“You have cancer.”
I never expected to hear those words at 35 with three young children.
Many things have gone through my mind since my diagnosis with stage 3 HER2+ breast cancer, but a prevailing thought has been my gratitude for Reformed theology—sometimes called Calvinism or “big God” theology. It has been a refuge for me in one of the hardest seasons of my life.
I fear people think Reformed doctrine is only for pastors or theology nerds, or that it’s just about dead men with long beards and furrowed brows. But Reformed theology has been a lifeline for me. It has been a pair of strong arms underneath me, bearing me through sleepless nights, haunting anxieties, and days filled with fatigue and pain. It has given me language for crying out to God when I haven’t known what or how to pray. It has given me peace amid what would otherwise undo me. It has brought me to a sovereign and wise God who works all things for my good and never fails to love his elect.
Here are three truths from experiential Reformed theology that are helping me in my fight with cancer. I hope they help you in your own suffering.
1. God is glorified in the suffering of his people.
The center of Reformed theology is the glory of God. Every person’s chief purpose, the Westminster Shorter Catechism tells us, is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. His glory is why anything comes to pass. This includes his elect people’s suffering—their miscarriages, difficult marriages, agony over unbelieving children, chronic fatigue or pain, sleepless nights, grief over loss—every single thing that afflicts his people.
Including my cancer. May God be glorified in it too.
The diagnosis shocked me, my family, and my church. It was no shock to God. He who knit me together in my mother’s womb (Ps. 139:13), who knows the number of hairs on my head (Luke 12:7), and who governs every cell in my body has ordained my cancer—he upholds the biological processes that created and sustain it. He ordained my cancer before I was born. We love to say “God is sovereign,” but it’s a mere platitude if he isn’t sovereign over my cancer.
To be blunt, God gave me cancer, and he gave it to me for his glory. I will live to see him glorified in my cancer, in this life or the next, because God is glorified even in the suffering of his people.
God gave me cancer, and he gave it to me for his glory.
As John Piper has famously said, “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.” God receives glory when I’m more satisfied in him than in my husband, my children, a healthy body, or anything death might steal. When God strips away everything and leaves me only himself—and my soul finds its deepest delight in him—he’s seen as sufficient, as enough. He’s made to look great because he is.
If my suffering will bring glory to God, I’ll embrace it. He is worthy.
2. God works all things together for the good of his elect.
Romans 8:28 is a precious, ironclad promise: “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” (It’s even more precious when understood in context.)
Along these lines, John Newton once observed, “Everything is needful that God sends; nothing can be needful that he withholds.” Ponder that for a moment. If I knew all that God knew, I’d pray for him to send me cancer because I’d know it would be for my everlasting joy.
It doesn’t need to make sense to me for me to believe it. You don’t need to understand how God is working for your good to know that he is. We must believe this promise by faith, even when we don’t see it.
I know cancer is part of God’s good plan for me, but I can’t tell you precisely how he’s using it for my good. Perhaps it’ll help me to fight sin or to more deeply rely on his grace. Perhaps it’ll help untangle my heart from this present world and focus it heavenward. Perhaps it’ll present opportunities to testify to his grace and the gospel’s power. Perhaps it’s for my husband’s sanctification or my children’s salvation. Perhaps it’s to edify others in their own suffering (2 Cor. 1:4). Perhaps it’ll be all or none of these things. But this I know: God will work this for my good.
Romans 8:28 is a promise we believe by faith, not sight. So I won’t demand God show me all the ways he’s working before I believe him. Instead, I’ll trust his promise even in the dark.
One day, God will show me all he was doing with my breast cancer, and I’ll gladly marvel. And if you belong to Christ, he’s working all things for your good as well.
3. God will keep his people to the end.
Reformed theology teaches me God will complete the work he’s begun in me—and will be with me to the end. My salvation and everlasting happiness depend not on me beating cancer but on God’s immutable determination to love and save me.
There isn’t a single thing in the world strong enough to separate me from God’s love—not cancer, hair loss, unfulfilled hopes, lost time with my children, Satan and a thousand demons, or even death itself. Nothing can separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus my Lord (Rom. 8:31–39).
Deep Roots
Why does Reformed theology matter to me? Because I’m in the fight of my life, and only a sovereign God will get me through. I need doctrine with deep roots—doctrine that’s able to handle the profound paradoxes of pain. I need a good and sovereign God who will bring glory to himself through cancer, who will work cancer for my good, and who will never abandon me.
My salvation and everlasting happiness depend not on me beating cancer but on God’s immutable determination to love and save me.
“Big God” theology is a balm for my soul. It has held my hand when all I could do was cry on the couch. It has sat beside me on the fourth floor of the cancer ward as chemo dripped into my body. It has whispered promises in the middle of the night as I’ve lain awake, fearing the future. It has been a light to me when all other lights went out.
The Christian life is full of many dangers, toils, and snares. Let’s develop theology for the darkness while we’re walking in the sunshine. If we’re going to make it, we need “big God” theology. We need to be able to trust the heights of his glory and the depths of his love for his elect. This assurance is carrying me through cancer, and it will carry you through whatever suffering comes your way.
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