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  • Keep Breathing
    • Keep Breathing: Introduction
    • Part 1
      • Stay Grounded
      • Keep Breathing
      • Gather Information
      • Feel What You Feel
      • Take in Support
      • Pray
      • Practice Surrender
      • Notice Your Reactivity
    • Part 2
      • Realize What Is Happening to You
        Is Happening To Everyone in Your Life
      • Take Inventory
      • Let Go of Shame
      • Extend Grace
      • Show Up
      • Learn Vulnerability
      • Make Amends
      • Stay Present in Times of Waiting
    • Part 3
      • Be Still and Keep Moving
      • Know You Are Not Alone
      • Ask for Healing
      • Seek Guidance
      • Meditate
      • Pursue Peace
      • Acknowledge Death
      • Grieve
    • Part 4
      • Express Gratitude
      • Stay Open to Joy
      • Make Room for Laughter
      • Celebrate Each Day
      • Let Yourself Be Carried
      • Be Who You Are
      • Know That You Are Loved
  • Desperate Hope
    • Shocked by the Diagnosis
    • Responding to Feelings of Fear, Anxiety, and Sadness
    • Ordering Desperate Hope
  • TLC Leader’s Manual
    • Group Leader Resources
      • Introduction to TLC
      • Meeting Format
      • Notes to Group Leaders
      • When a Group Member Dies
    • Strong Feelings
      • Understanding our Feelings
      • The Emotional Roller Coaster
      • Living With Fear
      • Dealing With Depression
      • Living with Anger
      • Grieving Our Losses
      • The Experience of Gratitude
      • Celebration and Joy
      • Experiencing Peace
      • Finding Hope
    • Challenges to Faith
      • Stretching Our Faith
      • Prayer
      • Examining Our View of God
      • Healing Prayer
      • The Lord Is With Us
      • God’s Healing Presence
    • Changing Perspectives
      • The Seasons Of Survival
      • Living Sanely in An Insane World
      • One Day At A Time
      • Positive Thinking
      • Accepting Our Need for Help
      • Building Friendships
      • Perspectives on Treatment
      • Coping With Pain
      • Repairing Our Self Esteem
  • Contact

Stretching Our Faith

A diagnosis of cancer creates a crisis for the person with the diagnosis and for his entire family. A time of crisis is a time of need. Emotionally it is time of instability and anxiety. Physically it is a time of tension and exhaustion. Psychologically it is a time of personal reevaluation. And spiritually it can be a time of profound questioning.

One of the ways to understand the spiritual needs of a person in crisis is to examine the questions that are commonly raised in a crisis. A person in crisis does not wrestle with mere ideas, but with God. “God, who are you?” “God, do you love me?” “God, can I trust you?” “God, is my faith strong enough to see me through this?” This is the heart of the spiritual struggling that people experience as they live with cancer. It is the trust and love in one’s relationship with God that is at stake in these struggles.

A common spiritual question asked in a crisis is “Why?” This question may lead to a questioning of God’s existence and character or to a questioning of one’s own spiritual well-being. Both kinds of questioning can be extremely frightening. These questions represent significant spiritual struggles and they can create a spiritual crisis which compounds the original physical crisis of cancer.

What we need in times of profound spiritual struggle are friends who will not be shocked by our questions and who will not attempt to supply the “correct” answers to these questions. People in crisis need friends who are prepared to struggle with them; who will not hurry past the questions and the spiritual struggles that crises may bring. Spiritual growth comes when we are able to do the hard work of facing these questions and of searching for new understanding with the support of others.

Dearest Father:
We long to trust you,
We long to anticipate your goodness,
But, when a crisis comes, we find ourselves wondering about you.
Are you really loving?
Do you really care about us?
And we find ourselves wondering
about ourselves.
Have we abandoned you?
Has our faith failed this test?
Speak to us, God, in the midst of our sorrow and pain and confusion.
Speak so we can hear you.
Touch us so we can feel you.
Heal the wound that threatens our intimacy.
Amen.


Questions for Discussion – Session 1

1. What questions have you found yourself asking about God during your journey with cancer?

2. What questions have you asked about yourself and your faith?

3. What has not been helpful to you as you have struggled with these questions?

4. What has been helpful to you as you have struggled with these questions?


Questions for Discussion – Session 2

Save me, O God,
   for the waters have come up to my neck.
I sink in the miry depths,
   where there is no foothold.
I have come into the deep waters;
   the floods engulf me.
I am worn out calling for help;
   my throat is parched.
Psalm 69: 1-3

O God, you are my God;
earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you;
my body longs for you,
in a dry and weary land
where there is no water.
Psalm 63:1

1.. When have you felt worn out from calling for help?

2. The psalmist longs for God. How have you experienced this?

3. In what ways has God seemed far away during your experience with cancer?

4. In what ways has God seemed close during this time?

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TLC Leader’s Manual

A photocopy-ready version of the TLC Leader's Manual is now available for download. If you are thinking about starting a Cancer Support Group, this might be helpful!

PDF version

MSWord version

Quote of the moment

"I think the reason we sometimes experience joy after the expression of gratitude and grief is that expressions of gratitude and expressions of grief both ground us in the truth and open our hearts. Gratitude and grief are both vulnerable states. They are states of grace. They are moments when we let down our defenses a bit, when we soften, when we are receptive to God’s tender mercies in ways that might not be possible in the more ordinary moments of life."
Juanita Ryan

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