For me the hardest part of all of it was that during those first critical moments when Cliff and I were kept apart and I wasn’t really sure how he was taking all of it. How would he react to being told he had cancer?
I have seen solid, God-fearing folks turn deeply angry when they experience a tragedy and then sink into a deep dark hole of depression and disappointment, understandably. But it can take a long time to recover…to find one’s way to the light again.
Then he told me his story of passing through the “dark night of the soul.” It’s beautiful - and I will let him tell it in his own words.
Here it is -
It was early Sunday morning.
Because of constipation symptoms I had visited a walk-in clinic late Saturday afternoon. After a rather quick examination I was sent to Urgent Care for one test and examination after another. Then early Sunday morning I was transferred to a bed in the cancer ward at St. Boniface Hospital!
I was placed in the “assessment” area, where patents were examined and then assigned appropriate wards for treatment. Lots of the usual stuff was going on, nurses taking vitals, doctors wandering in poking my torso, explaining, answering my questions gently but only generally. Nothing final.
Then it happens, another doctor arrived introducing herself as Dr. White, the “manager” of the cancer ward at the hospital!
I was shaken out of my sleepy daze…”Did she say Dr. White?”
Reminded me of Wilma’s white paintings….“I like your name I blurt out; it has all kinds of meanings!”
“Well,” I do now there are some meanings like purity,” she says a little hesitant.
“I’m sorry, my wife dose white paintings!” I blurt out.
I’ll never forget the sad look in her eyes peering at me over her mask as she began by telling me that I had, “stage four gallbladder cancer.” She mentioned the name of the cancer…sounded ominous and which I’d never remember! She explained that “stage four” meant it had spread from its starting point to other places in my body, the intestines and my bladder.
She paused, her eyes intense, “Mr. Derksen, I have to tell you that in your case there will be no surgery!”
Silence! She just looked at me and I just stared back at her, my slowly and unwillingly beginning to grasp the situation. No one hand mentioned this before, it wasn’t even on the table! Was I dreaming? Was I watching a movie?”
Our eyes were locked! I fumbled for something to say, “So will this have to be dealt with in another way?
She kindly explained the various methods like chemo and radiation and so on.
In the pause I decided I’d ask the crucial question! “How long do I have?”
“With chemo you will have 8–10 months! Without chemo 4-5 months.”
I’m stunned, “How do I tell my wife?” I ask pleading for an easy answer.
“Whatever way you want,” she say’s “everyone dose it differently!”
After she left, I lay back and counted the months! I had till December or January! Our art show was scheduled for November! Wow!
In ten months, Wilma would be alone! Tears welling up with all the implications for her!
Then I lay in my hospital bed going over it again and again – every word.
How come I hadn’t seen this coming? I had had no warning. I had had no voice...no prophecy and now suddenly I was being faced with the biggest life changing event in my life. Even the doctor had said it was an unlucky chance and that it was a silent cancer. I had no predisposing or precipitating factors.
I balked at her comment that it was just the luck of the draw! I sat up in bed pulling out my Bible that Wilma had stuck in my overnight bag. I really needed to talk to my God about how this would this go together with his plans for me! I needed something to help me put this together.
My Bible was tagged with blue post-it notes from the preparation I had done for the Spirit room, in anticipation of those I would give prophetic words for edification, encouragement and consolation. But because I hadn’t been feeling well, I hadn’t given them to anyone. Maybe they were for me… now! So there in the cancer ward I went to the first blue post it note.
My Bible opened to Jeremiah 29:11-13
For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
I burst into tears! I felt God right there. I was impacted like crazy... Here I was talking to God – asking him what this was all about…and here was his answer. I couldn’t believe it. It was so right. It was bang on!
He was saying “For I know the plans I have for you…to prosper me, not to harm me, hope and a future… and that I can find you….
Who could ever say, “Heaven wasn’t a good thing?”
I cried and cried, I kept reading it over and over again, weeping...
I began wondering about the context of this passage! Where does this come from? So, I scanned the to the top of the page, recognizing the passage of the prophet speaking to the Jewish captives in Babylon! But it had a new angle to it now.
He was saying to them live normally, have kids, have marriages, work in your gardens, seek peace with the Babylonians! Why? Because he explains in seventy years from now, I will bring you back to Jerusalem!
Wow, specific years they could count jumped off the page….like I was counting months! There was no messing around with God and is timing! He had a plan in mind no question!
Then I said to myself. “Cliff, you have to do your normal life – just continue what you were intending to do.” Which was finish my autobiography, finish your table top art book, begin to build the forgiveness center – and just continue to be a minister to others, helping them, writing meditations and being a witness to others. I needed to talk to others about my peace ---and describe this moment.
Bottom line, God knows what he is doing and he has a special plan for me!
My next blue post-it note, led me to Psalms 23. Then I wept through that entire passage. I felt like I was a little sheep being hugged by God himself! I felt him caress and press me to himself in love!
The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
2 He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
3 he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right paths
for his name’s sake.
4 Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,[a]
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
6 Surely your goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord
forever.
I was close to him. I had a new sense of his presence like never before!
He knew where I was in the hospital hearing the news for the first time from the doctors, and he was protecting and comforting me. I was a sheep in his arms like when people huge their puppies!
By this time there was another verse that was floating in my memory. It had been like a theme since I was admitted into Urgent Care. Romans 8:28.
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who[a] have been called according to his purpose.
The important words are “who are the called according to his purpose.” I had chosen God years ago when I was 6 or 7 years of age, and I had spent a whole life being a child of God so I could claim this verse... I don’t have to understand, I just need to know the truth.
Thinking about the term “all things!” All my life the all things have come to this….10 months to live. How can I outguess my creator? I don’t need to understand! If he can organize the world, he will set me on the right track for the next ten months I have left!
So, I let that rest for awhile.
Then I remembered Paul the Apostle!
I just learned recently that without Paul’s writings and explanations of the cross, we would have not had the message of salvation as abundantly clear as in his teaching in Romans and so on.
Also, that he suffered severely! He was left for dead more times than you can count, maimed, broken and in agony. Counting it a joy to suffer for Jesus! Then when he was in Rome shackled to a guard, he would bring the guard to the Lord, one after the other!
Traditions has it that when he was executed, he ran eagerly to
the block. God preserved one man to clarify the gospel for the gentiles, that’s pretty amazing! One man!
I thought if Paul could run towards the block; I can be okay with ten months. I will just do my best to share my journey and trust in God. I might in some way be the only person who might reach that one other person who needs to be encouraged like I have been. I suddenly realized that I have a unique place now, a platform to tell my story and give my message.
My heart was at peace!
And then I realized I had to tell Wilma about my ending. I hadn’t seen her since she dropped me off at the Victoria hospital. She called me that morning and told me that the children were gathering at the house and that she would come to the hospital with them.
Now I was worried... I wanted to break the news to her personally. I asked her to come first, alone! She was very quiet.
By the time she came to visit me, she had envisioned the
worst and believed I might have only one week to live. So when I told her I had ten months, she was (sort of) relieved. And then we realized the seriousness of it all over again. And we laughed and we
cried.
In hindsight I know I had to go through the dark night of the soul, and I will have to again and again, so I’m writing this blog for you as much as for me.
Thank you Cliff for leading us through.
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