So far so Good

I love teachers of the Bible who can take some of the most obscure passages of scripture and make it relevant in our lives. A scripture or passage that when we are listening, doing our daily reading, etc. we never stopped to truly lean into what God could be saying. One of these scriptures for me comes from 1 Samuel 7:12. The prophet Samuel played a crucial role in a crucial moment of God’s people. But, back to the scripture that I want to share with you today: 12 Then Samuel took a stone and set it between Mizpah and Shen, and named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far the Lord has helped us.” I know you are amazed at this moment. Wow, Caleb, you blew me away with that one, but stick with me for a moment. 

A little background on the scripture above it took the people of Israel a long time before they turned to Samuel to help them in restoring their relationship with God. Samuel had gathered the people in Mizpah before the above scripture, and it was here that Samuel prayed for the people. Still, the Philistines heard Israel were in Mizpah and used it as an opportunity to march on their enemies ( I promise to stop the history lesson here shortly and assure you I am getting to the point of all this). When Israel heard the Philistines were coming, they straight panicked. Much like in our own lives when we get the news that can take us back, whether it is about our kids, jobs, health, etc. I know what I want my response to be and what I pray for it to be, but those two things don’t always line up. Samuel responded by turning to God, and as he did, the enemy began their attack. But in the midst, God had heard Samuel and responded with an incredible display of power. To make a long story short, the Philistines were defeated before Israel that day. God had listened to the cries of his people and came to their rescue.

This is the point where we are introduced to the Ebenezer stone to celebrate God’s mighty intervention on behalf of his people. In Hebrew, Ebenezer means “stone of help.” So here is the point for me in all of this, and that is that I realize I haven’t celebrated enough of these victories in my own life. We need to spend more time celebrating these victories and celebrating one another. Whether it is a job, kids’ health, my amazing wife, my health, etc. There are so many distractions each day that take our eyes off the positive things happening in our lives and what God is doing, and many more things await us, but I pray that we will raise the stone of help like Samuel did all those years ago. His intent was not to give the people of Israel a day to remember their victory but something to celebrate and build on for months, years, and decades to come. A reminder of God’s help/blessing(s) not only that day but in times to come as well.

So I am raising my Ebenezer stone today for a couple of things in my own life. Last week I got my neck brace off and have started physical therapy, and this week we met with the oncologist on Tuesday after having our scan the previous Friday. My team of doctors continues to remain extremely positive. Before the trial, we had to clean and clear out the chemo so I was off treatment for over a month, and we have only been on the trial for three weeks before the scan. They typically look at a scan eight weeks into the trial, and that is also when they tend to find positive results. So I won’t lie as I was anxious and nervous not having had treatment for that month and been on this trial for such a short amount of time. But my doctor said there had been NO growth that we are stable and that we probably did see some decrease in the size but we did not have a CT scan prior that could serve as a marker. My doctor said that he is hopeful that we will now begin to see those decreases, and it honestly seems to be his expectation considering the initial response. By the way, stable is a positive term in cancer treatment and especially when you consider how aggressive my form is and was before getting to MD Anderson. We also had been told in the prior week from comments on the x-ray that we see “healing” in the bones. So far, so God. While it sucks to have this disease, it is hard not to feel humbled by many of the things happening.

So again, I want to encourage whoever is reading this to celebrate and set up your stone(s) continuously so that you can point to the victories when things aren’t so victorious. Below is one of my favorite Texas artists for quite a while now. This is one of his newest songs, but let’s celebrate and remember “people ain’t got it this good”: