The Power of Pink V

Teaching Men How to Fight Like a Girl

"Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil." Ephesians 6:11

The fundamental scheme of the devil is wrapped up in his very name. Words mean things, but perhaps no name has ever carried the weight of reality like the transliterated version of the Greek word, "diabalos." Anyone who has ever ordered the "El Diablo" Platter at their favorite Mexican restaurant knows that it will hurt you. His name describes his stragegy. He only purpose in life is to steal, kill and destroy. He has earned the nick name, "The Enemy." Diabolos is formed by associating two other descriptive words that when connected mean "to throw against or accuse." Satan is the accuser who is fond of raising doubts about what we believe or the people we love. He does this in order to cause us to believe that what we believe or who we love really do not have our best interests at heart. His whole nature is one of absolute selfishness. He glorifies self-gratification, and drowns people by gagging them in a deep ocean of salt water. The more they drink the thirstier they become. If they do not stop trying to quench their thirst for self-satisfaction, they will become victims of their own self-destruction.

"Teaching Men How to Fight Like a Girl" warns men to prepare themselves for the likeliehood that they are not born with the capacity to fight breast cancer the way it must be engaged. Men want an enemy to stand up to them and take them on mano a mano. The winner of the fight has their hand lifted over their beaten opponent. There is a feeling of exhileration that comes from pounding a threatening force into silent submission. Men are looking for a good clean fight. No biting, no clawing, no gouging, or punching in the clinches and definitely no hitting below the belt. Breast cancer fights dirty. It hits the one you love the most, and leaves you with a feeling of impotency when you find out you are helpless to do anything about it.

The news can always be trusted to supply a limitless number of high profilce stories of celebrities, politicians, sports heros, and ministers who have been unfaithful to their wives. Men are creative and relentless in their capacity to rationalize their behavior because their needs are not being met. Their spouse has not lived up to their expectation, and they allow someone else to enter into their lives as a substitute soul-mate.

Without being too graphic, men who are determined to remain faithful to their wives as they face the extended war with cancer need to know the playground has been closed and they are entering a war zone. War changes priorities. In peace time there can be discussions of personal preference and dialogues about needs being met. In war it is about survival. Women who are dealing with cancer have little emotional energy lelft to be the care giver or nurterer some men have entered into marrage to find. They need a woman to scratch their itch, but cancer is like falling naked into a field of poison ivy. It will make a man itch in places he has never had to reach for before. Men who are interested in fighting cancer must become focused on bringing everything they have to the battleline. They must learn that they do not have the luxury of returning to business as usual until the enemy is defeated.

That sounded a bit ethereal. Let me be a little clearer on the subject. If your marriage relationship is based on what you can get out of your wife, rather than what you can give to her, then your marriage is going to be in real trouble, and soon. Breast cancer changes a woman's priorities and it will interfere big time with a man's personal preferences. Don't fall for the enemy's propaganda campaign that it will wage 24-7 in your mind. You may consider yourself a man of faith and fidelity, but no matter how many "Promise Keeper" conferences you have attended, or marriage enrichment books you have read, it is time to call for reinforcements.

Zig Ziglar used to say that he didn't believe that a person became what they thought about. I once heard him say, "If it was true that man becomes what he thinks about then I would have been a woman by the time I was sixteen." Great line, Zig. Men do think about women... alot. The problem is that they do not dwell on what they can do for women, but what women can do for them. One of the maxims of life that I have observed is, "Men will promise love in exchange for sex. Women will offer sex in order to receive love." Breast cancer will hit a man right in his core values. Remember I said it would hit below the belt so put on your cup before you step into the ring.

The ash heap of history is filled with stories of men who believed women were put on earth to meet their needs. Men who have this perspective of women will suffer from battle fatigue and start looking for someone to provide for them what their wife no longer can give to them. Male PMS has been described as Power, Money, and Sex. This means a man may not become a victim of his lust for another woman. He may throw himself into his career, or become focused on financial succes so that he can spend his energy on a battle that he can fight on his own terms.

The fact remains. Breast cancer turns a woman inward. A man who has been used to being the focus of his wife's attention has to know that she will be forced by the fight to focus all her powers and energy on learning a new vocabulary, changing eating habits, reversing sleep patterns, exposing herself to strangers, driving thousands of miles to doctor's appointments, receiving chemo, losing her hair, and hearing countless numbers of horror stories from people who feel compelled to remind her that they know someone who died in the war with cancer.

So what is a man to do? First things first. Repeat this phrase. "This is not about me." Second: Act like what you have just said is the truth, and not just a pious platitude. Some ideas come to mind. Clean her toilet, vaccum the house, wash the dishes, cook a meal the way she needs to eat, and bite your tongue when she isn't as attentive to your needs as you have come to expect. Third: Find a trusted friend and repeat out loud the lies that the enemy is constantly playing in your head. Have this friend on the speed dial of the communication device of your choice. Fourth: Take no prisoners. The fight against breast cancer requires a relentless destruction of the thoughts, and tricks of the enemy. If you flirt with an invasive thought longer than 20 seconds, then you are rationalizing the disastrous results that are meant by this incoming stealth missile to the mind. Five: Place your arms around your wife, and hold her as you pray with and for her when the cancer drains her resources and she is running on empty. This will be the hardest for most men because they have always considered prayer to be women's work. Remember this is not about you and the title is, "Teaching Men How to Fight Like a Girl."

When Senator Edwards of North Carolina was campaigning for the office of President of the United States, he carried on a clandestine affair with a temporary staffer. He cheated on his wife, and secretly fathered a child and supported the woman who bore his daughter out of wedlock. It seemed to be a shock to the most hardened media mouthpiece. They sputtered increduoulsy that he did this while his wife was fighting breast cancer. Over and over again it was played over the airwaves that it was a particualarly calloused treatment of his wife to do this while she was in a fight for her life. I am no defender of this man's behavior, but I do know where it comes from. It is in the heart of every man who believes his wife is put on this earth to meet his needs. When those needs are not met, then that same man will begin to rationalize his resentment into a strategy to have his needs met. King David had many wives and concubines, but still felt the need to have Bathsheba scratch his itch. Sin for a season always produces bitter fruit.

When the battle with breast cancer begins, a shift of priorities takes place. A woman who has always had time and energy to be a nurturing, loving force for others calls upon all her resources and reserves to bring the best she has to the fight of her life. A man who wants to learn how to fight like a girl will get over himself, and follow her lead. He must admit he is unprepared for what is ahead, and find strength in his Lord in order to supply God's kind of love for his lady. This kind of love does not keep an account of what is owed. It must be done without any expectation of a return on his investment.

When a man prays with his wife in the fight of her life, he must get out of the pity bunker. When he prays for her, he takes his place by the side of the one he loves the most. It is not a natural thing for him to do. It feels funny to him because he is finally fighting outside of his comfort zone for the love of his life. The schemes of the enemy will not be quite so effective because they are calling in the heavy artillery, and God is sending His own "shock and awe" missiles into the camp of the enemy. If you listen carefully you can hear the schemer screaming, "INCOMING!"

"Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial...Let no one say when he is tempted, 'I am being tempted by God'; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust." James 1: 12-14

The Power of Pink IV

Teaching Men How to Fight Like a Girl

"Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might." Ephesians 6:10

When the Psalmist, David, wrote about "the valley of the shadow of death" I doubt that he had cancer in mind. Still the truth remains, the specter of death has always cast a shadow of fear over people. Regardless of the century, or our wealth, status or position in life, death is the great equalizer. It comes to everyone with a relentless finality. When David walked through his valley, he turned to God and developed a face to face intimacy with Him that moved him through the darkness of his fear and into the light of His Presence.

I have read the 23rd Psalm many times since I was a child. It was one of the first passages of Scripture I committed to memory. It has been judged to be the most familiar passage of the Bible, and it is the one that is turned to most often when people plan the funerals of their loved ones. It is no wonder that it is what God used to call me to Himself when Dana and I were processing the initial shock of the words, "It's cancer."

Those words are everything people have said they are. They strike fear into the heart of everyone who has heard them spoken to them or stood by when they were dropped on the ones they love. They are like a sledgehammer to the chest, and leave a person breathless with panic. They send the mind racing ahead on a road of speculation that takes a person to every worst case scenario that the imagination can conceive.

Worry and fear are first cousins in the family of emotions, and they conspire and cooperate with one another to take people who are facing a fight with cancer to the city limits of "What if."

What if we have waited to long to discover Dana has cancer.
What if we cannot find out where it is.
What if we cannot find the right doctor.
What if they remove her breasts.
What if she loses her hair.
What if they cannot get it all.
What if she does not recover from the surgery.
What if the cancer comes back.
What if our insurance does not cover the cost.
What if she loses her job.
What if she loses her insurance.
What if she loses her life.

There it is. Worry and fear keep taking a person step by step to the place that the enemy wants them to go. Death is the ultimate destination that a person find at the town square in the city of "What if."

I am a sucker for a good book title. It grabs the attention and sets the table for the feast that the author has prepared for the reader. One of my books on Lincoln is entitled, "Tried by War." Lincoln would not have become the man we know today if it had not been for the crisis of the Civil War. It fell to him to find a solution to a problem he did not cause, and heal a country that tore itself apart during his presidential administration. War does that. In the midst of all the death and destruction, it creates life. The life of Abraham Lincoln would be profoundly altered by the impact of the War Between the States.

David had his valley of the shadow of death. Lincoln had his. Dana and I were beginning to realize that we were walking through a valley that would introduce us to a series of events that would profoundly change our lives. Nothing would ever be the same again. Life would not return to normal. It could get better, or it could get worse, but it would not go back to the same predicatable game plan that we had come to expect and enjoy.

When the movie, "Fireproof" was released by Sherwood Pictures, it contained a statement that was worth the price of admission. One of the characters referred to the crisis of his life as "the new normal." I will be forever grateful to the Kendrick brothers for their insight on this concept that they shared through this movie. It took a while for me to get there, but after about a year of resisting what God was allowing to come into my life, I began to settle into a realization of this "new normal" and to release my right to have God restore what Dana and I had lost. We were going to learn that God was giving us something else to replace it. To receive it we would have to let go of what we were holding on to with a whiteknuckled grip. Our predictable, carefully prepared plan and perspective for our lives was a poor substitute for what He had in mind.

Cancer had not been on my "To Do" List. It had not been in my plan for our lives as a husband and wife. I would not have wished this on my worst enemy, much less the woman I loved with all my heart. I did not have the same kind of faith that Dana had when she heard the words, "It's cancer." She called it her "Great Adventure." I called it something else. Can't tell you what I said, but God heard it. Over the next two and a half years, God was going to hear alot of things that I cannot put in print. However, in all honesty, I have to tell you that I would say things to God that I never thought would come out of my mouth. Not proud of it. Not bragging about it. Just telling the truth. I do not have the same level of integrity that David had. I wonder if David meant to have all those prayers of his put in print. I sometimes wince when I read them, and think he should have had an editor remove some of those lines like, "O God, shatter their teeth in their mouth." Psalm 58:6 Probably not going to see that one on a plaque at "Hobby Lobby."

Cancer has a way of releasing our grip on the pretentious piety that sometimes passes for proper Christian behavior. It cuts through the carefully created image of who we think we are in Christ and reveals a much less flattering picture to us. It brings us to the end our ourselves, our resources and our reserves. Any Christian maturity that I thought I had developed over the previous five decades of walking with Christ was going to be put to a test that I did not want to take. It would take me places I did not want to go, and trigger reactions in me that I could not believe I could express to the God I loved.

Fortunately, I would discover a God of grace I had never met before. I would be ministered to by a Spirit of comfort that I had studied about, but had never had to lean on for that level of strength. Jesus would emerge from the shadows as a close companion who would come to me in the middle of the dark crisis and make sense out of the things that confused my mind and struck fear in my heart. I would learn more about my wife than I had ever known was there. I would be humbled by her fighting spirit, and her persevering faith. I would wear pink as a tribute to her and the women who faced this enemy with a toughness that tenderized my heart. I would shave my head to identify with what she was going through and to laugh at the very thing the enemy wanted to use to bring tears of shame.

The valley of the shadow of death was a reality to David. It is still a reality to us. Satan will still make sure that we are reminded that Dana's younger sister died of this same disease. This means we never let our guard down. We refuse to face life in our own strength. We stand firm only because we kneel. We have learned it is not always a bad thing when life knocks you to your knees. If you pray while you are down there, you will be stand stronger and fight harder when you get up. The call of God is to stand in the strength of His might. Bending our knees is the way we have found to yield our will and to stand our ground in the fight of our lives.

The Power of Pink III

Teaching Men How to Fight Like a Girl

"Prayer is the intimate communication between the Heavenly Father and His child." Don Miller

One of the toughest assignments I have ever faced as a Dad was meeting our daughters to tell them that their mother had been diagnosed with breast cancer. I don't know why it bothered me so much. Dana was more than able to handle the situation without me. My wife has an inner strength and resiliency that seems to flourish in the midst of a crisis. I have seen it in many women who have been hit with the news of about cancer. It is an awesome sight to behold.

When we arrived in Southlake Town Center, we were a little bit ahead of Ashley and Allyson. It gave us time to walk, and talk and pray. Little did we know that we had fallen into pattern that would serve us well over the next two and one half years. As we walked south from the Barnes and Noble Book Store, I could see our daughters in the distance. It was late afternoon and the bright sun threw a shadow across their faces, but I could see the outline of their bodies as the approached where Dana and I were standing. Both of them are college graduates, beautiful, accomplished women who have great strength and poise, but they looked like two little girls as they held each other and made their way to us. The scene broke my heart, and my eyes began to flood with tears. My mind was swept of all the words I had been practicing to say. My cell phone rang. It was a friend 60 miles away who called to let me know that he had just heard the news. I had walked with him and his lovely wife through his six month old son's brain surgery, and he wanted to let me know their thoughts and prayers were with us. He said,"I'm not that good at this, but you were there for us and we are going to be there for you. As much as we know how, we are going to pray for you and Dana and be there for you through this like you were there for us." I was in full melt down at this time. I responded with, "Start praying! Our girls are about 20 feet away and I have to tell them the news, and I don't know how." He promised to pray and we hung up. In the short length of that phone call, Dana and the girls ran to meet each other, and they threw their arms around their bodies in a group hug and wept. They knew instinctively that they were about to hear bad news, and Dana responded with a powerful, maternal instinct to protect her children. I walked over and wrapped my arms around all three of these precious ladies, and just started praying aloud for them right there on the sidewalk. It was a short prayer, and the words I prayed do not come to mind, but I know our first response was to place this news in God's hands. I asked Him to take this out of our hands, and do something with it only He could get credit for. I unashamedly asked for His healing touch on Dana and His ability to stand along side of her as she faced what was coming her way. We then walked hand in hand to the gelato shop and ate Italian ice cream. Sounds a bit silly now, but ice cream really helped get the bad taste of cancer out our mouths.

I was beginning to learn the truth of a statement made by a travelling companion of mine. In March 2002 I was heading to speak in Florida, and had to connect with a flight out of Atlanta. When I got off of my plane in Georgia, I knew I had very little time to catch my next flight to Tampa. Imagine my relief, when the gate that I needed to reach was right next door to my arrival gate, and I just walked right on the plane without having to run or wait. I sat down in my seat and I must have said, "Thank you Lord." The man in the seat next to me said, "Oh, you know Him too." I was a little taken aback. I had not realized I had said it aloud. I was grateful, but had not intended to use my prayer as a conversation starter. He asked what I was going to do in Tampa. I told him I was on my way to teach people how to pray. His words put a chill in my spine. He said, "That's easy. Tell them to get cancer!" I know the look on my face had to be one of shock and awe. This stranger had invaded my space and dropped a real bomb right in my lap. He said, "Don't be alarmed. I am not being flippant. I just didn't really take prayer seriously until I got cancer. After I got that piece of news, prayer became very important to me, and Jesus and I have become very familiar with one another." You can't make this stuff up. I have to admit that I have fallen back on this statement many times over the past two and half years.

That night we drove home, all the while calling family and friends with the news over the 70 mile journey. By the time we arrived at our house we were exhausted with repeating the report over and over. All we could do was hold each other and cry. We didn't know what was next. We still had a lot to learn about the fight against cancer that was ahead.

We knew when the sun came up we had to find and oncologist and outline a battle plan. There was so much to do, and yet life still went on all around us. We were pastoring a church and in the middle of a building program. We were both on the Volunteer Fire Department of our city, and I was about to begin a two year term as member of our city council. People all around us expected us to meet some expectation they had of us, but we were in need of help ourselves. We were overwhelmed by the news we had received,and intimidated by the new vocabulary words we were having to learn.

I remember thinking as I put my head on the pillow that I would get up if the sun came up in the morning, but I did not have any other plans for the day. Thank God we did not know what was ahead of us or neither one of us would have slept that night.

Like many people who have faced crises over the past centuries, the 23rd Psalm came to my mind. The turning point in David's walk with God did not come from a mountain top experience, but from a valley. We were in a very deep, dark valley, and the words that came to my mind were, "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me." I don't know what David went through before he wrote these words, but somehow God became someone he talked to rather than he just talked about. His references to God were all in the third person until his crisis became so personal that it forced him to talk to God. I was a preacher and I was equipped and experienced at talking about God. Cancer was taking me through a valley that was filled with changing shadows and shifting light and exposing a vulnerability in my soul that could only be protected by talking to God face to face. There is a huge difference between preaching and praying. That is because of the distance between talking about God and talking to God. One requires informaton and a moderate degree of intelligence. The other is a personal intimacy that is cultivated in what Oswald Chambers called, "the valley of humiliation." He said, "God gives us the vision, then He takes us down to the valley to batter us into the shape of the vision, and it is in the valley that so many of us faint and give way. God has to take us into the valley...until we get to the place where He can trust us."

Dana and I have prayed for over 30 years that God would allow us to be part of something only He could get credit for. We had no idea how big a part cancer would play in answering our prayers.

The Power of Pink II

Teaching Men How to Fight Like a Girl

"Man's extremity is God's opportunity." George Whitefield

One of my heros of faith is the 18th Century Evangelist, George Whitefield. He traveled seven times from England to the United States, and preached up and down the eastern seaboard of what was then the American Colonies. He was responsible for starting and supporting an orphanage outside of Savannah, Georgia that is still in existence today. He wove together the various Christian denominations into a strong quilt of brotherly love through his powerful evangelistic messages. He has been credited with giving Americans their sense of being part of a country made up of many parts with a common bond of Christian brotherhood. He was a friend to America before she became a nation, and often wrote members of the British parliament to let the thirteen colonies grow and prosper without undue interference from the government back home. When he died his preaching and praying had made a huge difference in how Americans viewed themselves, and thousands had been brought into the Kingdom of God. I have often read his journals, and encouraged by his capacity to trust God in difficult days. When facing a crisis, I gain comfort from his profound proverb, "Man's extremity is God's opportunity."

Platitudes and pats on the back from well meaning people were an inevitable response from people who tried to bring comfort to us after Dana was diagnosed with cancer. For some reason, people felt compelled to give advice freely or to share graphicly how a friend, family member or someone they knew had recently died of the very kind of cancer that has just attacked my wife. They seemed to be prompted by a voice whispering to them from the pit of hell. They were oblivious to the impact their words had on Dana and on me. Thank God had other people just listened, exercised the ministry of presence, and the power of prayer. They heard what we said, put their arms around us and prayed. It was great comfort and counsel.

After Dana and I received the news about her cancer we made our way to a restaurant to wait for our daughters to get off work. They were going to meet us so we could process with them personally the doctor's report. I had to get up from the table, and walk outside. The food tasted like cardboard, and the tension in my chest and the crisis induced brain fog had returned. I tried to prepare myself for the meeting with our daughters, but I was losing ground fast. On the front porch of the restaurant, I scrolled through my cell phone until I came to the name, Michael Catt. I have known Michael since we were young gun student pastors in 1977. The thought had come to me to get the word to him and have him place Dana's diagnosis of breast cancer in their prayer room. I knew the people of Sherwood Baptist Church would begin to pray for her. Like many pastors, he had more than enough to do in the day, but I thought I could leave a message on his voice mail. This seemed to help relieve the stress of not being able to do anything about my wife's conditon. It was a divine appointment when Michael answered the call. I don't remember saying hello, but I do remember blurting out, "Michael, Dana has just been diagnosed with breast cancer and I am trying to get ready to break the news to our daughters. I don't know what to say to them. I can hardly breath and I can't think clearly. Will you pray for us?" The sound of his voice, not the words that he spoke are what touched my heart. There was an immediate expression of tender concern. There were no platitudes or war stories. He immediately took our request to the Father. His prayer was not powerful because of the phraseology of it, but because of the theology of it. He took us to a loving God who could make sense of of this "extremity." God was more than able to handle His opportunity. As Michael prayed a calm began to come over me, and a clarity to my mind returned. I wept as he prayed, and did not add anything when he finished except words of gratitude and the promise to keep him and his church posted as the steps we were going to take became clearer to us. I returned to the table. We finished our meal, and headed to meet our girls.

When someone tells you that their wife or loved one has been diagnosed with breast cancer, this is not a time to pull out a grisly war story from your morgue of memories. There is no comfort in being told that others have died from this long before your wife found out she had it. What they did not know is that her younger sister died of this same disease several years earlier, and Dana had plenty of up close and personal experience with what breast cancer can do to a person. We hardly needed to be reminded by people who could not control their urge to process with us their worst case scenarios and family medical history. It made me want to punch them in the mouth to make them stop the flow of life-sapping sewage.

On the other hand, it is not much help to hear, "Oh, you ought to be glad its just breast cancer and not anything really serious. They have made a lot of progress in treating it, and its not that big a deal anymore. They can just remove it and hit it with chemo and radiation and she is going to be just fine." Then they would order dessert or start talking about the weather. It seemed that many people were content to push us into one ditch or the other, but did not have the capacity to come alongside and help us down this difficult road for any length of time.

The greatest lesson we have learned from hearing the news about cancer is contained in the four little words, "TALK LESS! PRAY MORE!" The more we talked about cancer or other people gave us the barrage of their personal experiences, cancer seemed to grow into an undefeatable giant. When we prayed or others prayed for us the giant began to shrink in the presence of God. The IMPOSSIBLE became the HIM-POSSIBLE when we were led to give it to HIM in prayer. It was then that our extremity became the opportunity God used to prove Himself faithful to walk us through the "valley of the shadow of death." Prayer would never again become a ritual or a daily devotional exercise that we would check off our "To Do List" in order to get on with what we had planned for the day. Prayer would become the air we breathed or as G. Campbell Morgan would say, " the way we set our sails to catch the wind of Heaven."

The Power of Pink I

Teaching Men How to Fight Like a Girl

"Finally be strong in the Lord, and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil." Ephesians 6:10-11

Nothing hits harder than the sneak attack of a relentless enemy. "It's cancer." When Dana and I heard the doctor speak softly this short, simple statement she handled the diagnosis much better than I did. March 2008 began a two year journey on the road of learning how to fight like a girl.

When I was growing up in the "Happy Days" era Dallas, Texas in The Fifties, the ultimate put down that could be made between two guys fighting for their territory on "The Blacktop" at O.M Roberts Elementary School was the burn, "You fight like a girl!" We had no idea that we were actually paying a compliment to our opponent. No man has learned to appreciate the tenacity, the stamina and the spirit of a woman until they have stood by them through their fight against cancer.

Dana was diagnosed with Stage 2B breast cancer, and her first response was, "Well, I knew it. I am just going to have to beat it." For my part, I was in a fog. It was a kind of crisis-induced coma brought on by the head on collision with cancer. Nothing optimistic or pugilistic came out of my mouth. I don't even remember how we walked from the basement of the hospital exam room to the parking lot of HEB Methodist Hospital.

Dana was on the cell phone contacting our daughters, Ashley and Allyson and setting up a meeting with them in Southlake. We were going to break the news to them in person, but by now they were well aware that we were not bringing them a good report. Between conversations with family and friends, she was giving me directions. I was useless. I had spent close to 30 years in the Mid-Cities, but couldn't fathom how to get to Southlake. It was as if a giant hand was squeezing the breath out of my lungs, and I could not get my mind to function. It was much like one of the brain concussions I have had over the years. I was awake, aware, but awash in an almost other world kind of feeling. I was grasping, gasping and drowning in a sea of denial. I had to ask Dana several times how to get out of the parking lot, how to access the road to Southake, and what exit to take. Nothing looked familiar to me. In truth, nothing would ever be the same again.

In the middle of the fog of war, my cell phone rang. It was Ricky Griffin, my pastor friend from the Panhandle of Texas. Grif and I had not talked in almost a year. His first words were a mixture of exhuberance and exasperation. In his patented Panhandle French, he said, "Man, I have had you on my mind all day! What is going on?" It was a question of genuine concern, not just a casual "Whazzup?" I began to spill my guts to Grif, and blurted out, "Ricky, Dana was just diagnosed with cancer, and I am overwhelmed!" His voice was a gift from God. He told me that his wife, Pam, had been diagnosed with the same kind of cancer a year before. He established an immediate bond with me. He knew exactly what this felt like. He told me to hang up the phone, and keep my eyes on the road, and leave the rest in God's hands. He said he was going to start praying and enlisting others to do the same. His last words were, "This is a battle you can win." The call ended and the fog lifted.

Don't misunderstand me. The enemy was still before me. The fight was still ahead, but now I could see Jesus standing in the line of battle. He was not waving a white flag. It was a good sign. Dana asked who had called, and I said, "I think we just heard from God." Thank God and Grif! We were not alone. We were not defeated. We were not victims. We were just in the fight of our lives.

Since March of 2008, Dana has referred to her fight with breast cancer as her, "Great Adventure!" She has been a tremendous encouragement to many people who have found themselves faced with the same challenge. What I have seen in her has humbled me and challenged me. She has taught me how to fight like a girl, and it is not a task for the faint of heart. It has caused us both to make a commitment to challenge people to form a long-lasting, life-changing support sytstem for their spouse, mother, sister or friend. To do this requires a full fisted attack that hits the enemy with the all five fingers of a joint task force that includes...

1. Believing Prayer: Take your place in the battle line along side of the Person of The Risen Christ. He is ready when you are to get right in the middle of what you fear the most, and make sense out of it.

2. Positive People: Toxic people should not be given permission to take you on a detour or sound retreat from the place Jesus has called you to stand.

3. Proper Nutrition: Knowing what to eat and giving your body what it needs to fight is not a spectator sport. It requires persistence and discpline to turn food into fuel for a fight not comfort for a retreat.

4. Regular Exercise: Stress is a real killer because it weakens the immune system. The body was meant to move. It is God's design to get rid of toxins that rob us of life.

5. Medical Science: Fighting the battle against cancer requires a commitment to learn a new vocabulary and to ask alot of questions. God is the Divine Healer. There is no other kind of healing than the kind that comes from God, but He has provided people with scientific insight into the nature of cancer.

Over the next few weeks, Dana and I will be taking an in depth look at these five things that people do have control over in their fight against cancer. The most important is prayer. It is the thumb of the hand in this fist of furious faith. The other four are weakened severely if the people who are entering this fight do not take their stand alongside The Intercessor, Jesus Christ.

I have developed an even greater respect for my wife, and for the women who are a part of this unique pink sorority. During the past two and one half years, I have come to a new understanding of the phrase, "You fight like a girl." I would be proud to wear it as a badge of honor, if I could ever match the courage that Dana has brought to this fight. Until then, Dana and I will share with others what we have learned through her "Great Adventure" and help others focus on the five things they can do to resist the temptation to run for the tall grass. There is no need to focus on being a victim, when we have been called to take our stand in the strength of the Lord for the victory that has already been won.