Therapy

When I had my meniscus repaired last summer I had to go to physical therapy after the surgery. One day we were with friends and we were making some plans and I said that I would not be available at that time because I had to go to therapy. Cheryl was surprised at my remark—why I don’t really know because she knows me so well. She quickly corrected me and said that I had to go to physical therapy. I guess she did not want our friends to think that I was going for mental therapy. I kind of like to leave people in suspense every now and then.

We all have different activities that we consider our therapy—I am talking about the type that helps us cope with stress and emotional fatigue. I hear of a lot of my men friends talking about how golf or tennis is their therapy—I am sure that works for many women also. Fishing, biking, jogging, canoeing, kayaking, and hunting are stress-relieving activities for many men and women.

 In different seasons of my life I have enjoyed some of these activities and considered them fun and relaxing. However, in my present season hobby farming is my therapy. I like playing in the dirt and taking care of farm animals. Fact is I have enjoyed doing these things all of my life, but in some places we have lived in the world I have not been able to pursue my avocation.

Last week my dad sent me some pea seed. Yes, we have pea seed in northwest Georgia, but I only plant a special pea seed—Mississippi pinkeye purple hull peas. That is the same pea that I cut my first teeth on while growing up in and around Greenwood, Mississippi. Cheryl and I planted our garden before we went to Jacksonville, and a friend has been tending to the garden during our absence. The deer ate my peas while we were gone. I am thinking about having some deer jerky this winter. It has been very dry since we have returned from Florida; finally, we had some rain last night. I had a great therapy session late this afternoon planting my peas.

I thank God regularly for giving us a small plot of land so I don’t have to leave home to get my therapy. This time of year when I leave work I don’t mind telling my colleagues that I am going for therapy. They know me and understand that I am headed to the garden. I praise the Lord for letting me be a steward of His resources.

Things

Cheryl and I were in Louisville on Friday and Saturday. We have not buried Rolfe because his estranged adopted daughter has not been located yet. According to Kentucky law the next of kin must be notified before the body can be buried. His daughter left home when she was a teenager, and Rolfe has not had a relationship with her for many years. Rolfe’s wife passed away in 1992 after a long battle with MS. So, we couldn’t do much to begin settling his estate, but we packed his clothes, books and sermons to give away.

He had already given away many of his “things,” but there was still much to do. For the past 10 years he has been giving his books to young pastors who he has been mentoring. He was very specific in telling me who he wanted to get all his sermon notes. But, Rolfe had a basement—and it had a lot of things that we will eventually have to get rid of.

Going through Rolfe’s possessions was strange. He was a very private person. He told me he wanted a closed casket because he did not want people “gawking” at his body! I almost feel that I am betraying Rolfe by going through all his affairs, but such is the business of death.
I confess that I could be a packrat. I work hard not to keep things just to keep them, but I know that I have kept things “in case we need them” over the years. When we returned to the states from West Africa in 1987, all our earthly possessions were in such bad shape that we only brought a small crate back to the states with a few personal things. We arrived at my parents’ house first, and my mom washed a few loads of clothes for us and hung them out on the clothesline to dry. When she brought them in from drying she dumped them on the bed and called Cheryl and me into the room. She said, “We need to throw all your underwear away because they are all dingy.” We had not noticed that since we did not have any white clothes to compare them to. So, we wound up throwing away most of the things that we brought back to the states.

Most of us do not get an opportunity to clean out all the things in our lives, and we continue to accumulate all those treasures that we hope to use one day. I have become one of those people in the years since we returned to the states. Having things is not bad, but if those things get in the way of serving the Lord, then they are all evil. If those things keep us from loving one another then they are corrupt. If those things become the object of our adoration then that is blasphemy. Colossians 3:2 is clear to me: “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.”

I have never seen a U-Haul trailer behind a hearse.  

Decisions

I have been doing a self-debate in my mind. OK, so what is that Cox? You know, where you can’t decide whether to do something, and you go back and forth in your thoughts until you do something. Yes, I wrote down properly what I meant—do something. Whenever we are trying to make a decision, sometimes we think we just won’t do anything with that decision. But the truth is that we make a decision anyhow—we decide not to decide. In coming to the conclusion that we will not make a decision, we have made a decision. Not to decide is to decide.

I usually make quick decisions. That can be an asset and it can also be a liability. Sometimes I might make a decision when I don’t have enough details to make the best decision. In other cases a quick decision is needed to mitigate a situation. Working with committees, work groups and task force groups, it is difficult to move forward sometimes when the leader wants everybody to be happy before making any decisions. If everybody has to be happy before a decision is made, then why have a committee to work through the decision?

I fault by thinking that I can make a quick decision and if it is not a good one, then I will have an opportunity to make another decision right away. The problem I have with those types of quick decisions is that sometimes it hurts relationships when I make a decision and don’t weigh enough of the possible consequences. So, you see I am still an “in-production” model when it comes to making decisions. The good Lord willing I will continue to make quick decisions when necessary, but use caution to gather more information before making a decision on those that could hurt relationships.

About that self-debate…it’s about whether to continue to write on the blog. I don’t really know how many people are reading it, but is it really important how many people are reading the blog (I have enough self-confidence without keeping score on the numbers) or that that someone is getting something of value by reading my thoughts.

Last treatment--home

On Monday morning I had my last treatment for prostate cancer--#28. It was uneventful, but saying goodbye to new friends was hard. Cheryl and I have become good friends with some of the other couples going through the treatment, and needless to say, the therapists and I really become well acquainted. We had loaded the car on Sunday afternoon, so after our goodbyes, we drove home on Monday—about 7 ½ hours of driving.

It was so good to get home. When you are away for six weeks, there are a lot of physical changes in the landscape, so we soaked up the beautiful views from our home and began to unpack the car and get settled into our home. There is nothing like being at home. Often people ask me where is my favorite place in the world to go, and I disappoint them by saying, “Home!”

Within an hour of arriving home, we received a phone call. Rolfe Dorsey went home—to his eternal home with the Lord. The timing of his death is so interesting, but not surprising to me. One of Rolfe’s huge concerns with his impending death was that his dying would upset my cancer treatments. He made me promise him that when he died that I would not miss one of my treatments to accommodate his funeral services. He told me to put him on ice and wait until it was convenient to bury him. He got his wishes. He has been holding on for the past three days, and once we were home he went home to meet Jesus.

When Allison was about six years old, we were renting a house in Mississippi. Cheryl was trying to explain that the house did not belong to us and that we were renting it, and finally Allison looked like she understood and said, “You mean it is their house, but our home.” She got it, and we have it—our house that we call home is only temporary. Our eternal home is with God.

Privileges

Rolfe Dorsey continues his battle with esophageal cancer in a nursing care facility in Louisville. Over the years he has developed a very close relationship with his internist. Cheryl and I had dinner with his physician while we were in Louisville last weekend. He is a gentle giant of a man who loves the Lord and has much compassion. I have several physician friends and I could equally describe them as very compassionate—maybe it has something to do with their walk with the Lord.

Physicians don’t give their home or cell phone numbers to patients, and I perfectly understand why. All of us have had the experience of calling our physician’s office and not being able to talk to a live person—“leave your phone number and we will get back with you before the end of the business day if you call before 4:00 pm.” Rolfe’s internist gave us his cell phone number.

An accountant in the internist’s office is a neighbor of Rolfe’s, and she and her husband love Rolfe dearly. They have been taking him prepared food for years, mowing his grass, and watching out for him. Now she goes to check on Rolfe every day after she gets off work. She calls me and gives me a first-hand report of his condition. Another friend of Rolfe’s goes by every morning to check on him. I can call his duty nurse any time to check on him. His internist calls me anytime he changes his medications. So, I haven’t needed to use that cell phone number. It is reassuring to know that I have that number, but I don’t want to abuse the privilege that he has entrusted to me.

A privilege is a license. A license is an authorization. An authorization is permission. The physician has given me permission to call him at any time. Today I am thinking about all the privileges that I have in life, but the greatest one I have is the one that I take for granted more than any other: “Because of Christ and our faith in him, we can now come boldly and confidently into God’s presence.” Ephesians 3:12 New Living Translation

Results

Almost finished! Yesterday I had my exit visit with my nurse and radiation oncologist. My next to last treatment was this morning, and then I went for some final blood work after my treatment. The results of the blood work will be the first measurement that we have received indicating the effectiveness of the proton treatment. The results will indicate how much my PSA has dropped. If you have been reading these blogs you will recall that my PSA was only 2.8 which is well within the normal range of 0-4.  A low PSA does not necessarily indicate an absence of cancer.  It is much more important to monitor how much it elevates from one year to the next.  Am I anxious about the results? Not really, but like most people I am interested in results. We focus a lot of our lives on results: business, school, church, sports, stocks, politics, etc.

Have you ever had any testing to determine if you are results-oriented or relations-oriented? Sure, you can be both, but researchers tell us that everyone—that covers a lot of people—leans towards one or the other. In teaching the SERVE principles that drive our Chick-fil-A business model, the hardest principle for most of us to convey overseas is the “V”—Value results and relationships. Business people in any culture understand the principle of getting results out of their enterprise. One does not have to spend much time helping them understand this principle. A lot of business people are like me—results-oriented.

I have a colleague at the foundation whose calling is to be relational and help couples have healthy marriages. He often reminds me that I am too results-oriented. I need reminders to work on being more relational. Our international team recently read a book entitled “Leadership and Self-Deception,” and it made me feel very uncomfortable because I recognized that I am often operating from inside the box (you will have to read the book to understand completely). You don’t have to read the book for this big lesson for me: Don’t worry about whether others are helping me. Do worry about whether I am helping others.

“If you think you are too important to help someone, you are only fooling yourself. You are not that important.” Gal.6:3 New Living Translation

Joy

For many years joy has been one of my favorite words. We gave the name “Joy” to our youngest child. When I was younger I only associated the word joy with my emotions, not with any spiritual meaning. The older I get, the more important the word has become to me.

When one of my colleagues working in one of our foundations was undergoing treatment for breast cancer I challenged her to find joy during her devastating treatments no matter how difficult the circumstance. Every time I have received a report on her treatment or her condition she always ends the text or email with something about joy. Since we have been in Florida for treatment she has sent me encouraging communication—always mentioning joy. She, along with countless others, has been such an encouragement to me during these treatments.

While I was studying the tribal language in Burkina Faso I discovered that there was no word for joy. I was so hurt because I thought to myself, how do they express their deep feelings of God’s abundant love for them which makes our hearts overflow with joy. Later I understood that they know very well how to show the deep feelings of their hearts full of Christ’s love and grace. They use two words: “suri noogo” which means happy heart. I learned from these very simple people that when you have a happy heart, other people know it because the face is a mirror of the heart. They said to me very simply: “You know a person has a happy heart if their face looks happy.”

Wow! What a lesson. This was one of those moments when I stopped and thought to myself: I came to help point these people to Jesus and I have been so blessed that they are pointing me to walk closer to Him.

What do people see when they see my face? Lord may my heart be filled with joy so that others may see Jesus in me.