Posts filed under 'prayer'
As life goes, I lost the most ardent follower of my ramblings on life insurance via this blog a few days ago. My Father passed away after a two year fight with bladder cancer. He always posted big readership numbers for me in Wyoming and I could always count on his honest feedback on what type of job I was doing in my goal to help people understand just a little more than they might otherwise about life insurance.
He was at times a brutally honest critic and always the first to tell me he thought I had done well. At 86 years old he dissected each post as if he was on the editorial payroll. He loved that I attempt to reach out to those whose medical conditions make it difficult for them to find an advocate in their hunt for affordable life insurance. His personal philosophy about sales is that you should never sell something you don’t believe in. He knew how passionate I am about what I do and appreciated how much effort we put into service.
We feel blessed that we had him as long as we did. When he was first diagnosed with cancer he was not given a very positive prognosis because of the high stage and grade. Right up to the last time we joined in prayer he knew in his heart that God had given him the extra time on earth to spread the word about what a powerful force our Lord is in our lives.
Bottom line. He is at peace now. No more pain. I miss my Dad but am pleased that he is with our Lord.
October 21st, 2008
As many of you have so graciously tolerated my use of my Mom’s breast cancer to discuss the life insurance take on the subject, you may remember that prior to Mom, there was Dad and his stage 4 bladder cancer.
About a year and a half ago Dad was given a few months to possibly a year to live when the oncologist were unable to find a chemotherapy drug that he could tolerate. He was told that they didn’t have anything else they could do. But we, family, friends and everyone we could engage did have one more arrow in the quiver, prayer.
We prayed for Dad’s healing in spite of the fact that the medical community had given him a rather grim forecast. Six months later he had a CT scan and there was less cancer then than he had when they discontinued treatment, and Dad felt great. He was 85 years old and walking a couple of miles a day and living life to the fullest.
We feel so blessed that he had that time of winning with God, beating the odds and enjoying a rather vigorous period of his life for a guy his age. He felt blessed enough to share the Lord with anyone who would listen. He shared his story with anyone, but particularly with people who were going through hard times physically, people who were old and facing cancer battles.
The cancer came back about a month ago and Dad is in hospice now. He’s not doing well. As you have all prayed for him and Mom in the past I would ask you to pray for them again. Cancer is a sinister thing but I’ve so many people make so much good come out of it. Please pray for God’s perfect healing for him. It seems they will be together before long and then the pain and discomfort will end. My Dad will be healed.
Bottom line. My Mom and Dad and I have prayed more together in these last two years than in our lives before that combined. God has brought us the peace, comfort and wisdom that we could not have found on our own. He has brought us extra time that doctors said wouldn’t happen. His grace and mercy have carried us.
October 16th, 2008
A few years ago I wrote about my Dad’s diagnosis with bladder cancer, a serious stage 4 cancer. In the words of the oncologist, an aggressive and dangerous cancer.
What I didn’t share at that time was the fact that his family doctor had treated symptoms as if he had a bladder infection for months. Round after round of antibiotics didn’t do anything and eventually, with some pushing and shoving from family members, he was referred to a urologist who diagnosed him with cancer. That was nearly two years ago and with radiation and chemo and more than a little prayer, the cancer was pushed back and he has had a very good last year and a half.
Recently Dad started having abdominal discomfort and stomach pain and his family doctor once again went after the symptoms with pain meds, acid reflux medicine and anti nausea medication. This went on for nearly a month with no change, in fact he was getting worse, losing weight and becoming weaker. Again the family stepped in and asked the oncologist to help us determine what was going on.
They scheduled a CT scan with the idea of seeing if there was something obvious or referring him to a gastroenterologist in the absence of that. What they found was that the cancer has started growing again and was actually causing all of the symptoms that the family doc was treating as if Dad had acid reflux.
We will find out today what courses of action are available, but one course of action has become clear. Dad and the family have lost all trust in this doctor who feels too important to refer patients to specialists, who thinks treating symptoms in the face of all logic pointing in different direction, and he won’t be in the picture any more.
Bottom line. This isn’t about life insurance and it isn’t about all doctors. What I hope to bring to the table is the thought that families and patients often know that treatment isn’t headed in the right direction, but don’t want to challenge what is going on. In retrospect I wish I had challenged more and more quickly. I wish we had dumped this doctor in the unemployment line two years ago. Once again my family is turning to God and we would covet your prayers in this situation.
September 26th, 2008
For other reasons than the flurry of life insurance related exchanges with the Zander Insurance Group last week, I was almost crushed by my own lack of humility and my own pridefulness.
When I left church on Sunday, as so often happens, I had heard the word of God and it seemed to be aimed straight at me. I had somehow allowed myself to let my pride take over ownership of God’s gifts and along the way I had shelved my once humble self.
After much prayer I want this morning to apologize to Mr Zander and to Dave Ramsey for boasting to whomever would listen that Zander was wrong in it’s approach to quoting life insurance while I was of course, right. I was arrogant and prideful and far from humble, all things that the God I serve demands of us.
I apologize for insinuating that Zander Insurance isn’t doing what they believe is right. I apologize for insinurating that they don’t do a good job for their clients and I apologize for my arrogance through the whole exchange. Our businesses are not right and wrong. They are simply different and I ask for forgiveness for my attitude. It won’t happen again.
Bottom line. God tests us and so often we fail. In the course of that failure we often hurt people we know and love and people who just happen to be in the way. My Lord Jesus has promised to accept repentance and admission of sin as a new start. I pray that from this day forward I will truly have the heart of a humble servant and not allow my own pride to take ownership of God’s blessings.
August 25th, 2008
Normally I would not “mix business with politics”, but for this post I am setting life insurance aside and using this forum to make my case for what I believe is the most important decision this country is facing concerning our future.
Let me preface this by saying that I have been voting for 35 years now. There haven’t been a lot of really great choices at the presidential level, but I’ve always voted my heart and my gut and done the best I could. I have never felt compelled to get involved in a campaign. I have never donated to a campaign (unless you count my portion of the matching federal campaign fund). I have just voted and lived with the consequences. That changed this year.
I have given a lot back to our country and the communities that I have lived in over the years, donating time and money for charity, good causes, disaster relief and so on. But I have never considered a step so bold as to answer Kennedy’s query in 1961, “Ask not what your country can do for you, but rather what you can do for your country”. America has come a long way since then. Unfortunately it has come a long way in the wrong direction.
People don’t reach out and help their neighbors the way they used to. People don’t get involved with their community like they used to. Adults don’t give their time to help our youth become responsible young adults the way they used to. Our country has become self centered both from an individual and a global perspective. This is not the country that I grew up in as a child.
Barack Obama isn’t the answer to our country’s problems, but I believe he is the leader that can most quickly help us all to find the answers. Barack Obama can’t fix overnight what this country, politicians and citizens alike, have gone about messing up for the last 40 years, but I believe he is the leader who can help us all to get a grip and turn in the right direction. Barack Obama isn’t exciting because he is a good orator or because he will be the first black president, but I believe he is exciting because he is the first presidential candidate since Kennedy that has recognized that the power should come from the bottom up and it is the job of the president to encourage that energy and funnel it in positive directions.
Barack Obama, unlike so many choices of the past, is not the lesser of two evils as I’ve heard so often. The evil is the direction of the country and I believe that Barack Obama is the right person at the right time to help this nation confront that enemy and win.
Much will be made through this election about whether Barack Obama has the experience to be the president. Let’s be real. The only people that can submit a resume sufficient to qualify themselves to hired as the president, would be a former president (and most of them wouldn’t get hired again). There will be challenges just like and unlike any president has ever seen and the most we can hope for is that we have someone at the helm that is willing the face those challenges and use his God given good sense on our behalf, and I believe that Barack Obama is the right person at the right time.
Bottom line. I believe our nation is about to turn a historic corner. My prayer is that our nation will come together and embrace this opportunity and fight for this breath of fresh air that we are being offered. It is not by blind faith that I support Barack Obama, but by my true faith that God answers prayers.
June 19th, 2008
Hard to believe it’s been 15 months since my dad was diagnosed with a stage 3, grade 4 bladder cancer. When it breached the wall of his bladder and dispersed to other areas of his body, well, the medical prognosis just wasn’t that good.
When, at age 85, even though he is a physically active and strong guy, he wasn’t able to continue chemo treatments because of how compromising it was to his immune system, the prognosis, medically speaking was going down hill. What the doctors didn’t know was that my dad is a serious believer in God and had so many people praying for him, that they could have just not bothered with prognosisizing (I know that’s not a word).
Last time they checked, some of the cancer was gone and the rest of it seemed stalled in it’s tracks. My dad is feeling great and still getting out for daily walks and snow shoveling. He even hung out with the Easter bunny last week (picture above). Praise God!!!!
Bottom line. Don’t forget to include prayer to a Lord who loves you in your cancer therapy plan. The ultimate life insurance plan.
March 26th, 2008
It seems like there is a never ending stream of medical breakthroughs for mice. I suppose to balance my envy for the mice getting all the good things, what isn’t published is articles about the dumpsters full of failed attempts at making mice sick and then curing them.
One of the latest mouse breakthroughs has to do with a hormone that may be a significant breakthrough in fighting both obesity and diabetes. The hormone is gastric inhibitory polypeptide (GIP) receptor blockade. In a nutshell it is a naturally occurring hormone that is secreted in response to food intake and in particular high fat intake. What caused this hormone to stand out is that it has a particularly long lasting presence after the intake of high fat foods, leading researchers to query whether it might be a key player in metabolizing fat.
The study is sorely in need of an acronym. Called “GIP Receptor Antagonism Reverses Obesity, Insulin Resistance, and Associated Metabolic Disturbances Induced in Mice by Prolonged Consumption of High-Fat Diet”, it did show laboratory promise to significantly impact the effects of a high fat diet on lipid and glucose levels.
While it would be great to think that the world would wake up one day with a driving desire to get health and get in shape, even it that did happen it would likely be followed by the reality that driving desires often fade quickly. The truth is that without medical breakthroughs and especially those breakthroughs that simply boost our body’s natural abilities, many are doomed to lose the battles with obesity and diabetes.
Bottom line. From a life insurance standpoint, getting weight and diabetes under control are huge victories. Being able to reverse the direction completely would be both a life changing and life insurance rate changing home run. Let’s hear it for the mice that are leading the way. My prayer is that each of these successes with our rodent friends will lead to life changing successes for people.
January 7th, 2008
I often use news stories to make a point about life insurance. Ran across a story today that I won’t use, but just want to pass along…..just on the off chance that you didn’t have any focus for your prayer today.
October 23rd, 2007
