Today is the anniversary of my bone marrow transplant.\u00a0 I am three (from an immune and blood formation system perspective at least).\u00a0 Yes, “it” happened exactly three years ago.\u00a0 Three years is a big deal in the medical community (according to what “they” have told me).\u00a0 My transplant specialist even told me once (at the end of year one) that he would not even consider transplanting me again if the disease returned before year three.\u00a0 Talk about a warm fuzzy!\u00a0 Well, I’m past that point now, and I’m well, and I’m getting more and more opportunities to share with those around me the most awesome love I’ve ever known; and it comes from the one and only “God man” who walked around down here quite a few years ago persuading many to believe what he has also persuaded me to believe, that he was and is the Son of God.\u00a0 That changes everything.\u00a0 It has changed my life and someday (barring the Rapture) it will change my “death.”\u00a0 No, one cannot truly encounter Christ and walk away the same.\u00a0 And that’s why I’m not sure exactly how well I actually knew Christ before I found myself near death.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I had “known” Jesus a long, long time, but it became quite evident to me when I was ill that I had never allowed Christ to turn me into a profoundly different kind of “creature” (as C.S. Lewis says).\u00a0 He has now (though I’m still “undone”).\u00a0 Many days, I have a hard time even recognizing me.\u00a0 Major organ failure?\u00a0 Cancer?\u00a0 Drugs (even high dose ones)?\u00a0 Needles (lots of them)?\u00a0 Many nights alone in hospitals?\u00a0 Virtual strangers caring for my only offspring?\u00a0 Absolute control over every drop of blood in my body to even more strangers?\u00a0 No more children?\u00a0 Regular blood checks from now “until”?\u00a0 A more than full life on the other side of all of this?\u00a0 Was this really me?\u00a0 The running record I kept of all these happenings tells me that it was.\u00a0 But the Angela I’d always known could never, ever have gone through any of this.\u00a0 She was a wimp.\u00a0 She was terrified of cancer (and needles).\u00a0 She hated medicine.\u00a0 She cringed at hospitals.\u00a0 She was a control freak.\u00a0 And the list could go on and on and on.\u00a0 Yet, many say they actually marveled at how she went through such things.\u00a0 Talk about a turnaround, huh?\u00a0 If you’d only known her before…..<\/p>\n
Do you need proof that God is real?\u00a0 Please just take a look at my story.\u00a0 I lived out what for me was “impossible;” and that’s how I know God is real.\u00a0 Nothing else that I’ve ever encountered down here, none of the “natural,” can explain how and why I am what and where I am now.\u00a0 It was “supernatural,” a word whose power I feel as if our culture has somehow lessened.\u00a0 Yes, it was indeed supernatural in the sense that even the flesh of the one going through it (my flesh) had a difficult time actually processing it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
There’s a lot about me that one might be able to challenge:\u00a0 my “weak” theology (my doctorate’s in education), my parenting (of daughter and rescue dog), my extravagant chai tea habit (almost daily), my writing style (rather verbose), my past mistakes (rather plentiful), my inability to say “no” (aka:\u00a0 time management), my dress code (“designer” only accidentally), my house at times (book\/paper-cluttered), and God only knows (literally) what else.\u00a0 No one, though, can challenge the fact that I met Christ in a way that I never knew one even could from down here.\u00a0 No, no one can convince me that I did not, as I lay near death, come face to face with a risen Christ, so much so that at times it felt almost as if he was actually holding me as I lay in a fetal position praying that I would not throw up again.\u00a0 And yes, experiencing Jesus that way was worth all it cost me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As I state very clearly in my memoir, I still hope and pray that I never, ever have to go through anything like this ordeal again.\u00a0 But, I also cannot say that I wish “it” had never happened; and I cannot wish this just because I might have died without “it.”\u00a0 I cannot wish “it” away because I’m not sure that I ever could have felt Christ the way I did had I never been in the circumstances in which I was.\u00a0 Yes, being born again (again) was worth it!\u00a0 And no, I don’t continue to feel Jesus exactly this way now, even though I yearn to at times.\u00a0 But having vivid memories of such intimacy with him does help get me through what we call “real” life down here, though “real” life is someplace else altogether (something else he taught me when I was born again….. again).\u00a0 So, as Frosty the Snowman says in the old cartoon every time he comes back to life, “Happy birthday!” (And yes, I know, you really do need that snowman voice to get the full effect.)<\/p>\n
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Today is the anniversary of my bone marrow transplant.\u00a0 I am three (from an immune and blood formation system perspective at least).\u00a0 Yes, “it” happened exactly three years ago.\u00a0 Three years is a big deal in the medical community (according to what “they” have told me).\u00a0 My transplant specialist even told me once (at the […] <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6VlK3-14","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=66"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=66"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=66"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.angeladentonfoss.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=66"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}