September 3rd, 2007 by admin

            After four or five months of dieting, I had lost about forty pounds. The good thing about this is that when the body gets the right foods, it feels and functions better. The diet was not easy and traveling with work made things even more challenging. Eating out anywhere was no longer an option. I managed to find places that offered salads or fruit in order to cope until I could get back home and get the good stuff. We tried to buy mostly organic vegetables, which always taste better and are healthier. We were certainly learning a lot about the human body and about the foods we consume.

           In the midst of this diet and trying to clean myself out of all the toxins and negative debris that had accumulated over the years, the Lord began tugging on my heart about something. He gave me a thought that I knew was from Him. He showed me that what I was doing with my natural body, I should be doing also with my spiritual body. I was removing all junk from coming into my physical body and cleaning out all the toxins. This is supposed to restore health. In the same sense God was dealing with me about removing all junk coming into my spiritual body and to also remove the toxins that polluted my spiritual walk. This made perfect sense, but I was so concerned about cleaning the physical body I never paid any attention to trying to detox the spiritual side.

           It is important to be healthy in all aspects of our life, and sometimes we fail to remember that our spiritual side can become toxic. Let me clarify what I mean by the spiritual side. Our soul — our mind, will, and emotions is what I am talking about here when I say the spiritual side. I am not talking about our spirit. I am talking about our soul. God wanted me to clean up my thinking, align my will with His, and find joy in my salvation. He wanted me to detoxify my thinking, clean out the toxins clouding His will for my life, and to be happy. It was going to be a cleansing of the mind, will, and emotions. He had already saved me, and I knew that my spirit was going to live with him forever, but I still had stuff in my mind and emotions that needed to be cleaned. This process is continual; I am constantly trying to keep the cares of the world, wrong thoughts, Hollywood�s message, my own will, and more from creeping in. I did however, put some measures in place that would aid this process, which are still active as of this writing.

September 2nd, 2007 by admin

            As I took this stand, I was directed to other people with cancer issues who had fought and beaten it with a special diet that was mostly raw foods. It consists mainly of fruit, vegetables, and grains. I had to eliminate all sugar, milk, cheese, all processed foods, and � well, the list goes on forever. The diet can be found at www.hacres.com.

            Like many people, I was a junk food junkie and loved my Reese�s candy bars and double stuff Oreos. Changing what we put in our bodies can be a huge challenge and a very big, bad habit to change.  Those who succeed know that truly, nothing is impossible with the right motivation. I was going to tackle this disease with Faith and Food. I love to research, and when this diet thing came up I went nuts studying. I noticed that most people fighting cancer did a lot of juicing. Carrots, apples, green leafy vegetables, etc� so I bought a juicer and then a juice press to get the most out of the juice. I was going to go all out and drink or eat whatever was necessary. I was willing to suck it down, if it was going to bring health to me. This diet had apparently worked for others, so maybe it would work for me.

            The pressure in the eye and even the blindness in the lower part had not even been too much of a thought in light of the new discovery of the melanoma. I was on one eye drop and apparently the second valve surgery was doing its thing since the pressure had stabilized. I could see pretty good (20-40) out of the eye, so I just set my sights in to eat right, believe right, and expect God to heal. I had some healing scriptures that I printed off and would read them for encouragement. Eating healthy was fun, and I actually enjoyed it except for the cravings for Mexican food. That was brutal. Missy also joined me on this diet which was, and is a great support. I added a number of supplements with the food that I was eating to help restore the immune system so that it could do its part in fighting off the disease. Missy was very instrumental in the research and preparation of the food and supplements and there is no way that I could have done any of this without her love.

September 1st, 2007 by admin

              This gave me hope, and as I studied other scriptures on healing, I was determined that if the Word of God was true then I would be healed. I saw that healing was in the Word of God for His people and the Word was truth. The Word is Truth. And if the Word is truth then healing is mine. I now had 3 keys to go on. First, it is God�s will for me to be healed. Second, if I trust in Him my leaf would be green. Third, healing and forgiveness are in a package together and come with salvation. This third key is actually illustrated when Jesus tells the man who is paralyzed that his sins are forgiven. He goes on to say, which is easier for me to say � �Your sins are forgiven or rise up and walk� (Luke 5:23). The illustration here is that it does not matter which one Jesus says, His people get both. Healing and forgiveness (along with other things I will not discuss here) are included in the salvation package. When anyone receives Christ, he or she will get it all.  With that in mind, I decided to draw a line in the sand and not have the surgery. I was going to believe God for my healing with my eye in tact.

             Remember that this is my journey, and like anyone, I have to decide for myself the path I take. Many great believers choose other pathways, and I do not condemn any for their selection. This just happened to be my path, and I would like to say that Missy and I were in full agreement with every step. I will not say that this decision was easy. I just did not have it on the inside of me to go through with the surgery. I was also willing to face any consequences if they came. I decided to believe the Word of God as God had revealed it to me and for my situation.

            As I was reading Psalms 103:1-5 about the benefits of the Lord, I noticed that in verse 3 that the Lord says that he forgives all of our iniquities and heals all of our diseases. What stood out the most from this was that it was in the same verse. I realize that man set up the verse structure of the Bible, but this was significant to me. A light went off in my head that made me think, if the Lord forgives my sins then he also heals my diseases. Well, I know that the Lord had forgiven me of my sins, and I knew that God had power to heal, but I never put them together in the same verse. Let me say it this way. I saw for the first time that if the Lord would not heal my disease then he also would not forgive my sin. Since they were in the same verse I could not separate them. They were a package deal: If God forgives then He also heals. I knew that it was impossible for Him not to forgive, so it must be impossible for Him not to heal. I saw that healing is a benefit of the Lord just as much as forgiveness. This was the third key in my faith journey. Healing is included in salvation with forgiveness of sins.

September 1st, 2007 by admin

            A few weeks later I got the report from the oncologist that no further spreading had occurred, and I should go ahead with the surgery to remove the eye. Well this certainly was a relief but now I had to make a decision on the eye. Was I going to remove it, or was I going to believe that it would be healed? The plastic surgeon in the meantime had called and told me that the surgery he felt was best for me after his research was the simple surgery of just removing the eye and felt that my recovery would be normal. I would have a prosthetic eye made and would learn how to live with it. He also left this up to me on the time frame of the surgery and told me to just call him when I was ready to schedule it. This was around the end of April 2006. I was not ready to remove the eye. I was not sure that this is what God had for me. Could this really be God�s will? Certainly, no one that I talked with could tell me that this disease was God�s will for me. On the contrary, people would tell me that this is not God�s will and that sickness and disease is from the devil.

            As well meaning as people are, it is easy for others to advise, but when it is your body and your life, you have to make the decision. You have to determine the will of God, and for me I needed to do it quickly. The doctors try and give history of others in similar situations that they can use as reference. In my case it came down to one other person who was documented in a British medical journal. I had a different case since I had two valves in the eye. The only case that was substantial was a woman in her sixties who decided to remove the eye. She decided on the surgery. Three years later, the cancer came back and she died. This was not very reassuring about the surgery that I had to contemplate. But what would be the consequences if I kept the eye?  Of course, there are never any guarantees. Ultimately, I needed God. I needed a divine answer. Should I remove the eye as one path of healing, or should I believe for healing with my eye in tact? I knew what I wanted to do, but this was a big decision and a scary one too. I told the doctor that I would call him when I was ready for the surgery and left it at that.

This is when I shifted gears and went back to the big question:  What is truth?

August 30th, 2007 by admin

            I was told that I needed to go see an oncologist before removal of the eye to see if the cancer had spread to any other part of my body. If it had spread, then the approach on this whole thing may change. Around this same time frame my parents who had been living in Delaware sold their house and moved in with Missy and me in Oklahoma. We were going to build them a garage cottage on the side of our house and help them enjoy life in their retirement.  My mother had always enjoyed Billie Bryme�s teachings, and it just so happened that her home church was in the next town over. She was scheduled to be speaking there. I needed a miracle and I knew that Billie Bryme moved in the gifts.

Meanwhile, I had gone to the oncologist and had the scans done on the rest of my body before going to see Billie Bryme. During the meeting she had a word for people to come up to the front if there was a growth or tumor in the body. I responded along with many others. Just another conformation that the church does not really walk in the healing that the Bible teaches is ours. She came to me and grabbed my hands, threw them up in the air and said, �Do not fear, it is done.� It would have been nice for more detail, but I took what she said like a bee takes to honey. I was encouraged and believed that everything was going to be alright and that the scans would come back fine with no further spreading. I also took it to mean that I was going to be healed completely.

August 29th, 2007 by admin

            Needless to say, Missy and I sat through the descriptions of the surgeries while also trying to assimilate the fact that I had cancer in the eye. It was a numbing experience, and we just did not know how to react. We had faith on one hand, but we also had facts on the other. And with cancer there are two physical fights: the body and time.  Those who have battled a life threatening situation know what I mean when I say life is different. Every day begins to be worth more. Time no longer is a frivolous commodity to spend at leisure. Time becomes a treasure that never comes back. Spend wisely.

            We left the plastic surgeon�s office and somehow found a way to smile. Missy had made a comment on how stupid the devil was since I had been doing those eye compressions every two hours for months and was pushing the cancer cells into the rest of my body. It seemed funny when she said it, but we had also come to the realization that this aggressive attack on my body had to stop. The devil was not only trying to blind me, but now he was trying to take my eye, disfigure my face, and take my life. Something had to be done with this devil.

August 28th, 2007 by admin

            In March of 2006 just a few months after the second valve surgery, I had the biopsy on the right eye, and in April received a diagnosis of Iris Melanoma. The only option the doctors gave me was to remove the eye completely. Chemotherapy and radiation were not options for this type of cancer. Every emotion and hope that I had plummeted south, deep, deep south.  I questioned:  What in the world had I done to deserve this? I had gone from an area of blindness in the eye to total removal of the eye. No eye; no sight.

            At this point I thought God really has my attention now, if He had not already. It is amazing that when the challenges come, God helps us to face them.  When the battle is hard, we can still stand.  As a result of this new diagnosis, I was sent to a plastic surgeon who gave me information on the procedures that could be used to remove the eye. There were a couple of different ones that were possible depending on how badly the cancer had affected the eye, and that would be determined once in the surgery room. One of the surgeries would remove the eye only and recovery would be favorable. The other surgery would remove not only the eye, but also some eye tissue and possibly muscle. This surgery could be disfiguring.

August 27th, 2007 by admin

           I really wish at this point I could stop this story and write that we went home and all was well.  However, the doctor noticed that my iris was discolored. Well the iris had been discolored since the very beginning, way back when I first noticed the partial blindness.  This was dismissed as a loss of pigmentation due to trauma from the car accident. It had never been an issue over the years and none of the previous doctors were ever concerned with it. Nonetheless, this last doctor who had done the valve surgery was concerned about this discoloration and wanted to have a cornea specialist come up and take a look. We were not ready for anymore bad news, after all the eye pressure was finally stabilized, and we wanted to move on with life and continue to believe God for the healing of the blindness that was still in the lower part of the eye.

            The cornea specialist expressed concern and, subsequently, wanted to run some tests including a biopsy on the iris, which required another surgery. Having already had 3 surgeries and a needling procedure, I just was exasperated to think of another surgery. I sought wisdom and counsel from friends and family � all deemed unanimously in favor of the biopsy with the reasoning that it is better to know anything else about my eye as opposed to guessing what else might be wrong. As with all surgeries, the risk of the biopsy meant that if the problem really was what my doctors thought it might be, then the surgery could cause the spread.

August 26th, 2007 by admin

            As a sales manager for a company, I was in front of clients and others all the time. I knew that if I did the surgery that I could be risking a lot, but I was just at a loss for what to do and had to have the surgery done. Missy and I just prayed. We were very concerned about the possibility of double vision but had no other choice but to trust God. We had to believe. Sometimes when life looks bleak, the only choice is to believe.

            I came through the surgery fine with not a trace of double vision. I actually recovered well from the surgery and was able to see really well except for the area of blindness that I had not recovered from originally. My pressure in the eye was good and stable. I could go down to one drop in the eye, and I did not have to do the eye compressions anymore. At one of my last post surgery office visits, the doctor did his usual check. Pressure was good, I could see well, and the best news was there was no double vision.

August 25th, 2007 by admin

            I was sinking fast and was losing hope that God really wanted me well. I had experienced every emotion in the book. I had faith, hope, excitement, joy, anticipation, comfort, but I also had depression, despair, fear, anxiety, pain and hopelessness.  The only thing left to do was to look to God and cry for mercy. I realized that even though I had been in faith oriented churches all my life and had enjoyed youth pastoring, missions, and associate pastoring, I had nothing on healing figured out. Suddenly, everything that I had believed was in question. It was a soul searching time — a crystallizing time where the big question was: What is truth?

            This had to be the search, because whatever truth is, that is the way it was going to be. Nothing will change truth, and I might as well come to that conclusion. So everything that I had learned in my past was going to be questioned on the basis of whether or not it was truth.

            As aforementioned, the pushing on the eye, the taking of the multiple eye drops, the taking of the pills, and the massive amounts of office visits lasted for about 3 months. It only stopped when I was rushed to the hospital with the most horrible pain in my lower back. The pills I had been on had created a wonderful kidney stone that was trying to get out. I will avoid the details, after a couple of days I was able to resume normal life.  Consequently, the doctors immediately removed pills from my treatment regimen, which then put me on a fast track for a second valve surgery. This time it would be a different doctor and a different type valve. In December of that year I had the second valve surgery — my third surgery overall. The scary thing about this surgery was the possibility of double vision. With that much hardware in the eye, there is a tendency for the eye to lack strength for movement in comparison to the other eye, therefore, causing double vision. This could only be corrected with special kind of lenses in glasses.