayaking and swimming and, when she was young, waterskiing. She especially loved reading in a canoe on lazy afternoons while her sweetheart fished.

There is not space or time to name all her accomplishments. Nor is there space to name everyone she loved. So many were precious to Jan, and she was beloved by so many. One thing she cherished most was her family: her beloved children Brett, Tara and Julie; her sweet Jim, husband and partner of over 50 years; her treasured grandchildren, Josiah and Eli; her siblings, Marilyn, George and Carol; her sons-in-law, Derek and Bob; and the entire Kalu family.

From the beginning of her battle with breast cancer, Jan’s goal was to be truthful about her own experience, and to use it to inspire and comfort others. Jan was not fond of trite clichés or false comforts. She bravely confronted the truth that everything would not end happily ever after. Still, she had hope. Though she would miss those she leaves behind, she insisted that she was not afraid of death. She knew there was more that lies beyond this earthly life.

Now Jan is safely on the other side of the final shore, embraced in the arms of her Savior, still reminding us that come what may, All will be well.

In lieu of flowers, the Woodard family requests that donations be made to two local organizations that were important to Jan: Family Promise and The Chevy Chase Community Center.

Good-bye, popcorn — the way to peace

God is with us, All will be well!

“We must not doubt in the darkness what God has shown us in the light.– “The Red Sea Rules,” Robert J. Morgan.

I didn’t doubt when I signed up for Hospice that it was the right thing to do. These are caring, compassionate people whose total goal is my comfort. We can never know how much time we have but as I’ve said before, I trust myself to the hands of God.

I regret that I won’t see my book, “Texting Through Cancer, Ordinary Moments of Community, Love, and Healing,” published by Upper Room Books next March. It is an example of letting go and letting God for all the details, like trusting my publisher and Amazon to help distribute it. All of life, in the end, is about letting go to the Great I AM.

I’m incredibly grateful to the Indiana Gazette for these four years to share my journey thru cancer, which is now nearing its end. I’ve been blessed by hundreds, if not thousands of you, my readers. No one hoped it would come to this, but all stories reach a conclusion. I’m confident that angels will escort me when my time comes.

The other night I awoke as Jim was making popcorn downstairs. I smelled buttery memories, like those collected over our 50 years together. I wave and say, “Good-bye, popcorn!” lightheartedly. God is teaching me to detach bit by bit from treasures of the past. While memories and people are wrapped in love, detachment says there is a time and place for everything to say good-bye until we are finally immersed in the Love of all Love.

A friend told me that many people will mourn as I leave that final shore. Sadly, I turn to board my boat. That’s when I see a crowd of folks on the other side, waving me home. Jesus is rowing my boat, caring for me as he always has and will do into eternity. Oh Lord, I don’t grasp what that means except to know my loving Lord presses me me close.

Perfect love casts out fear, my friends.

Jesus loves me, this I know. For the Bible tells me so.

All will be well.

Poems, prayers and peace

My doctor said I’m in liver failure and have a short time left. I’m trying to wrap my mind around that, since until a few weeks ago I didn’t even have pain.

Spiritually, I’m blanketed with peace beyond what this world gives as I prepare to cross through that thin place that separates today from forever.

Some people sensed this was coming before I was even told; I’d like to share thoughts from dear ones, hoping they encourage you and minister to your heart for that day we all someday face. The first is from a woman who was in the youth group at our church which I led.

Judy: “O Jan, I feel like I knew already… Praying for what God knows that we don’t, for how God loves when we can’t, and for where God is when our bodies can’t go beyond. Praying in hope.“

Me: “Thanks, my aman cara (Gaelic for soul friend). Hope never fails, even when we do.

Dearest Jan, “I so love that our times are in His hand. Not the doctors, not ours but His! He gently leads each one of us home and He orders each one of our days. So today, I am believing that THIS day is ordained by Him and that you are fulfilling His purpose in it. I am asking Him to fill you with the awareness of His presence with you. Moment by moment, He will lead you and fill your days with Himself until He calls you home, the way He will call each one of us home. Love, your Barb.”

From my granddaughter Fiona, living in China

Deep within my soul

Deep within my soul I yearn for you

I yearn for your tender words

I yearn for your gentle spirit

I yearn for your guiding hand

Deep within my soul I long for you

I long for your filling presence

I long for your smiling approval

I long for your guiding hand

Deep within my soul I need you

I need you in my breaking heart

I need you in my crying heart

I need you to guide my hand

Deep within my soul I cherish you

I cherish how you protect me

I cherish how you answer me

I cherish how you guide my hand

Love, Fiona

Rebecca: “May the Beloved enwrap and enfold you with all-embracing love, dear Jan!”

Greg: “Praying this morning that the One who created you and who loves you deeply would whisper stories of hope and glory to you all day long– that your very soul would resonate with the joy of his goodness.”

Nat: “I wondered if there was a scripture that included the word tall, for “’My Tall Friend Jan.’” Sure enough, there is. I Cor. 16:13, “’Listen, stay alert, stand tall in the faith, be courageous, and be strong.’”

Mel: “The doctors may have given you a guideline, but only God knows the number of your days. What I love most about you is your adventurous spirit, your grand faithfulness, and your unrelenting gift to find the best in all situations. May God use your time to continue to inspire others as you’ve inspired me all these years.”

Sue: “Dear Sweet Jesus. We don’t know when you will come to call us home. We become so deeply in love with our family and friends on this earth, it is difficult to think of ever leaving them. Yet we know your love supersedes anything we can imagine, and you have prepared a place for each of us. Help us to feel your breath on our face and your soft whisper of love. Help us know when our time is come to know your peace and joy.”

Kathy: “Help us to live as those who are prepared to die. And when our days are accomplished here, enable us to die as those who go forth to live, so that living or dying, our life may be in you and nothing will separate us from your great love in Christ Jesus.”

And from my twin sister Marilyn,

Continue with courage on life’s upward trail;
For where it is steepest,
God’s love is the deepest,
And will faithfully, finally, fully prevail!

Thank you, friends and poets, for your love and prayers that carry me from this side to the next.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/ Indiana Gazette

Photo: Abbey window, Iona Abbey, Iona, Scotland

Photo: My Kenyan granddaugheters

The Hiding Place

When I was a young woman my friend Bobbie suggested I read Corrie Ten Boon’s “The Hiding Place,” on vacation. We always went to my parent’s cottage at Lake Wallenpaupack in the Pocono Mountains, drawn by rustic roads, boating, swimming, … and Grandma’s cookies. Often there were daily showers before the skies cleared and we settled on the beach for the afternoon.

I always took books to read as my kids splashed in the lake or played in the cottage loft. To me it wasn’t a vacation if I didn’t have a book in hand, usually lightweight Reader’s Digest Condensed Books, that my parents collected.

When I asked what her book suggestion was about it didn’t sound like vacation reading – a story of survival in a Nazi concentration camp. Nevertheless, when Bobbie placed it in my hand, I took it along.

That book changed my life. I learned about how God performed miracles and comforted Corrie and her family, who died there. She talked about this Jesus she loved as her hiding place, where the Bible says she could run in and not be afraid.

There I was, lying on the beach, my heart aching for this Dutch woman who lived by faith in a death camp. I delved into psalms that were her life line and that have become mine.

Living with cancer is deadly serious. How do I respond? Some of our COURAGE and Cancer friends are doing a Zoom Bible study on Psalm 91, verse by verse discussing God’s protection in the face of danger. Pastor Kathy Mihoerck is guiding our conversation using Peggy Joyce Ruth’s “Psalm 91, God’s Umbrella of Protection.”

One of my notes beside Psalm 91 is “Grandma Wesp’s Psalm,” one reason I turn there, often. I think of my grandma reading this as an orphan due to tuberculosis, and weep.

The first verse says, (NIV, paraphrased): “Jan, who dwells in the shelter of the Most High, will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.” I love the image of dwelling, abiding and sheltering in place, resting in the Almighty’s shadow, where there’s plenty of room for all of us.

Verse 2 begins with “I will say to the Lord.” Most of the time we read the Bible silently, but this is encouraging us to express our faith out loud, where all the heavenlies – and the people we live with – can hear our voices lifted to a living God. Praise and prayer release power, strengthening our interior life.

“I will say to the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’” (91:2). God is my high tower, my safe hiding place from pestilence, arrows and traps.

When I was in Ireland we saw high towers where watchmen kept an eye out for enemies, who they could see from afar. I circled around three of these towers, my hands skimming the ancient stones, and felt connected across the centuries through God’s Spirit to the people who lived there long ago. They utterly depended upon him to be their tower of strength and provision.

Another passage I pray out loud is, “THIS is the day the Lord has made, I WILL rejoice and be glad in it!” That’s a good one to proclaim as I open my eyes in the morning. Whatever this day holds, I know Who holds me.

I also SHOUT passages, because the Word says, “Shout to the Lord!” There are other things I occasionally shout too, that I won’t mention here. If anyone hears me, they know I sometimes stumble on my spiritual walk, but step by step and day by day God and I are moving to higher ground.

When I shared with my cancer support group that I shout verses Pastor Kathy turned to her guide book and showed us how she highlighted directions for believers to shout out their faith and her personal note, “This sounds like Jan!”

One woman shared that a friend has her grandmother’s Bible, full of border scribbles to God. Pastor Kathy said now that grandmother is in Heaven, where God is still reading her notes and prayers to him back to this precious daughter as he holds her close.

That, like the message of “The Hiding Place,” is a gemstone to me, something to anticipate when I reach the other side.

I don’t know how you’re filling your time during social isolation, but I’m tremendously blessed to have a sense of community with friends and family. I am never alone, even when times are tough. In this hard time, I’m blessed by conversations with my Father in Heaven, who I hope to bless with every word that comes out of my mouth.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Corrie Ten Boon’s photo by Wikipedia

Glendalough stone photo by Judy Shipley

God is the Ruler yet

I heard him before I saw him—Jim and a robin, whistling back and forth in lively conversation.

“Don’t worry, I have sunscreen on,” he yelled from the backyard, squinting up into the light. Blue skies, still air and 71 degree temps urged us both outside, I went as far the upper deck.

A soft gray catbird feeds on our deck, almost close enough to pet. I suspect she’s looking forward to summer’s raspberries dribbling down her beak, I’m no competition when it comes to berry picking.

An eastern towhee danced his jig in the yard, scratching for dinner under the leaves. Is he like me, in awe of our red bud with tiny fuchsia flowers hugging branches like form-fitted evening gloves? When a pair of bright orange Baltimore orioles visited our suet for hours, I felt like God was playing a nature video before my eyes.

Our first hummer has arrived – is it a repeat visitor? How do they know to come? A speaker at Todd Bird Club siaid he banded hummingbirds and he identified two that returned the next year, flying back to Pennsylvania from some distant winter retreat. Today is the Migration Bird Count, but I’ve been in Shadyside Hospital. Heading home now, no procedures done, and my future, as always, is in God’s hands. Thank you for your prayers! I’m posting this earlier my usual than midnight because Jim is driving through snow to get me and when we will reach home is anybody’s guess. One more chance to trust Jesus.

Behind all the feathered activityis the sound of our waterfall, where silhouetted birds bathe early in the day. My senses lead my exploration, without me ever leaving my perch. Sight, sound, aromas… these frame the way I view the world.

There’s so much more, invisible to the eye. Some force calls birds in ancient patterns of migration, others design the predictability of the seasons. Other unseen realities are more formidable, like microbes spreading virus. Cancer is beyond my sight too, yet lab work and scans guide my doctors in choosing the next right thing to do.

I can’t see these enemies but I know, This is my Father’s world. O let me ne’er forget that though the wrong seems oft so strong, God is the ruler yet.

Things of the spirit are beyond our sight, yet are the most real of all to those who believe.

Can we see or taste love? Love drives Jim to hang sheets on the line in the morning breeze and to make homemade sourdough bread, a flour-everywhere, two-day process.

Fr. Leo Maasburg, author of Mother Teresa of Calcutta said he thought the saint couldn’t touch bread without thoughts of the Eucharist, the broken, suffering body of Christ. I miss sharing the cup and bread in community during this quarantine. To kneel at an altar and arise renewed, knowing who blood flows through my own, makes me yearn for those times to return.

With Mother’s Day upon us, it is easier to describe my heritage lilacs blooming than tell you how they bind my heart to my mother’s, gone nine years from my sight.

“In the Garden” was her favorite hymn; she called fragrant lilacs, “our family flower.” Finally unable to get down on the ground, she raised zinnias and petunias in pots to brighten walkways for neighbors.

Mom didn’t over-think her faith, she simply accepted the Good News at the heart of all being and passed along that faith to her children, teaching us hymns like,

This is my Father’s world, And to my listening ears All nature sings, and round me rings The music of the spheres.

This is my Father’s world:

I rest me in the thought

Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas;

His hand the wonders wrought.”

If I said the peas in Jim’s raised beds are beginning to pucker through the soil as pale sprouts, you’d believe me. But do you trust the Maker of the seed?

Robert Schuller is credited with saying you can count the seeds in an apple but only God can count the apples in a seed. Every farmer who plants new rows in fields knows it takes work, faith, prayer and a little imagination to reap a harvest from a handful of seeds.

Creatures and gardens are more than accidents of nature, more than the work of our hands. Josh McDowell calls the Gospel stories Evidence that Demands a Verdict, the title of his best selling book.

Evidence, on a wing and a prayer. As St. Peter wrote to the early church (1 Peter 1:8 NIV):

Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy…”

Whatever we have lost, whatever the future holds, this cannot be taken away. 

All will be well.

The one thing we must not do

Bullies were throwing stones at a cowering donkey and other smaller creatures with leprous blotches on their skin. It reminded me of Vincent Van Gogh’s incredible painting of the Good Samaritan helping a wounded fellow onto a donkey after he was attacked. At that moment, I heard a voice ask, “Who knows what you are capable of?”

I woke up then, with those words ringing in my ears. “Who knows what you are capable of?”

Were they directed toward those abusing sick animals, or to me?

I forgot about it, as often happens with dreams on the misty edge of consciousness. Later that day, I read a meditation in Celtic Daily Prayer that began with a similar question: “What can you do?”

The author says in the April 24 reading that in our greatest hour of suffering, that there is very little we can do.

You can debate that, until you talk with a parent whose child is on a ventilator. Until the doctor says, “There’s nothing more we can do,” or your home is destroyed by a tornado.

The meditation says one thing we can do is weep. Our tears are acceptable to God. The human story from start to finish is washed in them.

I admire the Indiana County Court House, built in 1869. Every person who helped dream and build it into existence is long gone. All the original judges and attorneys are gone. The passageway between the court house with its imposing Empire architecture and the matching jail along North Sixth Street was a fateful bridge for six prisoners, hung there. Whoever they were, whatever their crimes, they are only remembered in the dusty pages of Clarence Steven’s history of the county.

My neighbor worked for the bank that acquired the court house with a 99-year lease almost 50 years ago. He spoke of stepping outside the cupola after it was painted with gold leaf, and erecting the flag pole upon the bell tower in a fierce wind.

Another friend, Paul Botsford, told us about the painstaking process of restoring the four-faced tower clock, the largest one in the country when constructed. We make our small marks upon history, our temporary contributions in the face of constant change, and then are gone to this side of eternity.

But what we do here matters.

I glanced at that clock-tower on the way to my daughter’s wedding, 20 years ago on a steamy afternoon in the first June of this century. Both are still ticking. On a dreary day I can see the gleaming dome downtown, a few miles from my house, and am glad we chose to live here.

In my disturbing dream, I’m the one asked, “Who knows what are you capable of?”

When I was a child, my neighbor, Mrs. Work, had a house fire after buying a new Lazy Boy recliner. She picked it up in her living room and carried it to her front yard. How did she do it? In her case, it was coritsol surging through her veins. The answer for believers is we’re capable of far more than we can imagine. The Secret of the ages is this: “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”

Meditate upon that thought, the Creator of the universe dwells in us.

If those words make us shiver at what God has equipped us to bear and do, it is the Spirit, flowing in our veins, that assures us that we, the Body of Christ, are privileged to share in the suffering of the world on behalf of Jesus, the head of this mystical body.

When it comes to personal tragedy, how we respond makes a difference against the dark skies of loss. The Northumbria Celtic Christian Community, which assembled meditations in my daily reader (and which I often fail to open) says there is one thing we must not do.

We must not become bitter.

Bitterness uproots inner peace when we need it most.

Help me choose wholeness over resentment, Lord God.

Years ago, Jim dug wild poppies and we happily planted them in our yard, unaware the roots were wrapped in poison ivy. Within a few days it traveled through our systems, we were both overcome with its itchy strength, and ended up in the E.R.

Bitterness is like a poison growing underground, we don’t understand its potency. God has better plans for us than succumbing to its power.

I’m going to keep on hoping. Keep on weeping. Keep on looking for a golden dome glowing in the dark.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Good Samaritan by Vincent Van Gogh

Indiana County Old courthouse cupola photo from Indiana Co. Tourist Bureau

‘Don’t worry, you’re safe’

The pandemic spreads an existential feeling of unsafety, which registers with the neurons around your heart, lungs, and viscera. It alters your nervous system, changing the way you see and perceive threat – David Brooks, columnist

My friend Mitzi’s daughter felt anxious when notified by her company they were planning a conference call to discuss layoffs. How would she provide for herself and her kids?

As they talked on the phone and prayed, Kim received an out-of-state call from an unfamiliar number. When she answered it was the head guy of the large company for which she worked.

He said, “Kim, I don’t want you worrying all day. I’m calling to say you’re safe.”

That may be the fastest response to prayer my friends ever received!

What comfort in those words, “You’re safe.”

It echoes Psalm 91:1-3. When we run to the Lord God Almighty we find shelter and safety in his arms.

Mitzi’s instinct to immediately pray says it is a priority for her. St. Paul told us to devote ourselves to prayer in all circumstances. That can sound intimidating, as if we can’t measure up.

It is surrounded, however, by other guidelines, like guide ropes on a steep path. There’s no social distancing between Bible verses, yet Scripture sounds unrealistic when we pull out a verse and ask it to stand alone.

Here’s more of 1 Thessalonians 5, paraphrased and abbreviated from the NIV: “Since we’re children of the day:

• let us be self-controlled,
• wear faith and love as a breastplate,
• and the hope of salvation as our helmet.

“Our Lord Jesus Christ died for us so whether we’re awake or asleep, we live with him. Therefore:

• Encourage one another.
• Build each other up.
• Live in peace with each other.
• Be patient with everyone.
• Always try to be kind to everyone.
• Be joyful always;

“15:7 Pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for us in Christ Jesus.

• “Do not put out the Spirit’s fire
• Test everything.
• Hold on to the good.
• Avoid every kind of evil.”

Practicing these disciplines helps us slowly mature into a lifestyle of prayer.

What is our source of power? God himself.

Paul closed this part of his letter with: “May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

The God of peace is on our side.

One morning I had an image of continual prayer. There was frost on the neighbor’s dark roof. Within an hour of sunshine it was gone, momentarily humidifying the air. In contrast, I want prayers to constantly humidify the air with the dew of God’s Spirit, a transparent canopy through which light shines.

Another Kim, a book group friend, gave me a thoughtful volume, Prayers of Comfort & Hope. Afterward, someone asked me to pray for a woman; when I opened the gift book the prayer before me exactly addressed the crisis this stranger faced.

Accident? No more than the answer that came to Mitzi’s prayer for her daughter.

Of course, prayer doesn’t always happen that way.

God is our burden-bearer, walking with us the hard roads some are called to walk. On good days, these make us stronger people of faith, but troubles drain us. That’s true for cancer, other diseases and especially today’s pestilence with it’s terrible toll in deaths and economic and social suffering.

Sometimes hearing good news makes us wonder why the other guy received it and we didn’t. That’s because of a stinking little green demon called envy. She and I are well acquainted but I won’t waste anymore time on her here, right now.

I don’t have an answer for our suffering economy or families without a paycheck, except that maybe we’re all part of the answer. We can choose, as restrictions ease down the road, to support local stores, restaurants, nurseries and other businesses.

I was at someone’s house a dozen years ago. A package arrived, chock full of toilet paper. The family was too busy to go shopping and with a toddler needed this necessity! We all need a stock of TP, but when we can shop locally it will help our neighbors.

The important thing is keeping our eyes on God, who keeps us in his sight, like a mother hen attending her chicks.

Safe in eternal ways that we may not be able to grasp, but that’s not what’s important.

Neither is seeing evidence at this moment. That’s what faith is for.

The great Lover of our souls says, “My child, don’t worry. I am with you always and forever.”

All will be well.

‘The time of singing has come’

I thought there might be no more hikes after my broken hip this winter. That fear ended when Jim and I wandered through daffodils beside the upper lodge at Blue Spruce Park.

Behold, the winter is past;
the rain is over and gone.
The flowers appear on the earth,
the time of singing has come,
and the voice of the turtledove
is heard in our land. (Song of Solomon 2:11-12, ESV)

We went looking for fiddleheads, baby ferns pushing through the soil, that look a bit like upside down quarter notes, but we were too early. Fiddleheads are tightly curled greenery resembling the fancy carved end of a violin. We saw many in New Zealand, where the fern is a national symbol.

I’m overcome by the simplest things, now. It’s one of the few benefits of living with cancer. This time it was moss-covered boulders, resembling sunning seals by a bay.

My eyes glistened at the spring greenness of the moss, begging to be touched. This world is too tender to ever want to leave.

Blue Spruce is popular for its daffodils that fill hollows and dance along creeks in April. We didn’t walk far. We didn’t have to, making it easier for me managing walking sticks on soft ground. A pale jonquil with orange lipstick and a saucy face flirted with me. Within a small radius were gatherings of lanky, bright yellow daffodils, reaching for the sun above the trees.

With Chewie, our goldendoodle, beside me, I sat on a bench. Jim stretched out, resting his head on my lap. A moment to memorize the lines on his beloved face and tuck away in a pocket to withdraw another day. I could have stayed hours watching tall, leafless hardwoods sway and bend high against the azure sky.

I was glad for my black rubber boots when I stepped across a spring rivulet; a temporary stream with mini waterfalls tumbling over rocks and twigs, headed toward the lake, below. The chiming water could have been a children’s bell choir gone wild, ringing crystal notes that called my name as certainly as Mother did at the end of day when it was time to come inside from play.

In the dry season, the run will entirely disappear, as if it had never existed. Its brevity condenses and intensifies the joy it gives right now.

Since we’re required to stay inside and safe distances from others when out, I wonder if our nature walk would be considered an “essential activity.” What else would you call it? The damp ground, warm breeze, flowing water and brilliant sunshine infused my soul with hope.

Several days ago I had an IV at the hospital. Our tramp in the woods was every bit as essential to my spiritual well-being as that IV drip was to my body. Wholeness comes through many channels, beginning with gratitude for the good earth and air to breathe another morning.

We escaped the bad news of the pandemic for a stitch of time by walking where Jesus would have loved to walk, in the beauty of nature. Beauty, like music and mathematics, are evidence of a divine Creator. I don’t know much about music or math but enough to doubt such incredible things are mere accidents. Even more mind boggling, it’s the spaces between the notes that make music magic, and not just clamor. Imagine then, how God uses the solitary spaces in our lives, when nothing seems to be happening, to hum songs into our souls.

Irishman Daniel Twohig wrote the hymn, “I walked today where Jesus walked.” A gentleman of my grandparents’ generation, he was born in the 1880’s. He must have felt Jesus was a country boy at heart. Jesus knew the paths and hills that surrounded his childhood home in Nazareth and went there to grow in spiritual strength and wisdom, gathered from the aching beauty of his Father’s creation in Galilee.

We take rural hikes to soak in a smidgen of that strength and wisdom. The songwriter’s words are equally true for anyone seeking God’s presence in the outdoor world:

I walked today where Jesus walked,

In days of long ago.

I wandered down each path He knew,

With reverent step and slow.

Those little lanes, they have not changed,

A sweet peace fills the air.

I walked today where Jesus walked,

And felt His presence there.

Look around and glimpse beauty sprouting, today. It’s everywhere, lifting our spirits to higher ground.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

(Fiddlehead pics by Tara; pic of Jim and me by Brett.)

Sanctuary on stormy seas

Sailors on the French nuclear submarine L’Inflexible will enter a foreign world when they resurface, some time this month. They submerged in February, their ship a sanctuary, keeping them safe from Covid-19. They have no idea how it is ravaging the world, according to a newspaper report.

The French navy’s policy is to keep sailors fully focused on their job, without distractions. Only their captain is aware of what is happening, above. My heart is with them and their families. The shock of it all. The sense of loss they will suddenly experience.

Their situation is reminescent of Holy Saturday. Nothing seemed to be happening the day after Jesus died on a Roman cross and was buried in a borrowed grave.

Forgotten? Not by a long shot.

But dead, for sure.

His ministry, apparently over. Kaput. Done.

No one expected anything out of the ordinary to follow that quiet Saturday, though Jesus told his disciples he would rise in three days and be with them, always.

Then, came Sunday.

Up from the grave he arose, with a mighty triumph over his foes!

Victorious.

Alive, for sure.

Changing human history, forever.

Angelic alleluias call us to join in their songs of hope. Can you hear them?

I’m coping with multiple layers of health issues, plus fears of Covid-19, as are many of you. I couldn’t endure this journey through cancer, chemo and the threat of corona virus without songs of praise.

Holy Week takes me back to the sights and sounds of Jerusalem. My coworkers and I had been in Galilee, all green and lovely with the rolling sea and the scent of honeysuckle in the air. We’d also traveled through the bone-dry Judean desert.

Then, came Jerusalem. The Spirit brushed over us as our bus approached the Holy City. I felt the pull of history and geography as an unexpected yearning, a homing instinct deep within. Anticipation hovered as we sang “Sanctuary,” a new song for me:

Lord, prepare me to be a sanctuary,

pure and holy, tried and true.

With thanksgiving,

I’ll be a living sanctuary, for you! (Thompson & Scruggs)

Although I’d heard about Jerusalem all my life, being there is like comparing a faded sepia photograph from one bursting with color. Vehicles crowded noisy streets; one rear license plate announced, “I’m a student driver” along the winding road leading up to the Holy City. I felt like a student too. Immersed in this sacred place that seemed somehow familiar, like a dream from the distant past.

I wonder if Heaven will be like that.

When we arrive will we feel like a tourist, a guest, a foreigner?

Or will the embrace of the Father’s love overtake every thought and quivering emotion, bringing us to our knees to sing: Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty!

We’ve heard ideas about it, seen faint hints as we plod along. Until we arrive, we have no idea what delights await us.

How different that will be from what awaits the French sailors. Of course, their captain knows and most likely hurts for the thousand shocks those in his command will endure.

As does the Captain of our souls. He charts our course according to the stars his Father placed in the night sky, guiding us home.

When John Wesley crossed the stormy Atlantic on a missionary journey, he hovered in fear. Moravian believers, meanwhile, held a prayer and praise meeting. He envied how they trusted their Captain. Later, he was filled with God’s Spirit at what sounds to me like a boring meeting, Yet, God’s light broke through. He was transformed and transformed England with a movement of faith-infused social justice .

At the darkest moments, God is with us. A year ago, I was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer; it was and still seems unreal. I depend upon God’s grace for bright days to enjoy this green planet & precious loved ones. Yet, I know the day will come when the heavenly pull of love will far exceed all that presently keeps me earthbound.

Written to honor President Lincoln, someday I’ll say to Jesus,

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,

The ship has weather’d every rack,

the prize we sought is won – Walt Whitman

God, outside the spectrum of chronological time, knows the end from the beginning. Psalm 31 promises our times are in his hands.

That’s Scripture. God’s truth for you. For me. For all of us.

I’m praying you are blessed with a sanctuary, a safe harbor in Jesus, my friends, this Resurrection season.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery, Indiana Gazette

(Word Art by Tara Woodard-Lehman)

(The painting pictured here was a gift from our pastor’s wife, Lura Jean Park, to my son Brett, as a child.)

(Image of St. Columba from Diocese Derry & a Royal stamp)